Venezuela – Page 10 – The Pull Of The Land

The “Right Wing” Military

February 25, 2022February 25, 2022 Richard Barnes

Growing up, a standard assumption was that “the military” — whether that of the United States or that of Venezuela — was “right wing”. So ingrained was that assumption that when Hugo Chávez appeared on television on February 4, 1993, announcing that his coup attempt had failed “por ahora“, we assumed he and his comrades had intended to re-impose a Pérez Jiménez dictatorship on the country.

No one paused to consider his words nor his co-conspirators — all, without exception, men of the Left. No one paused to question the previous night’s role of Nicolás Maduro, trained in Castro’s Cuba and recently reintegrated into Venezuela.

Our paradigm was Seven Days in May, both the novel and the movie: any military uprising has to be from the “right”, à la Augusto Pinochet. (So strong was that paradigm that we didn’t ask ourselves whether the Chinese or Soviet armies were also “right wing”.)

In 1978, during a trip to Venezuela, while visiting friends whom I had known since infancy, conversations inevitably cascaded to the massive construction and manufacturing projects in the country, in particular the Ciudad Guayana area. My concerns about the massive “nationalizations” (expropriations) that had taken place and the control of the oil and iron ore industries — both the properties and the management — were met with assurances that these actions, although admittedly concerning, would not lead to a Socialistic or Communistic environment.

Seeing my doubts about their readiness to ascribe good intentions to the politicians drunk with power and riches, my friends clinched the argument by stating the obvious: “Ricky, don’t worry, if things take a turn to Communism, the military will not allow it. They will step in and put a stop to it.”

They had a point. We all agreed the military tended to be conservative. After all, Pinochet put a stop to the Communist depredations in Chile and by 1978, Chile’s GNP growth was in the double digits after the negative GNP swamps of the Allende era. Chile would go on to lead South America in both economic and personal liberties until recent years when they began flirting again with the totalitarian Zeitgeist.

So, it is easy to understand why Venezuelans felt somewhat secure in assuming their military had their back.

However, that does not excuse us. A little scratching beneath the surface ought to have awakened us to the fact — incontrovertible by now — that Venezuela’s military leadership was a hotbed of Communist infiltrators, with direct connections to Fidel Castro. Did we not consider it strange that the very first official state visit by Fidel Castro after the January 1, 1959, coup against Batista was to Venezuela a mere 22 days later?

Did we not have strong reasons to credit the rumors — now corroborated as facts — that the Venezuelan army had surreptitiously and illegally supplied United States war materiel to Castro’s guerrillas in the Sierra Maestra? Did we not wonder how it was that Vice-Admiral Wolfgang Larrazabal had so freely, with unmitigated audacity, invited Dictator Castro to Venezuela to celebrate the first anniversary of the coup against Pérez Jiménez (see Larrazabal)?

Where was the Venezuelan army when Communist-instigated “students” violently attacked a sitting vice-president of the United States and his wife when they came to the country on a state visit (see Nixon). For decades, the beautiful people instructed the rest of us to ignore Nixon’s assertion that Communists, a loud minority, had orchestrated this embarrassment. However, since the election of Chávez in 1999, the truth of Nixon’s statements was no longer denied and was now openly celebrated.

So, my good friends and I were without excuse: the Venezuelan Army could not be relied upon to protect the country from a Communist takeover because its leadership was too compromised. And many decent Venezuelan soldiers eventually paid a high price for this.

But it took decades to see this. President Carlos Andrés Pérez thought highly of Fidel Castro, actually meeting with him secretly during his first tenure (1974 – 1979 — the age of expropriations), and inviting him to his second tenure’s (1989 – 1993) inauguration. It was during that inauguration that Pérez naively gave Castro carte blanche to enter the country with hundreds of “advisors”, by-passing immigration. He also gave the Cubans full use of the Eurobuilding Hotel, then in final phases of construction, in Caracas. No Venezuelan was allowed in the building, only Cubans, including food and cleaning services.

It was during this infiltration that Nicolás Maduro returned to Venezuela camouflaged as a Cuban adviser. And, just as ominously, scores of fully equipped sharpshooters entered also. Upon departure, Venezuelan emigration officials reported to President Pérez that the number of Cubans and equipage departing was significantly less than what had entered. The president waved aside their concerns. Much later, Venezuelan intelligence (before its complete replacement by Castro’s Communists) confirmed that the weapons had been stashed for years in the Caracas metro, under Maduro’s hooded eyes.

