Chavez: Civilian militia should be armed full-time
By IAN JAMES The Associated Press Sunday, October 3, 2010; 6:55 PM
CARACAS, Venezuela -- Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said Sunday that members of the country's civilian militia should be issued weapons to be armed and ready at all times.
The Bolivarian Militia is a force of volunteers ranging from students to retirees formed in recent years by Chavez, who says it is a crucial component of the nation's defenses.
Until now, members of the militia have regularly trained at weekend boot camps, but their guns have usually been locked away in military depots when not in use.
"Who has seen a militia without weapons?" Chavez said during his Sunday television and radio program. He said he was surprised when he met some militiamen standing guard recently and learned they had no guns.
"The militias are the people with weapons in hand," Chavez told an audience including military officers and high-ranking officials in rural Guarico state.
"We need to break old paradigms because we're still seeing the militias as if they were a complementary force, some battalions that get together once a month over there, or go and march somewhere," Chavez said. "No, buddy. The militia is a permanent territorial unit and it should be armed, equipped and trained - campesinos, workers."
Chavez also suggested that the country should accelerate the formation of militia units.
The militia is named after Simon Bolivar, the independence hero who is an inspiration for Chavez, and its members range from housewives to engineers to public employees. Men and women in the militia regularly attend weekend training sessions where they learn to fire cannons, mortars and machine guns.
Diosdado Cabello, one of Chavez's longtime confidants, has said the militia comprises about 120,000 fighters and is growing.
Chavez, who survived a failed coup in 2002, says the militia should be prepared to defend the country against any threat, foreign or domestic. He has said he believes the United States poses a threat to his oil-exporting country, though U.S. officials strongly deny it.
Opponents of the leftist president say the militia is essentially a personal army for Chavez aimed at intimidating his adversaries, maintaining control and keeping him in power.
Posts: 2965 | Registered: Aug 2005
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In that same country there are liberals who think like you do.
-------------------- It isn't so much that liberals are ignorant. It's just that they know so many things that aren't so. Posts: 6949 | Registered: Apr 2004
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Chaves is a Marxist with a government styled after Cuba and the old Soviet Union. So who are you calling a liberal.
And who is your post directed at?
-------------------- Wise men learn more from fools than fools from the wise. Posts: 3827 | From: beautiful California | Registered: Sep 2008
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i assumed relentless was being facetious about liking Chavez...
Chavez at best can be descried as beyond big govt. he's like; the govt takes everything and the bureacrats keep what they want and the rest can have the scraps.....
that is much like the Soviets were... the Soviets were dedicated to having a thriving economy, whihc Chavez is not, but the Soviets made stupid rules and people cheated to "work" the rules and ended up destroying thier economy...
we sold them grain because the growers would harvest grain wet and it would weigh more, but then it would rot in the silo...
here? grain moisture is cacklacked right on the delivery truck, before it's even unloaded a the granary... they take sample, heat it to dry it and weigh before and after... too much moisture? no sale...
-------------------- Don't envy the happiness of those who live in a fool's paradise. Posts: 36378 | From: USA | Registered: Sep 2003
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Glass is right about the facetious nature of my post. The part that kind of threw me off was he's giving guns to civilians.. Most evil dictators take guns away.. Much like is being done here in the states.
I don't get it unless there's a brainwashing side to this where these folks will be used to police the streets.. Dunno.. Just thought the story had a paradoxical side to it.
Posts: 2965 | Registered: Aug 2005
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i think he is wanting to fight with Colombia, there's been some issues over him supporting FARC;
The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – People's Army (Spanish: Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia – Ejército del Pueblo), also known by the acronym of FARC or FARC-EP, is a Marxist-Leninist revolutionary guerrilla organization based in Colombia, which is involved in the ongoing Colombian armed conflict.[11][12][13][14]
FARC-EP is a peasant army which has proclaimed itself to be a revolutionary agrarian, anti-imperialist Marxist-Leninist organization of Bolivarian inspiration.[11][15][16][17] It claims to represent the rural poor in a struggle against Colombia's wealthier classes, and opposes United States influence in Colombia (e.g. Plan Colombia), neo-imperialism, monopolization of natural resources by multinational corporations, and paramilitary or government violence. It funds itself principally through ransom kidnappings and taxation of the illegal drug trade.[18][19]
FARC-EP remains the largest and oldest insurgent group in the Americas.
FARC-EP is a violent non-state actor (VNSA), described as a terrorist group by the Colombian government,[35] the United States Department of State,[36] the Canadian government,[37] the New Zealand Government,[38] and the European Union.[39][40] The Venezuelan government and others are less hostile towards the FARC-EP.[41]
Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez publicly rejected their classification as "terrorists" in January 2008, considering them to be "real armies", and called on the Colombian and other governments to recognize the guerrillas as a "belligerent force", arguing that this would then oblige them to renounce kidnappings and terror acts, and respect the Geneva Conventions.[42][43][44]
posted
Yeah.. that was a thought I had.. Arming the citizenry in the hopes of millitarizing them for an upcoming war with either Columbia or the US.. That war or the illusion of it has been warming up for quite a while now.
But the fact that he's going to arm regular citizens is just.. 180 out of sync with what we've been told about who he is.
Governments don't allow regular folks to own weapons if they don't trust them..
So wtf is going on here?
Is he or does he feel he's in a position that he can arm the folks and they won't overthrow him?.. Beats me.. Just odd.
Posts: 2965 | Registered: Aug 2005
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Governments don't allow regular folks to own weapons if they don't trust them..
trust who?
he got voted into office and then nationalised the TV along with everything else...
Venezuela TV channels taken off air
updated at 10:28 GMT, Sunday, 24 January 2010
The Venezuelan government has taken six cable television channels off the air for breaking a law on transmitting government material.
The privately owned RCTV International, openly opposed to President Hugo Chavez, is one of those affected.
On Saturday the government had ordered RCTV to televise a government message, but the channel refused to comply.
The communications director for RCTV, Gladys Zapain, told AFP there was "no prior notification" of the move.
Last week RCTV, along with 23 other cable channels, was redefined by the government as a national, rather than international broadcaster. 'Battle of wills'
The government had urged cable services to drop channels ignoring the rules.
"They must comply with the law, and they cannot have a single channel that violates Venezuelan law as part of their programming," said the director of Venezuela's state-run telecommunications agency, Diosdado Cabello.
When the first opportunity to televise a government message was rejected by RCTV, it was ordered off air within a day.
The BBC's Will Grant in Caracas says there was only going to be one winner in such a battle of wills.
He says it is thought that the move is temporary at this stage, but that the government is unlikely to permit RCTV to broadcast again until the media group agrees to comply with the new law.
Opposition groups accuse Mr Chavez of trying to control the media and prevent coverage of political discontent.
RCTV moved to cable in 2007 after the Venezuelan government of Mr Chavez refused to renew its terrestrial licence.
Mr Chavez has in the past accused it of backing a coup attempt against him.
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