By DOUGLAS FARAH. I have not had time to write much
recently, but two recent events point to the increasingly overt ties
between the Chávez government and international terrorist organizations.
New
revelations are now being published about Chávez's direct (although
repeatedly denied) ties to Hezbollah and other radical Islamist groups. A
new book, El Palestino, by Spanish journalist Antonio Salas documents armed camps in Venezuela where the FARC, Hezbollah, ETA and others all train together.
In the book, which comes out later this week, the author says he posed as a Venezuelan Palestinian interested in jihad
and ended up traveling around the world after fabricating a new
identity. His employer, Antena 3 of Spain, has released some of the
hidden camera video he shot to verify his experience.
According
to the book's publicity, "It was in Venezuela that he received his
baptism of fire. He found that just around the city of Caracas there are
six terrorist training camps. There he learned to shoot every kind of
weapon. His time there coincided with the training of members of the
FARC, ETA and other groups."
There
have long been reports of these camps from credible sources, but video
and direct, publicly available documentation and first hand experience
has not been. This is in keeping with Chávez's broader goals of creating
an alliance of state and non-state actors to wage asymmetrical warfare
against the United States. It is, quite likely, the worst of all worlds
for the rest of Latin America, and beginnings of the solidifying joint
venture that will eventually pose and existential threat to the United
States.
Both
Chávez, with the FARC, and Iran with its Hezbollah proxy, have the same
goal in this endeavor. Each of the proxies has relevant experience and
resources the other does not, and both have a long history of adaptation
and co-learning from other terrorist groups, regardless of
political/theological differences.
Chávez
has also made no secret of his desire to spread armed revolution across
Latin America to rid the continent of non-Bolivarian governments, or
transform the governments to the Bolivarian way.
Hence his support, through the Movimiento Bolivariano Continental, (Continental Bolivarian Movement), to the FARC, the Tupac Amaro movement in Peru, the Mapuches and MIR in Chile, etc. etc.
This
support is likely to increase as Chávez's internal situation
deteriorates. With the highest homicide rate in the hemisphere, water
and electrical rationing, inflation running at more than 30 percent and
his popularity in a steady decline, he is likely to be desperate for
anything that can give him a boost.
Iran,
Cuba, Bolivia, Nicaragua and Ecuador have enormous stakes in Chávez's
survival, no matter what the cost. So one can expect the region to be
roiled by something he cooks up to fabricate a crisis.
The
U.S. response so far has been muted to Chávez and his lethal alliances.
There are no good options for a response, but it is increasingly clear
that the day of reckoning is drawing near.
FamilySecurityMatters.org
Contributing Editor Douglas Farah is an award-winning investigative
journalist, author of "Blood From Stones:The Secret Financial Network of
Terror", and Senior Fellow in Financial Investigations and Transparency
at the International Assessment and Strategy Center. He blogs on the
Counterterrorism Blog and also at http://www.douglasfarah.com/.
Venezuela, in October 2012. During the presidential election, Alberto Carias, aka El Chino, was
interviewed by the newspaper "Contra
Punto" of El Salvador.
This controversial interview
was later published
in newspapers around the world.
