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<div class="header reader-header reader-show-element"> <font
size="-2"><a class="domain reader-domain"
href="https://thegrayzone.com/2020/01/17/brazil-paper-reveals-bolsonaro-terror-plot-venezuela/">https://thegrayzone.com/2020/01/17/brazil-paper-reveals-bolsonaro-terror-plot-venezuela/</a></font>
<h1 class="reader-title">Top Brazilian paper reveals Bolsonaro
government’s terror plot against Venezuela</h1>
<font size="+1"><b>Brazil’s right-wing government attempted to
attack Venezuela in a plot to overthrow its elected
president. The shocking terror operation has received
absolutely no coverage in mainstream US media.</b></font></div>
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<h3>By Ben Norton - January 17, 2020<br>
</h3>
<p>Brazil’s right-wing government helped support military
attacks on Venezuela in hopes of inciting a coup and
violently overthrowing the country’s leftist government.</p>
<p>This plan was revealed by a major pro-government
newspaper in Brazil. Oddly, the shocking story was not
covered by any mainstream paper in the US or Europe.</p>
<p>Outside a lone report by Venezuela’s state-backed <a
href="https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Brazil-Complicit-in-Attacks-on-Venezuela-Military-Base-O-Globo-20200102-0010.html">teleSUR</a>
— which US-backed coup plotters are now <a
href="https://www.telesurenglish.net/news/Juan-Guaido-Wants-to-Silence-teleSUR-by-Taking-Over-TV-Signal-20200112-0001.html">trying
to usurp</a> – the story was completely ignored in
Anglophone media.</p>
<p>The United States has supported a <a
href="https://thegrayzone.com/2020/01/01/top-20-the-grayzone-stories-of-2019/">series
of regime-change attempts</a> against Venezuela’s
elected government since 2002. But the details of
Brazil’s role in the latest coup plot is a novel
revelation.</p>
<p>On December 31, the Brazilian newspaper O Globo
disclosed the putsch plans in an article titled “<a
href="https://oglobo.globo.com/mundo/ataque-quartel-por-militares-que-se-refugiaram-no-brasil-era-parte-de-plano-maior-contra-maduro-24165689">Attack
on barracks by soldiers who took refuge in Brazil was
part of larger plan against Maduro</a>.” The subtitle
added, “Deserters intended to initiate large-scale
military uprising, but failed.”</p>
<p>O Globo is one of Brazil’s most widely circulated
outlets. It has a staunch right-wing editorial line and
is infamous for supporting Brazil’s fascist military
dictatorship between the 1960’s and ’80’s.</p>
<p>The paper maintains close ties to Brazil’s political
and military establishment. And it consulted with
numerous sources to reconstruct the plans for the
attacks on Venezuela.</p>
<h3>Trilogy: 3 planned attacks on Venezuela, with help
from foreign countries</h3>
<p>With the support of neighboring right-wing countries,
Venezuelan military defectors planned to launch three
military uprisings against the Venezuelan government on
or around Christmas Eve, according to O Globo.</p>
<p>The official name of the operation was Trilogia
(Trilogy). One attack targeted Venezuela’s Bolívar state
on the southeastern border with Brazil. A second attack
was planned as an amphibious invasion, and a third was
to take place near Colombia’s border.</p>
<p>Two of these three planned attacks failed, as only one
of the groups carried out the orders as planned.</p>
<p>Brazil-backed insurgents crossed into Venezuelan
territory and, on December 22, attacked the 513 Selva
Mariano Montilla infantry battalion in Venezuela’s
Bolívar state, located roughly 230 kilometers from
Brazil’s northern-most state Roraima, near the border of
the two countries.</p>
<p>A total of 16 Venezuelan military deserters
participated in the attack on the Mariano Montilla
barracks, killing a Venezuelan soldier and wounding
another.</p>
<p>They stole weapons, including 112 rifles, 120 grenades,
three rocket launchers, three machine guns, 10,
bazookas, and 10 ammunition boxes, according to another
<a
