29 Jan Opinion – Castro and Chávez, a Criminal Association
By,
Pedro Corzo, Senior Fellow, MSI²
The death of several dozen Castroite enforcers in Caracas bears irrefutable witness to the close alliance between the dictatorial systems of Cuba and Venezuela, a nexus in which the Nicaraguan dictatorship of Ortega-Murillo is directly involved, despots who have decided to release political prisoners in an attempt to ease the pressure revealed by current hemispheric conditions.
It is true that Venezuela has provided Cuban totalitarianism with invaluable support in the form of oil deliveries, the hiring of enslaved workers, and international backing; however, the Castros transmitted to Hugo Chávez first, and later to the, thankfully, imprisoned Nicolás Maduro, their extensive knowledge of repression and espionage, as well as a lesser-discussed aspect: the strategy designed to encourage the mass emigration of a politically dissatisfied population in order to reduce internal opposition and secure income from abroad.
There have been numerous reports regarding the control exercised by officers of the Cuban Armed Forces over Venezuelan military institutions. Personnel of various ranks have held authority at Fuerte Tiuna, the country’s most important military center, while instructing intelligence and counterintelligence services on how to neutralize, and even arrest, potential conspirators within the armed units.
It must be noted that the teachings of Castroism have led the Venezuelan autocracy to implement a system of social control very similar to that of Cuba, characterized by sectarianism, discrimination, and public mistrust, culminating in a generalized sense of hopelessness that, in my view, constitutes the most tragic legacy of any dictatorship.
The ties between the despots of both countries have been so deep that the most devastating butcher of Castroism, Ramiro Valdés, has been a frequent visitor to the South American country with the aim of establishing the logistical base the Chavista regime needed to survive. It is therefore easy to infer that Castroite agents in Venezuela must have played a significant role in managing the drug trafficking operations handled by the Cartel of the Suns.
Castroism is just as responsible for drug trafficking as Maduro and Diosdado Cabello, especially if we recall the allegations regarding Fidel Castro’s close relationship with several major drug lords during the 1980s and 1990s, as well as more recent claims asserting that the totalitarian regime attempted to conceal its criminal activities through the execution of General Ochoa and other high-ranking officers.
It is widely known that the Department of the Americas, one of the totalitarian regime’s agencies dedicated exclusively to the subversion and destabilization of democracies, throughout its existence and under the leadership of Manuel Piñeiro, alias “Barbarroja,” sought necessary funding through drug trafficking whenever it was short of resources. Carlos Lehder, who spent more than thirty years imprisoned in the United States for narcotics trafficking, told Radio Martí: “I was invited by the communist government of Cuba, by the Castro dictatorship, to go to Cuba to establish a channel, a line, a route for cocaine trafficking to the United States.”
On another note, I believe it is necessary to recall that the Castroite enforcers who died on January 3 in Caracas were not the only ones of their kind to fall in defense of the worst causes. Fidel Castro always longed to subjugate Venezuela, although it was Hugo Chávez, a traitor to his country, who handed it over to him on a silver platter.
The first known Castroite hitman to be killed in that country was Antonio Briones Montoto, one of the invaders of Machurucuto.
Castro’s interest in imposing his fundamentalism across the hemisphere was constant, but two countries, to their misfortune, exerted a fatal attraction over the Cuban despot: Venezuela and Colombia.
Castro’s interest in Venezuela was made evident by his trip to Caracas in January 1959, when he attempted to persuade the eminent democrat Rómulo Betancourt to align himself with his proposals, an objective he failed to achieve because the statesman from Guatire saw through him completely, while millions of Cubans remained enthralled by the ever-tyrannical Fidel.
From the earliest days of the Cuban Revolution, hundreds of Venezuelan insurgents were trained and supplied with weapons and money from the Island. However, it was not the assistance of the Castros that destroyed democracy; it was Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro who dismantled it, and all of them together have been involved in drug trafficking.
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Miami Strategic Intelligence Institute (MSI²).