Before closing this post, I do want to preview that during the coup attempt in 1993, President Pérez, swearing he would not commit suicide like Allende, acted with great courage and audacity, fully armed and fighting his way out of La Casona to Miraflores where he was shortly surrounded once again, forcing him to fight his way out a second time that night. Pérez was naive and foolish in his childish embrace of a rattlesnake like Castro, but when the chips were down, he acted valiantly. We are not cardboard creatures.

The above may read like an outline or a pitch for a political or crime thriller, but it is all true and factual. As we continue to review the rise of Chávez, we will get into some detail. For now, let it be said that one must never assume anything, including that the military, whether that of Venezuela or that of the United States, is “right wing”. Everything rises and falls on leadership. Instead of assuming, one must observe and analyze the leadership and its decisions and policies.

Dictator Nicolás Maduro, the world’s living testament to the wisdom of Article 2, Section 1, Clause 5

General Augusto Pinochet, circa 1973. Notable quote which distills why he is hated, even 16 years after his death: “Everything I did, all my actions, all of the problems I had I dedicate to God and to Chile, because I kept Chile from becoming Communist.”

President Carlos Andrés Pérez, circa 1973, campaigning for his first tenure in office

Venezuelan Vice Admiral Wolfgang Larrazabal and Fidel Castro, Caracas, 1959

President Carlos Andrés Pérez, Dictator Fidel Castro, and President Felipe González (Spain), 1990. By then, Pérez had been warned repeatedly that Castro had been conspiring with military leaders to overthrow him, including by means of assassination. Pérez impatiently dismissed these reports. He changed his mind during the 1993 coup attempt when he came within a whisker of losing his life.

Simon Bolivar’s Endiosamiento

January 29, 2022 Richard Barnes

Simon Bolivar was an enigma: heroic yet cruel; capable of stratospheric oratory yet acutely dishonorable (to put it mildly); extremely charismatic yet disloyal. To see prior posts about him, start here.

With such a flawed man, how is it that he was practically considered a god in Venezuela?

As he approached his final years, his luster had suffered greatly, given his openly carnal personal proclivities and, more alarmingly, his inclinations to tyranny. By the end of his life, he was little more than a repudiated dictator, having attempted to impose a centralized, totalitarian system on his Great Colombia. He died in Colombia in 1830 at the age of 47. A sketch of him shortly before his death reflects a man twice his age, the effects of tuberculosis but also of his dissolute actions.

His authoritarianism was so intensely rejected that the Venezuelan congress refused to approve the repatriation of his body to Venezuela, his place of birth.

However, twelve years later, General José Antonio Páez, who had betrayed Bolivar in leading a successful separation of Venezuela from Colombia (see Ranchitos III), began the intense process of resurrecting Bolivar for political purposes.

Páez requested the repatriation of Bolivar’s remains and, with much pomp, had him buried in the cathedral in Caracas. However, given the longevity of memories of people who had suffered much under Bolivar, more needed to be done later to divinize him.

In 1870, Guzmán Blanco initiated a systematic process to rehabilitate Bolivar’s image. Over Guzmán’s remaining years (he died in 1888) great public works were named after Bolivar, long-winded laudatory speeches extolled him with uninhibited exaggeration, and slowly but surely the former goat began to become the Great Libertador once more.

These rituals, motivated by political convenience, converted Bolivar into a sacred political military symbol, whose importance could not be underestimated.

Other political leaders continued this divinizing which, in many quarters, produced a cuasi religious cult to the dead hero. Nowhere was this cult more apparent and abundant than in the armed forces who were taught to consider themselves the heirs of the Libertador.

Fidel Castro and Douglas Bravo, a Venezuelan Communist whose ultimately successful strategy was to infiltrate the Venezuelan army (here), further converted Bolivar into a revolutionary saint. In fact, interestingly, it was Venezuela’s dictators who were most responsible for resurrecting Bolivar and elevating his memory to godlike status.