href="https://oglobo.globo.com/mundo/ministro-acusa-brasil-de-envolvimento-em-ataques-bases-militares-na-venezuela-24154923">O
Globo report</a>.</p>
<p>In a parallel operation, Brazil-backed insurgents also
attacked soldiers in the Venezuelan city of Santa Elena,
near the border. But this operation ultimately failed.</p>
<p>Unnamed sources told O Globo the ultimate goal of the
operation was to build a more heavily armed “superior
force” to carry out larger and larger attacks against
Venezuela’s government, kicking off a protracted violent
insurgency in southern Venezuela, on the border area
with Brazil.</p>
<h3>Brazil’s, and Guaidó’s, complicity in the attacks</h3>
<p>These attacks on Venezuela had the backing of Brazil’s
far-right government, led by President Jair Bolsonaro, a
fascistic demagogue who came to power following a
US-backed parliamentary and legal coup that forced
Brazil’s center-left Workers’ Party from power.</p>
<p>Bolsonaro has pledged to <a
href="https://theconversation.com/bolsonaro-wins-brazil-election-promises-to-purge-leftists-from-country-105481">purge,
imprison, and exile leftists</a>, and has staunchly
defended his country’s previous military dictatorship,
while heaping praise on the murderous junta of US-backed
<a
href="https://apnews.com/3506a62c508e43dcb9687866687c9a8c">Chilean
dictator Augusto Pinochet</a>.</p>
<p>Before and after the attacks on Venezuela, according to
O Globo, there were “high-level communications” between
Brazil’s Foreign Ministry and the coup regime of
Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaidó.</p>
<p>Guaidó, who the United States has been trying to
forcibly install as the head of state of Venezuela, had
been recognized by Bolsonaro as the supposed “president”
of the country although he was never elected to the
position.</p>
<p>Guaidó and Bolsonaro had met and publicly demanded the
ouster of Venezuela’s elected, UN-recognized <a
href="https://thegrayzone.com/2019/08/06/interview-venezuelan-president-nicolas-maduro/">President
Nicolás Maduro</a>.</p>
<blockquote data-width="550" data-dnt="true">
<p dir="ltr" lang="es"><a
href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Brasil?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Brasil</a>
</p>
<p>Nos reunimos con el Presidente <a
href="https://twitter.com/jairbolsonaro?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@jairbolsonaro</a>
para continuar fortaleciendo la ayuda humanitaria,
evaluar la situación en nuestra frontera común y
establecer compromisos como parte de los próximos
pasos para lograr la libertad de Venezuela. <a
href="https://t.co/b06GcRJfaw">pic.twitter.com/b06GcRJfaw</a></p>
<p>— Juan Guaidó (@jguaido) <a
href="https://twitter.com/jguaido/status/1101427021882765312?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March
1, 2019</a></p>
</blockquote>
<p>According to O Globo, most of the coup-plotters who
participated in the botched military uprising hid in
Venezuela. Many were subsequently arrested.</p>
<p>Yet five of the insurgents crossed back over into
Brazil and hid for several days among the Taurepang
indigenous community in Roraima state. Members of this
community informed the Brazilian government, which then
decided to rescue and officially grant refuge to the
Venezuelan defectors on December 26.</p>
<p>O Globo noted that Venezuela’s foreign-backed
right-wing opposition expressed “relief” at Bolsonaro’s
decision to protect the Venezuelan soldiers who had
carried out a violent attack on their homeland.</p>
<p>Venezuela’s actual government, on the other hand,
harshly condemned the Bolsonaro administration for its
decision to legally protect the coup-plotters, stating
that it was “setting a dangerous precedent of protection
for people who committed flagrant offenses against peace
and the stability of another state.”</p>
<p>Venezuela has <a
href="https://twitter.com/TarekWiliamSaab/status/1212816087433318400">formally
requested the extradition</a> of the five defectors
protected by Brazil, but the far-right Bolsonaro
administration has <a
