Last night CNN en Español aired the above image, which captions at the bottom "Who Killed him?" by "accident". The image of President Chavez with the caption about killing him below, which some could say subliminally incites to assassination, was a "production error" mistakenly made in the CNN en Español newsroom. The news anchor had been narrarating a story about the situation between Colombia and Venezuela and then switched to a story about an unsolved homicide but - oops - someone forgot to change the screen image and President Chavez was left with the killing statement below. Today they apologized and admitted it was a rather "unfortunate" and "regrettable" mistake. Yes, it was.
On a scarier note, an internal CIA memorandum has been obtained by Venezuelan counterintelligence from the US Embassy in Caracas that reveals a very sinister - almost fantastical, were it not true - plan to destabilize Venezuela during the coming days. The plan, titled "OPERATION PLIERS" was authored by CIA Officer Michael Middleton Steere and was addressed to CIA Director General Michael Hayden in Washington. Steere is stationed at the US Embassy in Caracas under the guise of a Regional Affairs Officer. The internal memorandum, dated November 20, 2007, references the "Advances of the Final Stage of Operation Pliers", and confirms that the operation is coordinated by the team of Human Intelligence (HUMINT) in Venezuela. The memo summarizes the different scenarios that the CIA has been working on in Venezuela for the upcoming referendum vote on December 2nd. The Electoral Scenario, as it's phrased, confirms that the voting tendencies will not change substantially before Sunday, December 2nd, and that the SI (YES) vote in favor of the constitutional reform has an advantage of about 10-13 points over the NO vote. The CIA estimates abstention around 60% and states in the memo that this voting tendency is irreversible before the elections.
Officer Steere emphasizes the importance and success of the public relations and propaganda campaign that the CIA has been funding with more than $8 million during the past month - funds that the CIA confirms are transfered through the USAID contracted company, Development Alternatives, Inc., which set up operations in June 2002 to run the USAID Office for Transition Initiatives that funds and advises opposition NGOs and political parties in Venezuela. The CIA memo specifically refers to these propaganda initiatives as "psychological operations" (PSYOPS), that include contracting polling companies to create fraudulent polls that show the NO vote with an advantage over the SI vote, which is false. The CIA also confirms in the memo that it is working with international press agencies to distort the data and information about the referendum, and that it coordinates in Venezuela with a team of journalists and media organized and directed by the President of Globovision, Alberto Federico Ravell.
CIA Officer Michael Steere recommends to General Michael Hayden two different strategies to work simultaneously: Impede the referendum and refuse to recognize the results once the SI vote wins. Though these strategies appear contradictory, Steere claims that they must be implemented together precisely to encourage activities that aim toward impeding the referendum and at the same time prepare the conditions for a rejection of the results.
How is this to be done?
In the memo, the CIA proposes the following tactics and actions:
*Take the streets and protest with violent, disruptive actions across the nation
*Generate a climate of ungovernability
*Provoke a general uprising in a substantial part of the population
*Engage in a "plan to implode" the voting centers on election day by encouraging opposition voters to "VOTE and REMAIN" in their centers to agitate others
*Start to release data during the early hours of the afternoon on Sunday that favor the NO vote (in clear violation of election regulations)
*Coordinate these activities with Ravell & Globovision and international press agencies
*Coordinate with ex-militar officers and coupsters Pena Esclusa and Guyon Cellis - this will be done by the Military Attache for Defense and Army at the US Embassy in Caracas, Office of Defense, Attack and Operations (DAO)
To encourage rejection of the results, the CIA proposes:
*Creating an acceptance in the public opinion that the NO vote will win for sure
*Using polling companies contracted by the CIA
*Criticize and discredit the National Elections Council
*Generate a sensation of fraud
*Use a team of experts from the universities that will talk about how the data from the Electoral Registry has been manipulated and will build distrust in the voting system
The CIA memo also talks about:
*Isolating Chavez in the international community
*Trying to achieve unity amongst the opposition
*Seek an aliance between those abstentionists and those who will vote "NO"
*Sustain firmly the propaganda against Chavez
*Execute military actions to support the opposition mobilizations and propagandistic occupations
*Finalize the operative preparations on the US military bases in Curacao and Colombia to provide support to actions in Venezuela
*Control a part of the country during the next 72-120 hours
*Encourage a military rebellion inside the National Guard forces and other components
Those involved in these actions as detailed in the CIA memo are:
*The CIA Office in Venezuela - Office of Regional Affairs, and Officer Michael Steere
*US Embassy in Venezuela, Ambassador Patrick Duddy
*Office of Defense, Attack and Operations (DAO) at the US Embassy in Caracas and Military Attache Richard Nazario
---Venezuelan Political Parties:
*Comando Nacional de la Resistencia
*Accion Democratica
*Primero Justicia
*Bandera Roja
-----Media:
*Alberto Federico Ravell & Globovision
*Interamerican Press Society (IAPA) or SIP in Spanish
*International Press Agencies
------Venezuelans:
**Pena Esclusa
*Guyon Cellis
*Dean of the Simon Bolivar University, Rudolph Benjamin Podolski
*Dean of the Andres Bello Catholic University, Ugalde
*Students: Yon Goicochea, Juan Mejias, Ronel Gaglio, Gabriel Gallo, Ricardo Sanchez
Operation Tenaza has the objective of encouraging an armed insurrection in Venezuela against the government of President Chavez that will justify an intervention of US forces, stationed on the military bases nearby in Curacao and Colombia. The Operation mentions two countries in code: as Blue and Green. These refer to Curacao and Colombia, where the US has operative, active and equipped bases that have been reinforced over the past year and a half in anticipation of a conflict with Venezuela.
The document confirms that psychological operations are the CIA's best and most effective weapon to date against Venezuela, and it will continue its efforts to influence international public opinion regarding President Chavez and the situation in the country.
Operation Tenaza is a very alarming plan that aims to destabilize Venezuela and overthrow (again) its legitimate and democratic (and very popularly support) president. The plan will fail, primarily because it has been discovered, but it must be denounced around the world as an unacceptable violation of Venezuela's sovereignty.
The original document in English will be available in the public sphere soon for viewing and authenticating purposes. And it also contains more information than has been revealed here.
39 comments:
It is laughable how paranoid and inaccurate your theories are Eva. Just because you think you are the first person to figure out what the FOIA is doesn't mean you can just invent details and pass them off as authentic. Don't worry, your paper tiger prophet Chavez will fall sooner than later. Once that happens, don't expect the State Department to give you your gringo passport back. Membership has privileges baby, and you have forfeited all yours. Enjoy the post-Chavez apocalypse with no petro-dollars to bankroll you and your lack of talent.
Obviously TWR is in the camp of those who think overthrowing a popular democratically elected President is a way that the United States can show how we love freedom and democracy.
I would certainly think Chavez would be fully justified in ending diplomatic relations with the US and deporting all Embassy personnel and their CIA hangers-on. There is little question that if another nation hatched a plot like that to interfere with a US election, the Bush government would do no less (unless they were the ones doing it again).
Venezuelan citizens who are actively involved in efforts to depress the vote, interfere with the vote, or intimidate voters should be arrested and charged.
Chavez is absolutely entitled to take any steps necessary to halt foreign interference in the internal affairs of his nation, and he should do so with all deliberate speed.
TWR, what exactly do you mean when you say that "membership has privileges" and that if you denounce US acts you then "forfeit them."
In other words, if you are a US citizen you must be loyal to all acts of the US government, without criticizing or resisting those acts that you don't agree with?
Is this the kind of "freedom" that you believe in? That everyone must be a bunch of drones (like you) and just agree with everything their government does?
The classic "love it or leave it" mentality? If anything is laughable, it is the way people like you think. And you come here to criticize? That, indeed, is laughable.
