Cancel the Putsch!

Outgoing Uruguayan President José Mujica was still considering a left-wing military putsch in Venezuela at the end of February. That’s how messy the political situation in Venezuela was and how weak President Maduro, Hugo Chávez’s hand-picked successor, looked. Then everything was forgotten. Not only the entire South American subcontinent had rallied behind Maduro, Venezuela’s political leadership had granted him the power to rule by decree for the rest of the year, effectively allowing him unlimited power to maintain law and order in Venezuela. Presto! Leftist putsch no longer necessary.

President Obama had opposed Maduro early on, but no sooner had Obama promoted him to the position of “extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States” than the corresponding Venezuelan legislation appeared in the Caracas parliament. Even if it is only a vague three page document, the swiftness with which it appeared leaves the impression that it had been prepared in advance and had just been languishing in some official’s desk drawer, waiting for the right moment to be brought out.

Obama’s strategy advisers couldn’t have been surprised by this. If Maduro suspends the elections scheduled in a few months in order to prevent losing his party’s parliamentary majority, that can only be to the advantage of U.S. foreign policy. As long as U.S. interference causes popular strife in other parts of the world, that’s acceptable to Washington.

But on its own continent, the American government demands peace regardless of who guarantees it.