[News] Clinton Emails Reveal Direct US Sabotage of Venezuela

[Anti-Imperialist News]

http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Clinton-Emails-Reveal-Direct-US-Sabotage-of-Venezuela-20160726-0041.html 



  Clinton Emails Reveal Direct US Sabotage of Venezuela

July 26, 2016

While Hillary Clinton publicly welcomed improved relations with 
Venezuela as secretary of state, she privately ridiculed the country and 
continued to support destabilization efforts, revealed her emails leaked 
by WikiLeaks.

In 2010, Clinton asked Arturo Valenzuela, then assistant secretary of 
state for Western Hemisphere Affairs, how “to rein in Chavez.” 
Valenzuela responded that, “We need to carefully consider the 
consequences of publicly confronting him but ought to look at 
opportunities for others in the region to help.”

His answer was in line with the U.S. embassy strategy in 2006, also 
revealed in WikiLeaks intelligence cables: “Creative U.S. outreach to 
Chavez' regional partners will drive a wedge between him and them,” said 
the confidential cable from the embassy. “By refusing to take each of 
Chavez's outbursts seriously, we frustrate him even more, paving the way 
for additional Bolivarian miscalculations. We also allow room for other 
international actors to respond.”

Spain was among the countries willing to help the U.S. in its subversive 
foreign relations strategy. Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright 
passed on a message from the administration of conservative Prime 
Minister Mariano Rajoy in 2012 expressing intentions “to re-orient 
Spanish foreign policy so that it can work with the U.S. in Latin 
America, especially on Venezuela and Cuba ... As a transition in Cuba 
and something significant in Venezuela (and possibly the Andes) loom, a 
stronger working relationship between the U.S. and Spain could be very 
helpful.”

When keeping an eye on regional meetings, Clinton was especially 
concerned with Venezuela. Responding to a United Nations statement 
against the coup in Honduras in 2009—that she supported 
<http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Hillary-Clinton-Forgot-That-She-Supported-a-Coup-in-Honduras-20160309-0047.html>—Clinton 
shifted the attention to Venezuela: “Ok—but have they ever condemned 
Venezuela for denying press freedom?” she wrote to Deputy Chief of Staff 
Jake Sullivan.

He responded “I highly doubt it. And that is just the tip of the 
iceberg,” to which Clinton wrote, “Ah, the proverbial iceberg.”

Clinton was cautious not to respond to all of Hugo Chavez’s “antics,” 
but her staff insisted that Venezuelan politics were a threat to U.S. 
interests.

An email advising how to spend USAID funds strongly suggested refraining 
from backing leftist states like Venezuela, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Cuba 
because the money “could undermine real democratic development to hand 
over ‘ownership’ to populist centralizers.”

Clinton should use language like “‘local ownership’ in a nuanced way” to 
avoid having her words “used against her by demagogues and kleptocrats,” 
said the email. Any funds channeled into such unreliable states, it 
added, must be accompanied by “(h)uman behavioral changes.”

International aid to Venezuela was siphoned off, but broadcasts to 
counter local “propaganda” were amplified.

The Broadcasting Board of Governors—which runs the Marti stations, Voice 
of America, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Radio Free Asia and the 
Middle East Broadcasting Networks—requested more funding in a 2010 email 
forwarded to Clinton to “combat the public diplomacy efforts of 
America's ‘enemies,’ which he (chairman Walter Isaacson) identifies as 
Iran, Venezuela, Russia, and China.”

The BBG, with a US$700 million annual budget—now increased to over 
US$750 million—was “facing increased competition from other governments' 
forays into international broadcasting ... including Venezuela's teleSUR.”

A month later, when the board was facing cuts, Cuban-born Florida 
Senator Ileana Ros-Lehtinen suggested focusing resources on 
high-priority countries like Cuba, Venezuela and Ecuador.

“Let the fun begin—and let's keep going w(ith) our plans,” responded 
Clinton.

Another leaked email from Stratfor described the BBG as “responsible for 
the radio and TV aggressions against Cuba,” which received its own 
category of state funding of nearly US$40 million. The board separated 
from State Department control in 1999, officially becoming an 
independent agency. “Congress agreed that credibility of U.S. 
international broadcasting was crucial to its effectiveness as a public 
diplomacy tool,” according to Congress’s 2008 budget on foreign operations.

While giving the cold shoulder to Venezuela, Clinton was cozy with Latin 
American players that opposed the country's leftist politics.

Her counselor and chief of staff, Cheryl Mills, forwarded her a 
recommendation for Mari Carmen Aponte to be appointed as U.S. ambassador 
to El Salvador. Aponte, noted the email, “has consistently fought Cuba 
and Venezuela's efforts to gain influence in Central America and as a 
result of her negotiating skills, the U.S. and El Salvador will open a 
new, jointly-funded, electronic monitoring center that will be an 
invaluable tool in fighting transnational crime.”

She won the appointment and later became assistant secretary of state 
for Western Hemisphere Affairs.

Clinton also drew fire for saying, "We're winning!" when the Venezuelan 
opposition won a majority of seats in parliament in 2015 and for serving 
as secretary of state while the National Security Administration 
regularly spied on Venezuela 
<http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/NSA-Spies-on-Venezuelas-Oil-Company-Snowden-Leak-Reveals-20151118-0010.html>. 


-- 
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