This could be done because it was not too difficult to take Bolivar’s heroic deeds and super-stratospheric writings and make him into a mythological figure, especially after several generations of hagiography by dictators who used him for blatantly self-serving political purposes. Juan Vicente Gómez, although greatly hated in some quarters, successfully pacified Venezuela and built roads still in use today. He ruled from 1908 to 1935, and built unnumbered plazas, buildings, and more, naming them after the Libertador.

Gómez died, fortuitously, on the anniversary of Bolivar’s death 105 years before. It is undeniable that Gómez had created an environment of stability that Venezuela had not seen since her separation from Spain over a century before. He did this while venerating Bolivar to an almost fanatical degree. For more on Gómez, see here.

Gómez legacy in infrastructure and consolidation of the country into one nation are undeniable, but those were not his greatest bequests. That honor belongs to his contribution to the rehabilitation of Simon Bolivar. Innumerable plazas, each one with a statue or bust of Bolivar, dotted the country and the cult of Bolivar became firmly established.

In addition, and portentously, Gómez, more than any other leader, professionalized the Venezuelan armed forces. Although ignored, Gómez, far more than Bolivar, was the creator of Venezuela’s soldier class. And he ensured that soldier class felt itself to be the heir to Simon Bolivar.

I was at a dinner in Venezuela early in the first decade of this century where, in the midst of a discussion about the direction of the country, a young lady spoke up, “Given all the adulation about Bolivar and how his name is being used as justification for the actions taken since the late 90s, I am having second thoughts about just how great that man really was….”

I’ve not been back to Venezuela since then. But I was left wondering whether the cultish hagiography is the same today as it was when I was young.

We’ll have more to say about this, given that Hugo Chávez rose to power as a “Bolivarian”. What is the meaning of that term? Why is it important to both Venezuela and the United States?

Bolivar as seen in innumerable plazas and city centers throughout Venezuela

Sketch of Bolivar made shortly before his death at age 47 in 1830.

I Remember

January 13, 2022January 13, 2022 Richard Barnes

A friend sent me a note this week which I’d like to share with you as encouragement as well as challenge. If you have children or grandchildren, do your best to inspire them to love God and country.

That is easier said than done, of course. But reminiscences like those of my friend are a good starting point.

He alludes to the “shacks around Caracas”. For more on that, see my series on “ranchitos” beginning here: Ranchitos I.

Here is his letter:

Dear Richard,

Thanks for the info about Venezuela. It’s sad to see a beautiful country taken down by evil men. The people are the ones who suffer. I remember all the shacks in the area around Caracas and that the city was noted as the pick pocket capital. I know I lost all the Upjohn travel money I had to a gang of pickpockets. It makes me worry about the US and the direction we are headed.

I remember life in Kalamazoo when I would walk to school and to church, about 6 city blocks; we had no car. We would see the little flags with the blue and gold stars in the homes of individuals with sons in the war. But I still remember Sundays as a day of rest: no lawn mowers, no sports, no car washing. But the sound of church bells announcing the start of church services. There were 3 large churches in our neighborhood, and we attended the farthest away. We walked there 3 times a Sunday, rain or shine, seeing all our friends on the way.

Now, no church bells; they may offend someone. It’s all about sports, baseball, golf, basketball, football, and only one church service on Sunday.

And political corruption.

Are we headed in the same direction?

God bless you and yours.

J.V.

Looking north on Burdick St., Kalamazoo, Michigan, 1950s

Looking east on Michigan Ave., Kalamazoo, Michigan, 1950s.

(Although I found photos of individual Kalamazoo churches in the 50s, I was unable to find any panoramic prints that showed at least several of them in one photo)

Papaito

December 31, 2021December 31, 2021 Richard Barnes

I asked Pedro, “How is Eileen?”

“Eileen is doing well,” her husband replied, “Just sad.”

A friend in Venezuela had not heard the news and when informed, replied, “¡Qué año tan fuerte ha sido este!”

In the summer I wrote about two childhood friends who had passed away earlier in the year (Lizbeth and Cyril). Their passing had saddened me.

And now the passing of my cousin, Max (“Papaito”) Albert Barnes has added bleakness to the melancholy occasioned by my friends’ preceding departures. Maybe the old adage, “Blood is thicker than water”, helps explain why this hit me a bit harder.

