Analysis: Military stand-off could lead to war neither side wants

Published on Thursday 26 November 2009 21:40

THE war of words between Bogota and Caracas has moved up to one of limited action as Hugo Chavez blows up bridges linking the two nations, blocks Colombian imports, restricts border crossing and harasses Colombians moving within Venezuela. Is war on the horizon?

The two presidents, Mr Chavez of Venezuela and Alvaro Uribe of Colombia, are remarkably similar. Both are seeking to perpetuate themselves in power and both cloak themselves in nationalist and populist rhetoric. Yet they are at the opposite ends of the political spectrum. Mr Chavez is an avowed socialist with revolutionary roots, while Mr Uribe is die-hard conservative who hates the left-wing rebels who murdered his father.

The latest trigger for discord is the military pact between Bogota and Washington. The United States has access to seven military bases across Colombia, and this war-torn Andean nation is now the regional hub for the US armed forces. Mr Chavez believes Washington has hostile intentions, that it wants to seize his massive oil reserves. The fear is not entirely without foundation, in that the US has picked a fight over oil before and there is evidence of US involvement in the 2002 failed coup against Mr Chavez.

More moderate nations, such as Brazil, have expressed concern over the pact with the US, and asked that there be guarantees the US forces based in Colombia could not be used to attack other nations. The pact makes no such guarantees.

While there is a long-standing border dispute, the roots of overt hostility between Venezuela and Colombia, and Venezuela and the US, date back to the failed coup. Mr Chavez accused the CIA of having a hand in it, and Colombia, along with the US, were the only nations to recognise the coup government. Bogota also granted asylum to the coup leader, Pedro Carmona. After this, as Venezuela moved further from Washington's political line, Colombia moved closer, with Mr Uribe becoming President George Bush's most ardent disciple in the US war on terror, for which he was handsomely rewarded with more than 300 million of US aid, mainly military, every year.

What really irks Colombia and Mr Uribe is Mr Chavez's attitude to the Marxist rebels. Two Colombian rebel groups, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc) and the National Liberation Army (ELN), are known to have bases on the Venezuelan side of the border. While Mr Chavez hotly denies any relation to the rebels and blames Colombia for not controlling its side of the border, he is certainly guilty of turning a blind eye to rebel activity within Venezuela, and he did ask that both groups be taken off the international lists of terrorist organisations.

But Colombian military intelligence insists he is more proactive; that Venezuela is the logistics centre for much of the rebel armies; that rebel leaders live in Venezuela, beyond the reach of the US-backed security forces; and that arms and munitions from Venezuela feed the rebel war machine. Venezuelan weapons, including sophisticated anti-tank missiles, have been found in Farc camps.

Venezuela has now become a principal transit nation for the drugs Colombia produces. Since Mr Chavez will not co-operate with the US Drug Enforcement Administration, nor allow the US to conduct over-flights to track drug-smuggling aircraft, traffickers have flooded Venezuela with shipments, which are either moved northwards to the US market or east towards Europe, often via west Africa. The US and Colombia both accuse Mr Chavez of not doing enough in the war on drugs. His retort is that Colombia produces the drugs and the US consumes them, so how can they point fingers at him?

As significant as rebels and drugs are the problems Mr Chavez is having at home. There are power and water shortages, rampant inflation and a budget shortfall, hitting the Venezuelan leader's generous social programmes. As he has done in the past, he is seeking to distract attention by whipping up nationalist feelings against Colombia and the US.

Few believe Mr Chavez actually wants a war with Colombia, as it is a war he could not win. While he has a technological advantage with new Russian Sukhoi fighter jets, which could quickly achieve air superiority, the Colombian military is the most battle-hardened in the region and is more than three times the size of Venezuela's.

Neither side wants, or has the resources to fight a full-scale war. However, Venezuela has just moved a further 15,000 troops to the frontier, while Colombia has 2,000 troops to the most critical areas of the border. Such a situation makes the possibility of an incident that much higher.

Add into the mix at least 2,000 Colombian rebels who move along the frontier and who would like nothing more than to spark a cross-border shoot-out, and you have a tinderbox with several sides waving lit matches.