The involvement of Venezuela in the Andean conflict is very interesting to me. It seems to be the underlying constant battle between the US and Venezuela; more specific battle between Chavez and Bush. Chavez’s reaction to the incident in Ecuador, and his consistent name calling, starts with Colombia but ends with the US. Better yet, the fault of the situation lies with the US. The statements below rest my case. Hugo Chavez called Colombia on his talk show, Aló Presidente, the “Israel of Latin America.” He then went on to say that,

“Colombia is a terrorist state that is subject to the great terrorist, the government of the United States and their apparatus.”

“It is the fist of the empire… And we’re not going to let them plant another Israel here in Latin America.”

“We don’t want war, but we are not going to allow the North American empire, which is their master, and their puppy-dog President Uribe and the Colombian oligarchy to come divide us, to weaken us. We are not going to allow it.”

Chavez compared the actions of the Colombian government to those of Israel in the Middle East who he accused of “invading,” “bombing,” and “killing” the Palestinian people with the intention of “preventing the union of the Arabic world.”

The biggest problem that Chavez has is that the US was involved with the raid. This signals once again in his eyes all the things that are wrong with the Bush administration: imperialist, divider, murder, and the list goes on. The second thing Chavez is upset with is the fact that, the Ecuadorian President Correa ordered an investigation of the FARC incident and found that, The guerillas were attacked in their sleep by a precision bomb. Ecuador reported that the bodies were found in their pajamas. Chavez felt, “This was not a battle. It was a cowardly murder.” “This was all coldly calculated, and the truth is starting to come out.”

Overall however, the Venezuelan government is calling out Colombia, but placing the blame on the US, as if Colombia does not have its own brain. The problem I find in the situation is that Chavez assumes that there is this alliance of the Andean countries, better yet all Latin American countries. Yes, Colombia went outside its jurisdiction but it is not like it waged war on Ecuador; and even more far fetched waged war on Venezuela. To be straight to the point, nothing even happened in Venezuela, yet Chavez is taking it so personal. Also it is important to recognize that Colombia is divided within its own nation. It was completelywrong in going out of their jurisdiction, but Uribe in his eyes was trying to stop the creation of violence in his country. I respect Chavez for his democratic policies, but I think he may have over stepped his jurisdiction on this one.