US supported military coup in Venezuela

Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro. Getty/The Hill. 

Envoys from the US government reportedly met with rouge military officers plotting a coup against the government of Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela. Venezuela's government blasted the report which was reported in US media. US officials repeatedly met with these generals a year ago when President Trump said he was exploring possible military options to deal with the country's rogue government. Those officers were receptive to the deal though the deal fell apart after a crackdown by the Maduro regime. It was planned to send secure radios and other help to the officers but the plan was shelved after the crackdown. 

My Comment:

This is not a surprising report out of Venezuela. Maduro is an enemy of the United States and has been for some time. He has run his country into the ground and is a threat to peace and stability for the region. I am sure a military coup and a return to a capitalist government would be the best thing for all involved. 

I have said several times that Venezuela is a military threat to the region. They have a territorial dispute with Guyana that could erupt into war at anytime and might provide Maduro a way out of his economic crisis. But if he doesn't trust his military than he might not go through with it. This new report means that he probably doesn't trust his military anymore. If nothing else that's probably a positive thing, just because Venezuela is in a downward spiral doesn't mean they should be allowed to drag the rest of South America down with them. 

It seems like the whole thing was a fool's errand though. Maduro sniffed out the plot and purged his military fairly quickly. Whether that was due to this plot being exposed or just because he is paranoid in general, it wasn't going to happen no matter what we did. Other things may be in the works but I doubt a military coup is one of them. 

I do think that Maduro is helped by these reports. He blames America for everything and says that everything in his country would be ok if it wasn't for US sanctions. Now he has a little bit of evidence for that, even though this story was rather insignificant. He can now tell his people that there really are plots against him. 

It also makes me wonder if there wasn't some American involvement in the recent assassination attempt on Maduro's life using a drone. Maduro claimed that of course but at the time I thought it was a possible false flag or just a run of the mill assassination attempt without outside help, but now I am not so sure. We will likely never know, but I would like to think that if we were behind it, it wouldn't have failed so miserably. 

I also find it interesting that the United States turned down these officers back when Barack Obama was president. Had this plot been launched back then it very well might have succeeded. But I doubt that Obama would have supported overthrowing a socialist dictator even if it is one that is a confirmed enemy of the United States. His ideological leanings are towards Maduro, not away from him. 

And it  makes me wonder if this plot was blown up by Obama/deep state people in the intelligence community. There are a lot of people still working that dislike Trump and like Maduro and anyone of them could have informed Maduro about this plot. That would, of course, be high treason but I wouldn't be surprised if it happened...