"Venezuela is not a threat to anybody, nor does it pretend to attack anybody, but it has the right to defend itself by increasing its defensive capability and military power"
By Hugo Chávez Frías
Too many crucial events have unfolded in the last months and the fate of the people in this continent has been put at risk. These events are not casual, they have been hatched for so long and far from here.
This is the same 200-year-old struggle: On this side, freedom, peace, sovereignty and dignity to forge our fate; on the other side, dependency, war, slavery, and the dark path of colonial period.
When these two options are clearly manifested, like it is happening, it would be a shameful irresponsibility if we did not do anything, if we let it happen, if we kept a submissive silence. it is fair and just to raise our voice and remain loyal to the commitment to the change of time beating deep in the hearts of the peoples of Our America and the Caribbean. We are not willing – to paraphrase our Liberator Simón Bolívar – to pass on a new colonial period to posterity. An posterity is no other thing but the generations of sons and daughters that have already started to raise by millions throughout this land.
It is necessary to recall and clear up the most recent Latin American events and put them into context to uncover their hidden plot.
On June 3, after 47 years and an intense diplomatic struggle, that unusual resolution condemning Cuba, from an OAS submitted to the US imperial power, is eliminated in San Pedro de Sula. There, it is fair to say it, the ALBA countries were determining. 21 days later, in Maracay, Venezuela, the ALBA changed its name and got stronger with the incorporation of Ecuador, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and Antigua and Barbuda. Now we are nine peoples united by an effort of liberating solidarity with an own presence and voice in the continental concert. It became the Bolivarian alliance in Maracay.
Though President Rafael Correa had already announced it, on Friday, July 17, the US operations at the Manta military base finished. This sovereign decision made by Ecuador raised the alarm at the Pentagon, which would not rest until it relocated its base in a new strategic space according to their continental domination interests.
June 28, coup d’état in Honduras. An ignominious attack against the people’s will, unanimously condemned by the international community. Today, the brave Honduran people are in the streets and the fields claiming their rights and demanding the return of Manuel Zelaya to the President’s Office. Meanwhile, the gorillas try to extend the days of their usurpation and turn their back on the world. Within this context, it is clear that the alleged mediation of President Arias just reflect the preservation of the US interests: The plan he proposed, beyond his function, is aimed at the return of Zelaya to the President’s Office, but with his hands and feet tied up.
And now the Plan Colombia enters a new phase: the United States arranges five new military bases in Colombian territory. Who are President Uribe and the Colombian oligarchy trying to deceive by making it look like the increase of the US military presence, through these new bases, does not pose a direct threat against Venezuela’
Uribe’s obsession with a Free Trade Agreement with the United States makes him be capable of everything.
Colombia is, unfortunately, the beachhead of the US retaining strategy in South America and, of course, its operation base. As a matter of fact, these new military bases are a real and concrete danger against the sovereignty and stability of the South American region. They are spearheads of a new colonial period.
The Plan Colombia, let’s not forget this, was conceived by following a war domination strategy of the par excellence militarist state. The US meddling – to which we must add the presence of the state of Israel – in the Colombian domestic war makes it impossible to not trespass the borders of this fraternal an suffered homeland. They seek their expansion in the region and, first of all, to Venezuela. So, the Plan Colombia is not an exclusively Colombian issue; it affects and threatens us all.
In this sense, I have spoke with some heads of state of our continent in order to warn them about the danger embodied by these US bases against Venezuela. It is evident that it will be a major topic at the nest Unasur meeting, to be held next August 10 in Quito, on the occasion of the inauguration of President Rafael Correa for a new presidential term and the constituent process of the Citizen’s, Bolivarian and Alfaro’s Revolution leaping forward in the Homeland of my general Manuela Saenz.
In the name of the historical and fraternal bonds with the Colombian people, the Bolivarian government has been extremely patient with Uribe’s government, but everything has its limits. Faced with a government that does not respect anything and serves the interests of the empire, we have to act as we have acted. We have been forced, in order to preserve our dignity, to withdraw our ambassador to Colombia and freeze relations. We are responding to a sustained line of aggression against Venezuela.
A line of aggression reproduced here by private media. With no shame, they justify the new US military bases in the Colombian territory, and have the nerve to attack the Bolivarian government because it fully took a step to defend our sovereignty.
By the way, today, Sunday, the prestigious Rómulo Gallegos Award will be granted to the Colombian writer William Ospina thanks to his novel El país de la canela. Ospina embodies a great Colombian and South American conscience; he is one of the greatest voices of the other Colombia; that si to say, the real, worthy, and fraternal Colombia. We would like to recall one of his touching poems titled 9 de noviembre de 1948 (November 9, 1948), which embodies the best tribute to Gaitán. And we do it as a declaration of fraternal love to the Colombian people and as a reaffirmation of our solidarity with peace:
‘To understand this huge passion spread from chest to chest, from outcry to outcry, you must know about centuries of shame, about indigenous people educated by white people, about slaves that lived alone months of agony; you must know about falling living Gods, about dead wining Gods, about the infinite tiredness of living in a world without love for the world, about the stupidity of sad castes that intrigue, hurt and humiliate, but do not know about being worthy of their land and sky.’
Venezuela is not a threat to anybody, nor does it pretend to attack anybody, but it has the right to defend itself by increasing its defensive capability and military power. This explains the increase of the technical-military cooperation between Russia and Venezuela. The visit of the Russian Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin has strengthened and expanded our military relations.
Faced with a horizon riddled with foreign threats against our Bolivarian Revolution, our domestic strengthening is absolutely decisive, starting with our political strengthening. that is the reason why the reorganization phase of the PSUV members, is extremely important: the creation of socialist patrols will allow us to dynamize the party’s presence everywhere. Especially, it is going to allow us to effectively put the socialist message on the map. I send an encouraging message to the patrol members of our United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), for Venezuela, and by Venezuela.
The PSUV, the militias, the working class, the Bolivarian youth, the Bolivarian Armed Force, the peasantry, the students... Everything must be fully strengthened! And let the Patriotic, Bolivarian and Socialist ideology to be the fuel lighting us, the cement hardening us, the poetry wining our hearts.
I will say it along with Simón Rodríguez; ‘Ideas and militias. What a creation!
Hugo Chávez Frías
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