This is what happens when you get your news from the Daily Kos. Chavez, who only 3 months ago thought that John Negroponte was out to get him, is apparently becoming unstable. Now his fevered brain has cooked up an invasion plot.
President Hugo Chavez urged soldiers on Sunday to prepare for a guerrilla-style war against the United States, saying that Washington is using psychological and economic warfare as part of an unconventional campaign aimed at derailing his government.
No doubt they were disguised as students, or a TV station.
Dressed in olive green fatigues and a red beret, Chavez spoke inside Tiuna Fort—Venezuela's military nerve-center—before hundreds of uniformed soldiers standing alongside armored vehicles and tanks decorated with banners reading: "Fatherland, Socialism, or Death! We will triumph!"
Now there's slogan to die for.
"We must continue developing the resistance war, that's the anti- imperialist weapon. We must think and prepare for the resistance war everyday," said Chavez, who has repeatedly warned that American soldiers could invade Venezuela to seize control of the South American nation's immense oil reserves.
Sorry Hugo, we have bigger fish to fry.
U.S. officials reject claims that Washington is considering a military attack. But the U.S. government has expressed concern over what it perceives as a significant arms build-up here.
Chavez—a close ally of Cuban leader Fidel Castro—told soldiers the Washington was trying to weaken and divide Venezuelan society, including the armed forces, without resorting to combat.
"It's not just armed warfare," said Chavez, a former army officer who is leading what he calls the "Bolivarian Revolution," a socialist movement named after 19th-century independence hero Simon Bolivar. "I'm also referring to psychological warfare, media warfare, political warfare, economic warfare."
That explains the military get-up and the speech to the soldiers.
Under Chavez, Venezuela has recently purchased some $3 billion worth of arms from Russia, including 53 military helicopters, 100,000 Kalashnikov rifles, 24 SU-30 Sukhoi fighter jets.
Last week, Chavez said he is considering arms purchases, including submarines and a missile-equipped air defense system, as he prepares for a tour of Russia, Belarus and Iran.
"We are strengthening Venezuela's military power precisely to avoid imperial aggressions and assure peace, not to attack anybody," he said Sunday.
Probably to defend against his own people, who are going to be very upset when he follows Castro's footsteps, "President for life".