Flying Too High, Venezuela Shops for MiGs

July 25, 2003
MARY ANASTASIA O'GRADY

When former Colombian Finance Minister Juan Manuel Santos told a Caracas
audience last week that Venezuela is trying to buy 50 MiG fighter jets from
a Russian manufacturer, the Venezuelan government bitterly denounced him.

Although Mr. Santos does not represent the Colombian government and
Colombian officials tried to stay out of the fray, his words risked further
deterioration of the already strained relationship between the two nations.

Bad blood between these countries, sharing a 2000-kilometer border, is
legendary. But things have gotten decidedly worse since Venezuelan
President Hugo Chavez made it clear that he believes in promoting Fidel
Castro's armed struggle on the South American continent and that he
sympathizes with Colombian guerrillas. The MiG issue could take relations
to a new low.

The problem for Colombia is not simply a question of Venezuelan air
superiority. The purchase could put pressure on Bogotá to engage in an arms
race when the country has more immediate and destabilizing threat: the
internal guerrilla conflict. Moreover, Colombian alarm at the prospect of
Venezuelan MiGs must be considered in light of a steady stream of reports
that Venezuela has been accommodating the Colombian rebels.

A little short on diplomatic skills, the Venezuelan ambassador to Colombia,
Carlos Rodolfo Santiago, immediately answered Mr. Santos's assertion by
calling him a "cynical and irresponsible liar." He also reportedly denied
the existence of the letter that the former Colombian official had cited as
proof of his assertion. "The only thing that has happened is that during a
visit of Russians to Caracas, it was asked how much that could be worth,"
he said. "But that is not to say that there was a tender offer or something
similar." Venezuelan Foreign Minister Roy Chaderton accused Mr. Santos of
links to coup-plotters.

As to the letter, Mr. Santos seems to have been on solid ground. Colombian
security analyst Alfredo Rangel Suárez tells me he has seen the text and in
a column last week in Colombia's El Tiempo, he described its contents.
Contrary to Mr. Santiago's claims, it was not a casual inquiry.

"The request from Venezuela to the Russian factory is very specific: Fifty
combat aircraft, with multifunctional Zhuk-M liquid crystal 6X8 inch radar,
with navigation and weapons control systems that insure the use of six
types of air-to-air missiles, three classes of guided air-to-surface
missiles, in addition to bombs and 30 caliber guns," wrote Mr. Rangel
Suárez. "Additionally, it asks that ten of the planes be delivered within
18 months of the contract signing and also that it include a tailor-made
maintenance center for MiGs in Venezuela." The letter was sent to the
director general of Russian MiG Aeronautic Corporation, Nicolai Nikitin and
signed by Venezuelan Air Force commander Régulo Anselmi, according to an El
Tiempo report.

Mr. Chavez cashiered Mr. Anselmi not long after April 11, 2002, which means
that the letter is more than one year old and the Venezuelan ambassador to
the U.S. says that the only orders pending are for four Russian-made
reconnaissance helicopters. It's thus uncertain whether the idea of buying
MiGs remains alive.

Venezuelan sources differ on the question, with some sure that there is no
budget for such extravagance and at least one reporting that the signs
suggest a Russian deal is in the works. But Mr. Rangel Suárez tells me that
he has verified that the Venezuelan order to the Russian factory "was made
official by foreign minister Chaderton some two months ago in a visit to
Moscow. The contract would be signed next year and initially they would
deliver two flotillas of eight planes each. Later they would make delivery
of the remaining planes that were ordered."
Why Venezuela might want so many high performance fighter planes remains a
question. Its unlikely that even the cocky Mr. Chavez is misguided enough
to think he can mix it up with the U.S. Air Force.

The most plausible theory involves the distraction and intimidation effects
that the MiGs might have on a neighbor already engaged in a difficult
internal conflict.

For some time Colombia has been concerned by evidence that Venezuela may be
plotting with the guerrillas to overthrow its government. In interviews
with Colombia's Caracol News television last week and written up in
Venezuela's El Universal, two defectors of the Colombian Revolutionary
Armed Forces [FARC] claimed that the FARC receives weapons training and
logistical support from members of the Venezuelan military. The two men
said that uniformed Venezuelans came and went freely in rebel camps in the
border zone.

This is not surprising given the fact that the Venezuelan military has been
gutted of its professional staff and turned into an armed brigade, infused
with Cuban consultants and a heavy dose of militia, and is now dedicated
solely to enforcing the Bolivarian Revolution.

Add to this Castroite agenda Mr. Chavez's personal political ambitions, the
fact that the economy is a basket case and that his popularity hovers at
only 30%, and its not hard to envision him picking a fight with a
historical nemesis to stir up nationalism.

Surely Mr. Chavez realizes that the Americans would not stand for an overt
attack but he also must know that the U.S. would have a hard time managing
a border skirmish in which Venezuela could claim that Colombia was not
controlling its own rebels.

The confluence of events on the Colombian-Venezuelan border does not bode
well for hemispheric peace. Perhaps the U.S. senators who have been
sabotaging George Bush's efforts to create an effective Latin American
policy should take some note of this.

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