Venezuela no more Trump protest Maduro kicking
Venezuela August 14, 2019
PHOTOS: Venezuelans march against US embargo in enormous #NoMoreTrump
protest
The Grayzone attends a massive march where hundreds of thousands took to the
streets of Caracas to condemn the US embargo of their country with the
slogan, No more Trump!
By Ben Norton
Venezuela has been reeling for years from the effects of a suffocating
blockade by the United States. This August 5, US President Donald Trump
tightened the noose when he declared a total economic embargo of the
country.
Venezuela no more Trump protest Bolivar kicking
Hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans responded to Trumps executive order by
flooding the streets of the capital, Caracas.
They protested the crippling US blockade with the slogans No more Trump!
(No más Trump!) and Trump unblock Venezuela! (Trump desbloquea
Venezuela!).
Venezuela no more Trump protest crowd
The embargo freezes all of Venezuelas assets, blocks it from the global
financial system, and forbids US companies from doing business with its
democratically elected government.
Even more severely, Trumps order threatens secondary sanctions against any
company in the world that does business with Venezuelas internationally
recognized government.
Venezuela no more Trump protest fence
The brutal US sanctions imposed by the Trump administration in August 2017
have already led to the excess deaths of at least 40,000 Venezuelans in less
than two years, in a conservative estimate by renowned economists Mark
Weisbrot and Jeffrey Sachs.
Now the collective punishment of Venezuelas civilian population is certain
to worsen.
Venezuela no more Trump protest crowd stairs of El Calvario
On August 10, Venezuela and solidarity groups around the world held a joint
protest against the embargo.
I attended the gargantuan march in the capital Caracas, where masses of
Venezuelans marched with signs and banners reading #NoMoreTrump!
Venezuela no more Trump protest Maduro banner
The demonstration was gigantic one of the largest I have attended in my
life.
If you stood in place and watched the march go by, you could witness rows
and rows of demonstrators proceed for possibly an hour.
Venezuela no more Trump protest march
After demonstrating for five hours, protesters gathered next to the Stairs
of El Calvario, a historic monument in Caracas.
Thousands of people filled the streets, and many more covered the enormous
staircase.
Venezuela no more Trump protest stairs of El Calvario
The government of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has denounced the US
embargo as a form of economic terrorism, and issued a call for the unity
of all Venezuelans to defend the motherland and its sacred national
sovereignty.
His rhetoric echoed that of Javad Zarif, the foreign minister of Iran
another country enduring crushing US sanctions, after Trump unilaterally
sabotaged an international nuclear agreement. Zarif has pointed out that,
according to any consistent meaning of the term, sanctions that collectively
punish entire populations and destabilize whole economies, harming civilians
to advance political interests, are, definitionally speaking, a form of
terrorism.
Venezuela no more Trump march stage
The US government has explicitly stated that its unilateral sanctions
against Venezuela are motivated by political interests. Indeed, the Trump
administration will settle for nothing less than regime change.
When Trump declared the embargo, the government of Maduro had been in
Barbados for negotiations with the opposition that were mediated by Norway.
Maduro told The Grayzone in an exclusive interview that, in these talks, his
government was more than willing to meet the opposition in the middle but
that the US embargo changed all of that.
Trumps National Security Adviser John Bolton, an extreme hawk who has
called for regime change in Venezuela for years, has made it clear that he
opposes all attempts at diplomacy and dialogue. By declaring the embargo,
Bolton and the White House effectively scuttled negotiations between the
Venezuelan government and factions among the opposition.
Maduro responded by giving up on the talks, and his government sharpened its
message: No more Trump. This slogan marked a key shift in political tone,
from one hoping for diplomacy a call for a change of regime in the heart of
the empire.
In his interview with The Grayzone, Maduro noted the opposition has a much
longer history of sabotaging attempts at diplomacy, recalling its withdrawal
from similar negotiations in 2018. He said the US-backed opposition has a
strategy of total aggression against Venezuela.
They have owners, they have bosses. These owners, these bosses,
unfortunately are in Washington, Maduro continued. Its not an independent
opposition, with its own positions. They cannot reach an agreement with us
if Washington does not agree and tell them to do it. Thats the point we
have reached in this situation.
The United States has made no secret that it hopes to restructure and
privatize Venezuelas state-owned oil industry following any successful
regime change operation. Over the years, Washington has cultivated and
funded a radical opposition inside Venezuela that is led by the neoliberal
party Voluntad Popular (Popular Will), that seeks to do precisely this.
Voluntad Populars Juan Guaidó, who has led numerous failed coup attempts,
publicly expressed support for the Trump administrations embargo of his
country.
Venezuela no more Trump protest signs fence
The declaration of the embargo came just two weeks after Guaidó boasted that
the opposition-controlled National Assembly had collaborated with the US
government to impose sanctions on Venezuelas subsidized food program CLAP,
which provides sustenance for close to free to 6 million families more
than three-quarters of the population.
Venezuela no more Trump march Chavez banner
This campaign of economic warfare is similar to the one pursued by the US
government against Nicaraguas socialist government in the 1980s.
Former CIA agent John Stockwell explained the strategy at the time: The
point is to put pressure on the targeted government by ripping apart the
social and economic fabric of the country
That means making the people
suffer as much as you can, until the country plunges into chaos until at
some point you can impose your choice of governments on that country.
The embargo is so extreme that even some critics of the government are now
opposed to the US policies. I spoke with an opposition supporter who runs a
stall at a middle-class market in the relatively affluent Caracas
neighborhood of Cumbres de Curumo. Although he is against Chavismo, he
lamented that Washingtons economic warfare is making the lives of average
Venezuelans hell.