But I think it is more than blood.

Perhaps it is that all three marked my childhood.

Ultimately, none of us chose where we were to be born or who our parents were going to be. Darwinists credit the doctrine of selection; Christians credit the doctrine of election.

But neither Darwinist nor Christian can seriously claim that he had anything to do with where or with whom he came into this world.

Papaito had a wonderful sense of humor but you would have been unwise to have sold him short when it came to serious matters. For instance, in early 1969, a few months after our uncle’s murder, he and I were talking about our uncle as we arranged moving boxes in the garage. He stopped to take a break, taking a seat on a bike, “Is our family all that special?” he asked.

“Huh?” I replied, rather dumbly.

“I mean, we talk about our family as if it were something special. But is it really? Don’t all families believe they are special?”

I responded, unthinkingly and immaturely, “Of course we are special! How many families have a grandfather who descended from the Pilgrims and was the first to leave Massachussets and go to Cuba to the war? And then marry a Spaniard and then his children go to Venezuela, etc. etc. etc.?”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right,” he concluded, but not with too much conviction.

In retrospect, I now can see that he was onto something true and that my reply had completely missed his point. What he was inchoately reaching for (and what I was too immature to catch) was not so much that we are more special than others, but, rather, that we are to be grateful for what went before. What came before us helped make us what we are and we are to improve on that and forward that heritage plus our improvements to the following generations, just like our parents and grandparents had done for us.

We do not worship our fathers and mothers or the long line of folks that preceded us; we do honor them, however. We tell our children stories about that past and their duty to honor likewise and build and live up to a good name so as to progress in the true sense of the word.

To worship the past is to stagnate; to honor the past is to progress.

In that sense every family is special.

Papaito was way ahead of me there, whether he realized it or not.

In the case of my cousin, my two friends and other children, we all “met” in El Pao thanks not to any overarching plan of ours, but to the will of a sovereign God. Some arrived a bit sooner while some left later. But that’s where we met and that’s where we and our families formed bonds that, for some, prevail to this day.

And those bonds extend to our families and friends outside of El Pao. For example, in my case, although they visited once or twice, my cousins in Miami did not live in El Pao. And yet, the cords that were knit in that camp extended to them and from them to me. The same goes for my cousins and friends who lived in Venezuela but outside El Pao.

At the end of the day, what will survive — even into eternity — is not the car you drove or the house you built or the lands you visited, but rather the bonds you forged. The family, loved ones, brethren, people whose paths you crossed in life.

Including during childhood.

What did you want to be when you were a child?

We tend to smile — I know I do — when hearing that, or a variation thereof.

I always found it difficult to answer that question when posed to me in childhood. (In later childhood the difficulty was in admitting what I really wanted to be.)

I’ve heard it said — by professionals and laymen alike — that what you were inclined towards in childhood in regards to making a living or making a life, most likely, generally speaking, is what you were meant to pursue.

That, in capsule form, illustrates the lasting power or impact of a boyhood and girlhood which included a blessed home, a caring family, a faithful church, decent brethren, friends, and more.

This is not to dismiss those who came after who also had a major influence on your life (see Unvisited Tombs, for example). Nevertheless, oftentimes, when folks are asked to name important mentors or sources, one seldom hears about people or events in their nonage.

No, I am not a Freudian. My allusions to the springtime of life have nothing to do with that.

They have everything to do with gratitude to the Lord for the parents and grandparents He gave me; for the home and extended family He lent me; for Miami — not the city so much as the family and loved ones that awaited me there year after year; for El Pao; for my church and brethren in the labor camp; for cousins, such as Max (Papaito); for childhood friends such as Cyril and Lizbeth and more, some who have passed away, a few with whom I stay in touch, and others of whom I’ve long lost track.

They all had an immeasurable and lifelong impact on me. And I am a debtor to them.

Yes, like my cousin Eileen (Max’s sister), I too am sad. Not in the sense of those who have no hope, but rather in the sense of saying farewell. Not as an “adios”, but as an “hasta luego”.

As this year 2021 ends, I extend my sincere and heartfelt condolences to Papaito’s surviving wife, Isabel, and sister and brother (my cousins Eileen and Michael) as well as children and grandchildren and loved ones and more.

