Lagniappe
The
Wall Street Journal : Chavez's
'war' drums
Editorial
Colombia's
military scored a major antiterror victory this weekend by killing the second
in command of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia and 16
other FARC guerrillas. Venezuelan President and FARC ally Hugo Chavez
has reacted by threatening war against Bogota. But the real news
is that the raid produced a laptop computer belonging to the expired comandante
that reveals some of Mr. Chavez's secrets.
The
raid that killed FARC big Rafael Reyes shocked the
terrorists because it happened in Ecuador -- about a mile across
the border from Colombia. The guerrillas are used to operating
inside Colombia, only to escape to safe havens in Ecuador and
Venezuela when Colombia's military is in hot pursuit. This
time Colombian officers kept going, and for legitimate reasons
of self-defense. (We doubt the U.S. would stop its troops at
the border if terrorists were bombing sites in Texas from havens
in Mexico.)
Mr.
Chavez rushed to insist that Ecuador's sovereignty
had been violated, even before Ecuador did. On his weekly television
show on Sunday,
the Venezuelan bully called the death of Reyes a "cowardly assassination" and
observed a moment of silence. He closed the Venezuelan embassy in Bogota,
ordered 10 battalions with tanks to the Colombian border, and warned of war
if the Colombian army staged a similar raid inside Venezuela.
Such
a conventional war isn't likely. Colombia today has a superior
military force, thanks in part to Mr. Chavez's
purge of his own officer corp as a way to minimize risks of
a coup d'etat against him. The war bluster is especially phony
because Mr. Chavez is already waging his own guerrilla campaign
against Colombia through his support for the FARC. The FARC's "foreign
minister," Rodrigo Granda, was nabbed three years ago
by bounty hunters in Caracas, where he was living comfortably,
and a former Venezuelan military officer told us years ago
that the army was instructed not to pursue the FARC in the
Venezuelan jungle.
What
may really have upset Mr. Chavez is the capture
of Reyes's laptop. According to Colombia's top police official,
General Oscar Naranjo, the computer contains evidence supporting
the claim that the FARC is working with Mr. Chavez.
General Naranjo said Monday that Reyes's laptop records showed
that Venezuela may have paid $300 million to the FARC in exchange
for its recent release of six civilian hostages. Mr. Chavez
had spun those releases as a triumph of his personal mediation.
General
Naranjo said the laptop also contains documents showing that
the FARC was seeking to buy 50 kilos of uranium, and the Colombian
newspaper El Tiempo has reported that the records revealed
the sale of 700 kilograms of cocaine valued at $1.5 million.
The general added that the military found a thank-you note
from Mr. Chavez to the FARC for some $150,000
that the rebels had sent him when he was in prison for his
attempted coup d'etat in 1992.
Ecuador,
an ally of Mr. Chavez, was slow to express outrage
at the Colombian raid but eventually came around. Ecuadorian
President Rafael Correa said that the rebels were "bombed
and massacred as they slept, using precision technology." He
is right about that -- which is why the FARC's friends are
so angry.
The
Wall Street Journal is
one of the most important national newspapers in the
United States. Petroleumworld does not necessarily share
these views
Editor's
Note:This commentary was originally published by The Wall Street
Journal, on 03/04/2007. Petroleumworld reprint this article
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