Concerns for Stability in Latin America

The stakes have been raised in the developing crisis between Colombia, Venezeula and Ecuador today. Ecuador, having at first been cautious in its political response to the killing of Raul Reyes, second in command of the quasi-Marxist terrorist group FARC on Saturday, seems to have followed Venezuela's lead by withdrawing its ambassador to Colombia, helicoptering troops to the north-eastern border and roundly condemning the Colombian government.
Chavez seems therefore to have succeeded in recruiting President Correa in his attempt to isolate the US-backed Colombian government. Sensibly, Colombia's reaction has been calm and conciliatory: the Colombian government today re-emphasised its respect for its two neighbours and resisted the temptation to reply with a troop deployment of its own. Besides, it appears to have softer and potentially more harmful political weapons to hand - hard evidence of the involvement of the Venezuelan and Ecuadorian governments directly with the FARC leadership. Chavez has only recently publicly described the guerrillas, who have been partly responsible for a thirty year old civil war in Colombia which had devestated the country and which was still in full swing until the last five years, as a legitimate political and military body. Concievably, this could be because such revelations were about to come to light.
The computer disks found at the sight of the guerrillas' camp apparently include photographs of senior officials, both Venezuelan and Ecuadorian, meeting with the rebels in the very same encampment. The disks also contain references to a potential purchase of uranium, and direct communications between Chavez and FARC.
The question is, then, are the allegations true? There is a good chance they are, firstly because Colombia has pursued a practical working relationship with Venezuela despite the ideological differences of their governments, and Uribe has avoided direct criticism of Chavez and his policies: the Colombians have nothing to gain by provoking their neighbour in this fashion, and have not done so in the past. Secondly, the Colombian defence ministry has said it will submit the documents for international verification. Not the hallmarks of a smokescreen.
If they are true, it suggests a policy of destabilisation of the Colombian government by the Venezuelans, whether systematic or not. In one sense this is not surprising. Colombia, backed by the Bush administation and with a conservative president at the helm, does not quite fit in with Chavez's vision of a new socialist/bolivarian revolution across the South American continent. Furthermore, Uribe has enjoyed overwhelming popular support in Colombia for successfully ending the civil war and bringing peace and stability to a troubled land - and not just from the middle classes. He enjoys strong working class support - his policies themselves, while not exactly socialist, are not Bush-esque either. However, Chavez's support for the FARC represents a sharp and worrying change in the nature of Venezuelan politics. While Chavez's rhetoric has been fire and brimstone, he has mostly played a sensible and rational game in South American politics - retreating when taking a position too far. Materially interfering in the internal politics of a democratic sovereign state is a steep step away from this policy, and lurches uncomfortably towards the unstable despotism South America experienced throughout the whole of the last century, and has taken such a long time to move away from.
The veracity of the claims, and how seriously they are taken by the Colombian government will be vitally important in the next few days: Uribe has proved himself a strong and principled leader, and may be unwilling to let the findings go, particuarly if they prove a threat to Colombian national security. If a compromise can be reached through the mediation of Spain, this would be mutually desirable for both countries, niether of whom can afford and escalation of tensions. It is also unlikely that Chavez or Correa will succeed in corralling other South American States into anything more than a condemnation of violating Ecuador's sovereignty. Furthermore, the United States would be loath to allow a destablisation of the region, considering its proximity, the US's other commitments and the flux of leftist governments recently elected there.
A bleaker interpretation might consider, however, that both Uribe and Chavez are presidents coming to the end of their constitutionally limited terms of office (always a tricky time for South American leaders), and both have attempted to seek constitutional amendments recently to change this. Would a war shore up their hold on power?

Trouble in the Caribbean

Obscured by the hubris of the Russian presidential 'election' in the British media, a potentially far more important turn of events is taking place in Latin America today. President Hugo Chavez ordered the closure of the Venezuelan embassy in Bogota, and the deployment of 10 troop batallions to the Colombian border. This represents an extraordinary volte face from the optimistic state of Colombian/Venezuelan relations only a few months ago, after the unprecedented step taken by Alvaro Uribe in making the Venezuelan president a mediator in deadlocked hostage negotiations. In November Uribe cancelled the invitation to Chavez, claiming that he had been talking (as against prior agreement) to top Colombian generals above his head. Considering Chavez's previous experience of leading military coups, it is easy to see why.
Since then relations have sharply deteriorated, Chavez calling Colombia a 'terrorist state,' and claiming that FARC are a legitimate armed force. This latest development comes after the death of Raul Reyes, second in command in FARC after a Colombian military operation on Saturday. The action has been called a 'cowardly act,' by Chavez, who accuses Colombia of violating Ecuador's soveignty as the operation took place one mile into Ecuadorian territory.
Chavez has made several questionable decisions after surviving a coup in 2002 that was supported by Washington. These had included denouncing the United States, breaking out of the Andean community trading bloc, extending cordial relations to Iran and arming a 100,000 strong militia directly under his control from the urban poor. However, apart from the latter many of these actions have been no more than political stunts, and incendiary rhetoric more often than not gets hotter before an election or referendum that Chavez or his supporters needed to win.
Nothing has come close to a large scale military deployment that threatens Venezeula's closest neighbour.
It is possible that Chavez is feeling internally vulnerable after the rejection in December of his proposed constitutional changes in a popular referendum, meaning he has only a couple of years left as president until he has to stand down. If so, this makes today's announcement especially worrying, as Chavez had agreed to respect the result - a military emergency could threaten Venezuela's democracy, which has been itself groaning under the ego of the president, and his use of the Venezuelan state as his personal political tool.
It is even more worrying for the Colombians, who would be vulnerable to a Venezuelan attack, although the country has United States military support. President Uribe has overwhelming public backing in his policies regarding FARC, and his position with Venezuela. Because of Colombia's relationship with the United States, Chavez has attempted to ostracise the country from other South American governments, the majority of which have social democrats in charge. Chavez has talked of a 'Bolivaran-socialist' revolution across the continent. However, Colombia has cordial relations with all other South American governments, including Lula da Silva's in Brasil. This is either, then, another colossal piece of political showmanship by Chavez, intended to shore up his support among Venezuela's urban poor, who for the first time are beginning to criticise him, or something far more sinister. It is hard to see how Chavez could hold realistic plans to attack Colombia (the war would be devestating to both and each are the other's biggest trading partner), unless it was to provoke some kind of American response before the Bush regime leaves the White House. Either way, Chavez is playing a risky game.