href="https://oglobo.globo.com/mundo/governo-brasileiro-vai-ignorar-pedido-de-nicolas-maduro-para-entregar-suspeitos-de-atacar-bases-militares-24157232">dismissed
Caracas’ requests</a> on the grounds that it does not
recognize Maduro’s legitimacy.</p>
<h3>Brazilian media confirms what Venezuelan government
said</h3>
<p>The O Globo report confirms public statements by
Venezuelan government officials after the December 22
attack.</p>
<p>Venezuela’s communication minister, Jorge Rodríguez,
declared that the defectors not only had support from
the government of Bolsonaro, but were also trained in
paramilitary camps in Colombia.</p>
<blockquote data-width="550" data-dnt="true">
<p dir="ltr" lang="es">Estos criminales fueron
entrenados en campamentos paramilitares plenamente
identificados en Colombia, y recibieron la
colaboración artera del Gob de Jair Bolsonaro</p>
<p>— Jorge Rodríguez (@jorgerpsuv) <a
href="https://twitter.com/jorgerpsuv/status/1208851511666790401?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December
22, 2019</a></p>
</blockquote>
<p>The Venezuelan intelligence services tracked the
infiltrators’ movements from Brazil, through Peru, and
into the Colombian city of Cali, where they received
training.</p>
<p>Venezuela’s foreign minister, Jorge Arreaza, wrote,
“From Peru they enter Colombia and they receive support
also from Brazil. This is a coup-mongering strategy of
triangulation by the governments of the <a
href="https://thegrayzone.com/2019/07/05/canada-adopts-america-first-foreign-policy-us-state-department-chrystia-freeland/">Lima
Cartel</a> to produce violence, death, and
destabilization in Venezuela.”</p>
<blockquote data-width="550" data-dnt="true">
<p dir="ltr" lang="es">Desde Perú entran por Colombia y
reciben apoyo también en Brasil. Es una estrategia
golpista de triangulación de gobiernos del Cartel de
Lima para producir violencia, muerte y
desestabilización política en Venezuela. Denunciamos a
estos gobiernos ante el mundo. ¡No pasarán!</p>
<p>— Jorge Arreaza M (@jaarreaza) <a
href="https://twitter.com/jaarreaza/status/1208900081321226240?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December
23, 2019</a></p>
</blockquote>
<p>The coup plotters also entangled local indigenous
communities in their violent operations, recruiting
accomplices from the native groups on the border area
between Venezuela and Brazil.</p>
<p>Nine members of the local Venezuelan indigenous
community were involved in the attacks, according to O
Globo, and all were arrested for their role in the
botched coup attempt.</p>
<p>Tensions between Venezuela and Brazil remain at a
boiling point. However, Maduro has hesitated to sever
all ties with the powerful neighbor in order to preserve
trade between the countries.</p>
<p>Unilateral <a
href="https://thegrayzone.com/2019/10/11/life-resistance-venezuela-ben-norton-us-blockade/">US
sanctions on Venezuela have already killed tens of
thousands of civilians</a> and made it difficult to
import food into the country. Venezuela still relies on
food from Brazil’s massive agricultural sector to help
feed communities near the border. The imports are
especially important as Washington attempts to sanction
Caracas’ CLAP food distribution program, which feeds
seven million families.</p>
<p>Venezuela’s government has managed to fend off the
violent infiltration and subterfuge by its powerful
neighbor. But thanks to a media blackout, the plot
remains unknown to almost everyone in the US, except
perhaps to those who helped hatch it.</p>
<div itemtype="http://schema.org/Person" itemscope=""
itemprop="author">
<p><br>
</p>
<div>
<p>Ben Norton is a journalist, writer, and filmmaker.
He is the assistant editor of The Grayzone, and the
producer of the <a
href="http://moderaterebelsradio.com/">Moderate
Rebels</a> podcast, which he co-hosts with editor
Max Blumenthal. His website is <a
href="http://bennorton.com/">BenNorton.com</a> and
he tweets at @<a
href="https://twitter.com/BenjaminNorton">BenjaminNorton</a>.</p>
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