25 years of US hybrid war against Venezuela: An interview with Vladimir Adrianza

Vladimir Adrianza, geopolitical analyst, interviewed by Brian Mier. Photo: teleSUR English

July 13, 2024 Hour: 18:08

When the Biden administration announced last week that it would resume dialogue with Venezuela, some journalists and analysts suggested that this could be a positive sign if the US government could recognize the results of the upcoming presidential election on July 28. To shed more light on this issue, I interviewed Dr. Vladimir Adrianza Salas. Salas, a geopolitical analyst with a doctorate in security, defense and integral development from Venezuela, National Experimental Polytechnic of the Fuerza Armada (UNEFA) has decades of experience researching U.S.-Venezuelan relations.

How has the relationship between the United States and Venezuela changed over the last 25 years?

Venezuela has suffered the constant aggression of the United States and, one might say, all of its Western allies for 25 years. This aggression may have changed in style and form under successive US presidencies, but the effect remains the same. Beginning with the Obama administration, Venezuela was declared by executive order to be an unusual and extraordinary threat to the United States.

Venezuela was a neo-colony of the United States in the 20th century – a time when all of the country’s internal affairs and international politics were directly influenced by the United States. This began to change when Hugo Chávez came to power. The aggression began when he took power. Today we can say that the Universidad Nacional Experimental Politécnica de la Fuerza Armada (UNEFA) has been constantly aggressively persecuting Venezuela for the last 25 years under various US administrations. This is more than the policy of a particular political party, it has become a state policy of the United States towards Venezuela. Why? Because the political tendencies that have characterized Venezuela over the last 25 years do not please the US establishment.

That is the reality. Bush’s presidency was marked by failed coups. We suffered the coup of April 2002. Our oil industry was sabotaged from December 2002 to January 2003. We suffered from constant media aggression in many forms. This aggression definitely continued after the death of President Hugo Chavez. We definitely suffered from the same constant aggression and this has become a hybrid war that has materialized in different types of actions.

An example of these measures are the presidential decrees that have resulted in over 930 so-called sanctions against Venezuela. I say “so-called” because the United Nations is the only world body that can legally impose sanctions on another country, and only after long deliberation. Venezuela is subject to a blockade, a blockade that is definitely damaging important national industries such as the oil industry. The first presidential decree was issued by President Obama, and six more were issued by President Trump. The Biden-Harris administration refused to lift them, so we are now holding national presidential elections under a blockade. They are also taking place in a context of obvious involvement by the United States, as has been the case in the past, when even Vice President Pence personally intervened in an internal matter of our own country.

Venezuela was on the periphery of the Western world and the United States in the 20th century, and the economic model that was implemented here was precisely the oil model, which was closely linked to the interests of the Rockefeller group. It is an economic model that we have not yet been able to fully break free from. Venezuela remains a blockaded country, which has cost us a very high number of deaths and migration, especially of young people of working age, to other countries – including the United States. The blockade has caused us so much damage that the oil and other products of the petroleum production chain, valued at almost $100 billion, that we exported in 2012, have fallen by 96%. These are the conditions that the Venezuelan people are suffering.

The US’s relations with Venezuela have not changed. The fact that a Republican or a Democrat was in power in the US did not affect the relations. The aggression against Venezuela was a common policy of the state. This is my perception of the question you asked me.

Do you think there is a connection between the resumption of dialogue between the Biden administration and the Maduro government and the presidential elections this month?

I think that trying to resume dialogue is part of a larger process. US foreign policy is characterized by double standards. When the US has said something publicly, behind the scenes it has often done something else. That is exactly what is happening today. There is a political group here that is totally based on US interests and that we call the ultra-right. This ultra-right has been financed by the United States and there have been various aggression programs by the Southern Command, the State Department, etc., precisely to finance these groups, with the aim of leading Venezuela into social chaos and civil war.

This is clearer today than ever. It would take me a long time to explain all the aggression that Venezuela has suffered through various programs – especially the US Southern Command – and how the State Department has financed these far-right groups, up to the appointment of Juan Guaidó, whom no one elected, as president. Juan Guaidó was a puppet used by the United States and its allies to simply destabilize the country. Fortunately, that episode is now behind us because Venezuela’s democratic institutions have prevailed.

The Constitution of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela stands, but the aggression continues. The fact that we are trying again to talk to the Biden administration is not a guarantee, especially because Biden is currently a very questionable president in the United States due to his senile condition, which is widely criticized, even by members of the Democratic Party. So this ongoing dialogue does not give the Venezuelan people any guarantees, nor is there an agreed roadmap on whether the upcoming elections on July 28 will be accepted by the international community and whether the decision of the Venezuelan people will be duly accepted by these ultra-right groups here in the country, or whether this permanent aggression that we have experienced will continue.

We saw how hard times were under Donald Trump, but the executive orders were not reduced. It was the first executive order of Barack Obama that set all this in motion. It followed the strategy of coups that began here in the 2000s and led to the events of April 11, 2002 and the events of the oil sabotage of 2002-2003, plus all the media and other types of aggression that Venezuela was subjected to. So there is no guarantee that a new round of dialogue will help. I believe that the United States will not move from its position and Venezuela will not move from its position.

So all we have left is diplomacy and dialogue in the hope of reaching agreements so that the United States understands that there is a political reality in Venezuela with which, apart from sabotage, they must reach some kind of understanding. The Venezuelan government has shown good will to reach an agreement with the United States. We are very close countries, we are all part of the Americas and we should really try to understand each other.

There are many ties that unite the Venezuelan people with the people of the United States. It is only logical that the politicians, the political framework, the establishment in the United States and the national political class reach a framework of understanding for the benefit of both peoples and for the benefit of both nations, while respecting the sovereignty of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.

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