(AFP) – A sweeping overhaul of Venezuela’s top brass is designed to remake the armed forces and draw them closer to Washington, multiple military and political sources told AFP. Delcy Rodriguez has been in power for less than three months, but has already taken major steps to overhaul Venezuela’s economy and politics. Since her former boss and fierce US foe president Nicolas Maduro was toppled in January, Rodriguez has allowed more US investment in Venezuela’s vast energy sector and pardoned hundreds of political prisoners.
This week, she turned to reforming Venezuela’s all-powerful military and intelligence services, replacing a slew of entrenched commanders with officers seen as acceptable to Washington. The most dramatic step was removing long-serving Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino and installing former intelligence chief Gustavo Gonzalez Lopez in his place. “Gonzalez Lopez is now the United States’ man in the armed forces,” said Sebastiana Barraez, a journalist who covers military affairs. “He is pragmatic and not ideologically tied to the left.”
A retired Venezuelan general told AFP that Washington wanted to restore the pro-US military doctrine abandoned under the leftist firebrand Hugo Chavez. For decades, Venezuela maintained close military ties with the United States, buying weapons and sending officers north for training. Chavez broke those links and turned heavily to Moscow. The former general said the shift aimed to roll back two decades of cooperation with Russia and Cuba, whose advisers helped reshape the armed forces and supplied weapons from rifles to Sukhoi fighter jets. He said much of that Russian equipment would soon need replacing if Venezuela were to return to US technology and training systems, once common before the Chavez era.
The retired general said the United States might even open a temporary base in Venezuela to secure the transition, a move that would cut against years of anti-imperialist rhetoric from the former government. Cleberth Delgado, a former intelligence official now in exile, said the changes marked a transition guided by “instructions” from Washington, though the United States has not publicly confirmed any such role. “These appointments would not have been possible without US approval,” he said.
Rodriguez’s allies say the changes are needed to stabilize the country after Maduro’s ouster, amid lingering fears of a coup and uncertainty over how long the transition government will last. Before becoming defense minister, Gonzalez Lopez led the presidential guard, the DGCIM counterintelligence service, and twice headed the SEBIN intelligence service. Rights group Provea described his return to a top security post as “recycling impunity,” noting he is under US sanctions for alleged human rights violations.
During his tenure at SEBIN, opposition figure Fernando Alban died in custody after falling from a tenth-floor window. Authorities called it suicide; the opposition said he was murdered. A retired general said Gonzalez Lopez previously aligned with Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello, a powerful Chavista figure, before shifting his loyalty to Rodriguez as the purge unfolded.
– Javier TOVAR
© 2024 AFP
