In an op-ed in the New York Times Elizabeth Dickinson describes the situation on Venezuela’s border. The Chavista Maduro regime had delegated control of the border to the Colombian National Liberation Army (ELN), a guerrilla group founded to mount a leftist insurgency. Here’s the meat of the op-ed:
Now the E.L.N. stands emboldened to challenge the authority of the Colombian state — and U.S. ambitions in Venezuela. The borderlands are webbed with lucrative corridors where the E.L.N. and other armed groups move seamlessly and often exercise more control than the government. With profits flowing from illegal mining, drug trafficking and human smuggling, both the Colombian guerrillas and complicit members of Venezuela’s security forces have deep interests in maintaining the status quo in Caracas and resisting attempts to bring rule of law to these territories.
In advance of Mr. Maduro’s capture, the E.L.N. was taking steps to ensure its interests in the borderlands were safe, regardless of what happened in Caracas. Since mid-December, it has gone on the offensive in the Colombian region of Catatumbo, displacing thousands of civilians in the process. It has also clashed with a local criminal group known as the 33rd Front, a dissident faction of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, which has repeatedly angered the E.L.N. with attempts to control key rivers used for trafficking in and out of Venezuela. President Gustavo Petro’s announced deployment of some 30,000 troops to the border has done little to stop the fighting.
But rather than anchoring the region with America’s longtime partner in Bogotá, President Trump turned on Mr. Petro, threatening direct attacks on Colombia the day after Mr. Maduro’s capture on Jan. 3. Although a phone call last Wednesday between the leaders lowered tensions, the détente is fragile.
Removing (literally) Maduro from Venezuela may have the unforeseen effect of destabilizing not just Venezuela but Colombia as well.
Aristotle said it more than two millennia ago: nature abhors a vacuum. Already, clashes between armed groups have forced thousands of civilians from their homes, and a vacuum on the Venezuelan side could intensify competition among criminal and insurgent networks. If the Chavista regime, having never established effective control of the border, does not stabilize the situation, and the United States which lacks both capacity and strategy does not either, the ELN, FARC dissidents, cartels, paramilitaries, or others will. The U.S. lacks a coherent stabilization strategy, and its recent actions risk exacerbating instability unless paired with a credible regional security plan. Failing that neither the Venezuelan people, the Colombian people, or we may like the result.
Which border? Because Maduro had stoked tensions and claimed neighboring Guyana’s oil producing region as recently as last April.
https://www.crisisgroup.org/latin-america-caribbean/andes/venezuela-guyana/venezuela-presses-territorial-claims-dispute-guyana-heats
The use of unofficial / irregular forces to extend a countries influence is a familiar tactic (see China wrt South China Sea, Iran wrt Middle East).
One of the goals of the tactic is to destabilize neighbors; so with Maduro the same issue of an ungoverned border with Columbia would have continued; Maduro wasn’t one for turning down the dial.
Indeed, Maduro had destabilized the whole hemisphere by crashing Venezuela to the point 8 million people became refugees all over the continent.
That’s one of the reasons why Venezuela is a unique case. It earned the animosity of all its neighbors with its destabilizing actions — including countries governed by the “left”. Compare that to say Cuba. Cuba isn’t a democracy; but it does have friends or at least neutrality in Latin America because it hasn’t tried to destabilize all its neighbors since 1990.
Its not to defend removing Maduro, or understating the problems of Venezuela; but its likely removing Maduro (and just Maduro) hasn’t made problems worse in the sense of stop digging a bigger hole; Maduro was doing a lot of malicious things.
I dont think much of anyone liked Maduro so very few were sad to see him go. I think the issue is much more about what happens with his sudden disappearance. Our record in that area is not especially good since we generally dont really understand the internals of places we take over. We took out Kadafi (sp?) whom I dont think anyone liked very much but the following chaos was pretty bad. I guess we will find out if Mauro’s presence was keeping any of the groups like ELN in check and whether the VP can address it.
Steve
There’s a distinction that needs to be made. It doesn’t matter whether Venezuelans liked Maduro. The issue is whether they liked what Chavez promised and delivered briefly, basically until the bill came due.
If they did, changing leaders will not fix the problem.