[R-G] Closed Consulates and Closed Minds: Bush’s Last Shot at Chávez

[Anthony Fenton]

11-17-08
Closed Consulates and Closed Minds: Bush’s Last Shot at Chávez
By Robert Buzzanco
http://www.hnn.us/articles/56993.html

Mr. Buzzanco is Professor and Chairman, Department of History,  
University of Houston. He is the author of Masters of War: Military  
Dissent and Politics in the Vietnam Era and Vietnam and the  
Transformation of American Life, and numerous other publications on  
foreign policy and political economy.

Last Friday, November 7th , the Department of State closed the  
Venezuelan consulate in Houston and gave the consul general and staff  
72 hours to leave the country, another distressing development in the  
continuing U.S. program to isolate and destabilize the government of  
Hugo Chávez. While Chávez’s personal dislike for President George Bush  
may make diplomacy between the two nations difficult, the history of  
U.S.-Venezuelan relations complicates matters and breeds Venezuelan  
distrust even more. As U.S. power has waned, Latin America has turned  
more to the left than at any time in its history, with the Venezuelans  
establishing credible alternatives to American hegemony after a long  
century of suffering under regimes propped up by Washington.

The United States long backed military dictators in Latin America as a  
bulwark against nationalism and socialism and because they adhered to  
the U.S. principles of “free” trade and investment. In reality, this  
meant that the Americans recognized leaders produced by military  
coups, such as Marcos Pérez Jiménez in Venezuela, who had overthrown  
elected governments. President Dwight Eisenhower, in fact, awarded  
Pérez Jiménez the Legion of Honor, the highest honor given to a  
foreign national.

Key to U.S. support of the Venezuelan dictator was his coziness to  
U.S. business interests. By the 1950s, Americans held up Venezuela as  
a “showcase” for Latin America, proof of the benefits of economic  
cooperation with Washington. U.S. investments there rose to about $2.5  
billion, or about a third of all American investment in the entire  
region.

Most of that money went into the oil industry, as Venezuela was one of  
the biggest exporters of petroleum to the United States [and is still  
third today, after Canada and Saudi Arabia]. Inside the country, the  
“oil-garchy,” as it was labeled, lived lavishly while the average  
Venezuela survived on $500 a year and about half of the adults  
remained illiterate. With his oil money, Pérez Jiménez spent huge  
amounts on military programs and other benefits to the elite, while  
poverty was stifling.

It was amid this history that Hugo Chávez emerged, promising  
independence from the Americans and social benefits to the mass of  
those mired in poverty. Not surprisingly, Chávez understood that  
control of oil resources was the key to economic autonomy, and he has  
taken steps to nationalize Venezuelan petroleum and remove the  
overwhelming American control of the oil industry there. He also led  
the creation of the Banco del Sur, an investment and development  
institution for Latin America to challenge the U.S.-led International  
Monetary Fund and World Bank.

In return the U.S. government and media has waged a virulent campaign  
against Chávez, calling him a “dictator” (particularly ironic since he  
has been elected several times, has accepted elections that his side  
has lost, and has more claim to being democratically chosen than Bush  
did in the U.S. election of 2000) or “crazy.” His associations with  
other Latin American leftists like the Castro brothers in Cuba or Evo  
Morales in Bolivia raise the fear of an independent Latin America  
unwilling to any longer be an economic colony of the United States, so  
much so that the U.S. supported and abetted a failed coup against the  
Venezuelan leader in 2002.

But Chávez has pulled back too. Despite warning that he might cut off  
oil exports to the United States, the Venezuelans still send about  
1.25 million barrels a day to the United States and its national  
company, Citgo, continues to operate throughout the U.S.

Still, the tensions are escalating. In a show of solidarity with the  
Bolivians and due to his continued fears that the Bush administration  
would try to oust him, Chávez expelled the U.S. ambassador to Caracas  
on September 10th , and the Americans expelled the Venezuelan  
ambassador immediately thereafter.

The more recent closing of the Houston consulate, apparently because  
of a technicality about moving without State Department permission,  
was the latest escalation in this political battle and a final salvo  
by Bush as he prepares to leave office. However, during this latest  
episode, Chávez has removed Padrino as consul general due to his  
diplomatic faux pas. Clearly, and contrary to media caricatures, the  
Venezuelan leader has approached relations with the U.S. on the whole  
in a reasonable manner and is abiding by diplomatic protocol.

I have met the ex-Venezuelan consul general, Antonio Padrino, and he  
is an impressive man, with a degree in economics, a background in  
petroleum, and a desire for better relations with Washington. Various  
U.S. officials to whom I have spoken say much the same, that it is  
time to take a more realistic and mature approach to Venezuela. Their  
hope is that the end of the Bush administration will create the  
conditions for diplomacy with Caracas. After all, as both sides  
understand, Venezuela has oil to sell and the Americans are good  
consumers.

President-elect Barack Obama caught heat during the campaign for  
saying he would meet with Chávez to improve U.S-Venezuelan relations.  
But that is the only realistic approach that both sides can take,  
especially given the U.S. need for more oil and the drop in global  
petroleum prices that imperils Chávez’s social programs. Ironically,  
the current economic calamity may provide a chance for Obama to reopen  
relations with Venezuela, since he, the media, and the public are  
preoccupied with the crises in banking, the auto industry, pensions,  
and unemployment, and may have little stomach for petty escalations of  
this cold war with Caracas.

It is absurd for the United States, a country with a $671 billion  
military budget, to fear Venezuela, but Caracas has legitimate reasons  
to be very wary of a country which has supported a coup, openly backs  
the political opposition, the remnants of the “oil-garchy,” and has  
waged an incessant public relations campaign against it.

Hopefully, the grown ups will triumph, the Houston consulate, which  
serves several states and is vital to the lives of Venezuelans in the  
U.S.–and American businesses seeking to trade and invest in Venezuela– 
will reopen, and the Americans and Venezuelans will put their mutual  
need for each other ahead of political differences. Continued tit-for- 
tat attacks will only damage everyone. Instead of closing the  
consulate, U.S. officials should open their minds to a new  
relationship with Caracas.