John Bolton says the blockade only affects the government, but it is
screwing us all! the stall owner complained.
Venezuela no more Trump protest Yankee go home
Bolton an architect of the Iraq War, which killed more than 1 million
people is leading the US governments extremely belligerent campaign
against Venezuela. And he has made the Trump administrations message very
clear: It will not tolerate any negotiations, any diplomacy at all, with
Venezuelas democratically elected socialist government.
Venezuela no more Trump protest imperialism socialism
Protests against the US economic warfare are very common in Venezuela, yet
they receive almost no coverage in a Western corporate media dead-set on
amplifying the narrative of the US-backed opposition.
Three days before the gargantuan anti-embargo protest, on August 7, I
reported from another march. Tens of thousands of Venezuelans took to the
streets to mark the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Boyocá, a historic
fight in which the great liberator of South America, Simón Bolívar, defeated
Spanish colonialists, eventually liberating numerous nations and uniting
them in the radical republic of Gran Colombia.
Just as they struggled for liberation from the Spanish empire two centuries
ago, Venezuelans say they are now trying to free themselves from the
suffocating oppression of the US empire.
This August 7 march was sizable, but it took place on a Wednesday afternoon,
and the weather was burning hot. The protest on Saturday, August 10 was much
larger.
Contrary to claims familiar to Western corporate media, the regular
pro-government demonstrations are not all organized by the state itself.
Besides the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), the governing party
founded by the late President Hugo Chávez, there are hundreds of other
left-wing groups that support Maduro and organize protests of their own.
Venezuela no more Trump protest communes or nothing
They range from large grassroots organizations like the Francisco de Miranda
Front (FFM) to unions, religious groups, both Catholic and Evangelical, and
feminist organizations; from the Communist Party of Venezuela to hundreds of
communes and missions, where average citizens exercise direct democracy and
govern their local communities, with support from the state.
Chavismo is very popular among the grassroots base, and there is a deep
wellspring of revolutionary fervor among working-class Venezuelans.
Venezuela no more Trump protest FFM
Many Venezuelans are proud nationalists who take great pride in their
country, and pledge their desire to defend its independence and sovereignty
against foreign aggression.
Venezuela no more Trump protest flag dress
Those at the August 10 march were not pulling any punches. Trump, sanction
your mom! and Mr. Trump shit-face, were a few of the slogans on display.
Venezuela no more Trump march shit face
Another popular sign depicted Uncle Sam painting the face of Juan Guaidó on
a clown puppet, using paint from a can that is marked coup.
Venezuela no more Trump protest signs
Chavista marches like these are also filled with singing and dancing, and
demonstrators often bring along musical instruments, especially drums.
Venezuela no more Trump protest drums
To anyone who spends time in working-class barrios in this country, it is
immediately clear that there are millions of Venezuelans who support their
elected government, and who deeply believe in the progressive, socialist,
and anti-imperialist Chavista movement and its Bolivarian Revolution.
Likewise, there are many Venezuelans, even members of the opposition, who
are unequivocally opposed to the US sanctions and embargo.
Corporate media outlets, however, pretend as though these Venezuelans dont
exist.
Venezuela no more Trump protest truck
After the march, I spoke with a housekeeper who works in the home of a
friend a working-class mother of Afro-Colombian descent who lives in the
poor neighborhood Petare. She said she had seen me at the protest, and
thanked me for reporting on it, because the foreign media always ignores
us.
It was a reminder that the demonstration consisted heavily of poor and
working-class Venezuelans who used their day off from work to take to the
streets and cry out for an end to the blockade of their country.
The US government has shown utter disregard for these people, however.
Washington is waging a campaign of unconventional warfare attacking not
only Venezuelas government and economy, but also its infrastructure, its
media, and even the minds of its citizens terrorizing millions of
civilians.
It is increasingly evident that the US government has been targeting
Venezuelas electrical infrastructure with cyber attacks, leading to
periodic blackouts. Mainstream corporate media outlets have admitted that
Washington already has such technology, and has been planning to use it
against Russia and Iran. U.S. Escalates Online Attacks on Russias Power
Grid, The New York Times reported in June; U.S. Carried Out Cyberattacks
on Iran, the paper of record reported a week later.
The blockade has also taken a toll on Venezuelas health system, preventing
the country from importing critical medicines, medical equipment, and parts
for machines.
These multifaceted forms of US unconventional warfare inspired protesters to
hand out the following flyer at the march, warning of terrorist attacks by
Guaidó and US imperialism (a translation of the handbill follows):
Venezuela no more Trump protest flyer
How terrorist attacks by Guaidó and US imperialism affect you:
1. They try to paralyze the strategic economic-production apparatus of the
country.
2. They prevent access to and distribution of food, water, electricity, gas,
transportation and communication.
3. They weaken the healthcare system and threaten the lives of Venezuelan
families, especially our children and grandparents.
In their rhetoric, Chavistas frequently compare what the US is doing now to
what Spain did two centuries ago.
In fact, a descendant of Bolívar who lives in Caracas and supports the
Maduro government, declared on the great liberators 236th birthday this
past July: Now Venezuela is confronting another empire. It is the nerve
point for the worlds empires. Its happening again.
Despite the increasingly aggressive US assault on their country, the
Venezuelans I have met are careful to distinguish the US government from the
US people. In my months in Venezuela, I have only ever encountered
friendliness, hospitality, and generosity.
At the same time, many Venezuelans I have met view the United States as an
existential threat that applies tactics of unconventional warfare tactics
against them and their families. On August 10, they sent that message by the
hundreds of thousands, appealing to the civilized world for a respite from
US meddling.
You can see my photos from the march, and more from Venezuela, here at
Flickr: