U.S. imperialism’s aims are also shown by the provocative role of the “election monitors” in Venezuela—the snoops of the Carter Center and associates. These “democracy experts” are aiding and abetting the majority of the capitalist class that’s waging an uphill battle to oust the Hugo Chávez government through a recall referendum. It’s not an accident that these “observers” are organized by former president James Carter—a Democrat. The liberal wing of the war party in the United States—with John Kerry in the lead—has been clamoring for some time now for tougher measures against Venezuela. And this is what Kerry can be expected to do if he gets in office.

What’s the crime workers and peasants in Venezuela have committed in the eyes of the wealthy? They have fiercely resisted, and twice defeated, attempts by local capitalists and their imperialist backers to the north to overthrow the elected government. Working people have used increasing political space since Chávez’s election to fight for land, jobs, housing, and decent health care. They have taken advantage of laws adopted by the government that, if implemented, would strengthen the ability of those who toil for a living to defend their interests. Through these struggles millions of working people have become more self-confident and developed higher expectations. By developing the leadership they deserve, the exploited producers of Venezuela can more and more see the need through the struggles they are engaged in to carry out a social revolution, overthrow the rule of the capitalists and landlords, establish a workers and farmers government, and join the fight for socialism—that is, follow the historic line of march of the working class.

This is what a majority of the local bourgeoisie and U.S. imperialism fear. Even though Venezuela is not like Cuba, the U.S. rulers believe their own propaganda and are getting ready more and more to act on it. This is one of the reasons Washington has taken steps in the last year to smooth its working relations with the monarchy in Saudi Arabia—the number one oil producer in the world—including by cutting its large military presence there. The prospect that oil shipments to the United States from Venezuela—its third-largest petroleum supplier—could dry up is not so far fetched if the U.S. rulers qualitatively escalate their provocative course toward Caracas.

In any such offensive against Venezuela, U.S. imperialism can also be expected to strike against Cuba. The Yankee colossus cannot stomach the presence in Venezuela of thousands of internationalist volunteers from Cuba—from doctors, to literacy instructors, to agricultural specialists—and the normal trade and other ties between the two countries.

The latest U.S. sanctions limiting travel to Cuba by Cuban-Americans and the number of relatives on the island they can send money to—including banning anyone in the Cuban Communist Party from receiving such funds—is an ominous escalation of Washington’s threats and provocations against the Cuban Revolution.

These measures, along with Washington’s cynical campaign at the UN and beyond to brand the Cuban government as a violator of human rights, have nothing to do with concern for humanity, democracy, or freedom. They are carried out by an imperialist regime that has invaded and occupied Iraq to safeguard its plunder and secure its strategic bases in the Middle East—a regime that’s the number one jailer in the world, and now notorious in the eyes of millions for abusing prisoners at home and abroad.

The arrest, frame-up, and conviction on conspiracy charges of five Cuban revolutionaries working to protect their fellow countrymen from armed groups operating from U.S. soil is one more dramatic proof of the hypocrisy of U.S. claims for “justice” and “humanity.”

Washington’s use of its military garrison in Guantánamo—Cuban territory occupied against the will of the Cuban people—to jail indefinitely, without charges or rights, hundreds of men accused of “terrorism,” and to subject them to what can only be described as systematic torture, is among the greatest provocations.

These hostile actions are of a piece with the more than 40 years of the unrelenting attempts by every U.S. administration—Democrat or Republican—to overthrow the Cuban Revolution. In the face of the determination, consciousness, and preparedness of Cuba’s working people all these efforts have failed.

But why does Washington’s economic war against Cuba never end? By its example, Cuba represents a mortal danger to the property interests and prerogatives of the U.S. ruling families. Cuba shows that working people—including in Venezuela, and the United States—are capable of forging a revolutionary leadership, taking political power out of the hands of capitalist exploiters, and joining the worldwide struggle for a society based on human solidarity and the needs of the earth’s majority, not the dog-eat-dog reality and morality of capitalism.

Working people should demand:
End all U.S. restrictions on trade with and travel to Cuba!
Normalize diplomatic relations with Havana!
U.S. out of Guantánamo!
Free the Cuban Five!
U.S. hands off Venezuela!
 
 
Related articles:
Venezuelan gov’t arrests Colombian coup plotters
Mass protest denounces U.S.-backed plan to oust gov’t
Massive march in Havana protests new U.S. government sanctions against Cuba
Steelworkers end strike in Venezuela  
 
 
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