I wish for them and for you a wonderful and prosperous 2022.

My simple yet genuine thank-you to Papaito for fond childhood memories and learning experiences.

“… or ever the silver cord be loosed …. Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God Who gave it (Ecc. 12:6a-7).”

May you rest in peace, Max (1952 – 2021).

Cousins, left to right: Janis, Sarita (d. 2014), Vivian, Max (Papaito), Louis (Papito) circa 1961.

Edwin (d. 1982), Max (Papaito), José — circa 1965

From left to right: Pete and Janis (Colón), Eileen (Barnes) Morillas, Michael Barnes, Isabel and Max (Papaito) Barnes, Ronny Barnes, circa 2013

Photo courtesy Jim Shingler. El Pao end-of-bowling-season banquet, 1964. Many are gone; practically all had a major impact on many of us.

Mrs. Miller, Bat Guano, and Beforehand Rebukes

December 4, 2021December 4, 2021 Richard Barnes

I do not remember her first name, if I ever knew it, that is. Back then, for us youngsters, it was strictly “Mr.” and “Mrs.” and “Miss”.

But I do remember her.

She was from New Mexico. And boy did she resent Florida’s having “stolen” their state motto, “The Sunshine State”, from New Mexico! She said she could prove the theft too! Although I never asked her for evidence.

Once, after I handed in a picture project on hygiene, she called me to her desk and, remaining seated, gently began explaining why she thought I had missed the point. I had drawn a picture of a refrigerator. Through the open door, one could see the shelves labeled with the names of the items that belonged on each: eggs, milk, soft drinks, butter, and so forth.

“The fact that some of these items may be misplaced, does not affect cleanliness,” she said.

“Oh, I know. What I was showing was that if you leave the refrigerator door open, food can spoil,” I replied, silently wondering what items I had drawn so poorly that she thought they were misplaced!

She looked up at me as I stood with a genuine look of surprise that she would not have understood the intention of having drawn an open refrigerator door. Then she leaned back on her chair and laughed.

“Ah! I see. OK. Yours is a valid observation. Leaving the refrigerator door open is not good. You can go back to your desk.”

That same year, we took a field trip to the Orinoco to explore the Bethlehem Steel port facilities. That was one of my most memorable school trips, though, if you ask me why, I wouldn’t be able to tell you even if my life depended on it. I remember boarding the van, riding there, searching around the port, and riding back. Maybe I so enjoyed the camaraderie with my fellow classmates that the trip just floods my memory banks with good thoughts.

And then there was that night that some hooligans (my friends) did some mischief at the club. I don’t recall the mischief, but boy do I recall the tongue-lashing Mrs. Miller gave the class the following morning! I recall that because I had no idea what she was talking about.

It must have shown on my face because she snapped at me, “Ricky, don’t act like you don’t know! You were part of the gang!”

I was crestfallen. One of my friends noticed it and demurely raised her hand to say, “Mrs. Miller, it is true that Ricky was not a part of the ruckus. He was there at the beginning but left soon after the trouble started.”

My dejection was replaced by white hot anger! My “friend” was lying, and she knew it. I was not there at all. But she obviously was! She even smirked at me — when Mrs. Miller wasn’t looking, that is.

I am chuckling and laughing as I write this. What was so important to me at the moment, is now a childish memory. Actually, it became a good memory, for which I thank both Mrs. Miller and my friend.

A year later, I myself became a hooligan one afternoon when several of us, hunting for bats, managed to fall through the club ceiling causing quite a mess on the tables, chairs, and floor below. I’d never before (or since) seen so much guano rain down. And the company executives who just happened to be inspecting the premises that very day were also impressed with the bat droppings and the shocked kids hanging from or watching down from the now very visible attic. Our daze in trying to figure out how to clean up the mess was extremely short-lived, as we were peremptorily instructed to go. Immediately! We quickly obeyed.

So, Mrs. Miller’s rebuke was well deserved, even if it was a year too early! As the film noir puts it: “The postman always rings twice”.

My work took me to New Mexico often in recent years. It is one of those places that pull at you, like Venezuela. The West does that to many of us. I thought of her often during those trips.

I think Mrs. Miller was in El Pao only one school year. At least that’s what I remember.

But for some reason I do remember her. And I appreciate her.