Tracking US Intervention in Venezuela Since 2002
18 November 2015 - 10:56 AM
Analysis
Tracking US Intervention in Venezuela Since 2002
It's been over a decade since a U.S. sponsored coup temporarily overthrew Venezuela's democracy, and Washington is still plotting.
Shortly after being returned to power by popular force in April 2002, then president Hugo Chavez quickly warned the United States was already planning its next move. Chavez had been ousted from office for just under two days in early April, in a coup carefully choreographed by Venezuela's business elite, renegade military elements and the United States.
By early October, 2002, Chavez announced Venezuelan authorities had already uncovered another coup plot. Two weeks later, Chavez narrowly escaped an assassination attempt. The attempt appeared to coincide with anti-government protests.
Then, as U.S. president George W. Bush entered his second term in 2005, Washington appeared to redouble its efforts to remove Chavez. A month after Bush was sworn in for a second time, Chavez said his government had uncovered another assassination plot. The plot was uncovered just weeks after then U.S. secretary of state Condoleezza Rice described the Venezuelan leader as a “destabilizing force.” In September that year, Bush again lashed out at Venezuela, accusing the country of failing in its fight against the narcotics trade.
Another major coup plot was foiled in 2006, when Venezuelan authorities said they found evidence the U.S. embassy in Caracas had been secretly collecting military information. That same year, the Department of State began barring certain arms sales to Venezuela. This was the beginning of what would later become a key pillar of U.S. policy towards Caracas – sanctions.
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http://www.telesurtv.net/english/analysis/Tracking-US-Intervention-in-Venezuela-Since-2002-20151117-0045.html