For twr, "Membership has its privileges" is the same thing as the 'garch teat. Chavez took his away. That "who you blow" job he had lined up at PDVSA is gone and now he has to make his living in Miami selling T-shirts at intersections to Cubans that are printed with things like, "por que no te calles"
twr, your comment is the perfect example why the people in the civilised world just "love" Americans and their politics.
Viva Venezuela y su revoluciòn bolivariana
viva Hugo Chávez Frías !
Hi Eva, great job. I did not really expect any military action this soon but I can see why they are seizing this opportunity. There will already be alot of chaos even without CIA help so it is perfect timing for a military takeover. Keep the faith, hope for a miracle, gary
Oh my, the word straight from Langley, Virginia.
It is laughable how ameriKKKan dogs still think their stupid tactics will work. Sorry, but more and more people have become suddenly politically mature by observing your war crimes in Iraq and how you have no regard whatsoever for international law.
I'm happy to say that the military industrial banking/media complex is being totally exposed on all fronts. The problem for the leadership of this fascist world government system is that they are all inbred demented filth and they are imploding due to their own evil delusions.
The CIA works at the behest of the Rockefeller/Rothschild banking cartel and they were forced to leave Venezuela by Chavez. They want total control of the planet and all of it's natural resources then, they plan on killing 80-90% of the world population.
Chavez, is the only world leader with the courage to stand-up to their power and they hate him for it. He took-on the world bank and the IMF and won.
The Bush/Cheney/Clinton cabal are all controlled by their banking masters and they will do whatever they are told with regard to Chavez.
It's going to get real ugly and will spin out of control in the next year or two, maybe sooner.
The neo-fascists that now control the US government will create yet another pretext or "staged event" like 9/11 to blame on Chavez so they can use military action. However, they will need to bring the US under marshal law first and take total control of all decent and protest within the US.
The more cornered these criminals get the more deadly they will become. 2008, will be the year that all living hell breaks loose around the world. Next year will be the most ominous and dangerous 12 months thus far in human history.
Enjoy every minute of every day...
twr,
What does the freedom of information act have to do with Embassy communications which are top secret?
You sound like an idiot. Why don't you go to the US where you might run into the gringos who think all Latinos are third world people fit only to scrub their toilets, pick vegetables, or cut their grass? .... that is, if you can get passed them at the border. Did you miss what is going on in the US regarding the Spanish speaking peoples? The majority of citizens in the US do not like Hispanic peoples right now.
Because a majority of people vote for something in their own country the US doesn't like, there should be bloodshed and insurrection to "those people"?
overazealousness breeds naivete ... it is typical tradecraft that this "exposed" "operation" memo is but a contrived bait laid out to be found and misdirect whilst the true plan quietly proceeds to success ... beware brethren and sistren(??)
Moreover, just as in the west, leading candidates from both/all major parties are but pawn puppets of the PTB, so too on a grander scale are both Chavez and Ahmedinajad, inter many alia, too but "role-players" for the self same PTB. Oh I guess but this is too advanced craft for many to comprehend. (remember Hitler?)
Babu,
I think you are right although I think Chavez should be prepared for anything because there was a shipment of weapons confiscated.
That communique is odd being written in spanish it should not be discounted but it may be to elicit a harsh govt response to the opposition which could then be used to condemn the pro-Chvez people.
If what I am doing is not getting the results I want, I would leak something as this and wait to see if it brings the response I want.
I love how all of you accept this b.s. lock, stock and barrel. You really think Chavez's call girl has access to internal CIA documents that are barely a week old? I suppose you all believe that CNN is trying to assassinate Chavez as well? Or that artificial price controls on everything from food to currency is sound economic policy? Or that borrowing billions of dollars from abroad even though oil is hovering at $100 a barrel is good fiscal management? Or burning bridges with every leader with whom you have a disagreement is good diplomacy?
Please, don't question my intelligence. You are the ones who are blind to the reality on the ground in Venezuela. Oh and btw, just because someone thinks Chavez is a dangerous buffoon driving the nation into the ground doesn't mean
that person is a Bush supporter. On the contrary, most intelligent thinkers in the US who oppose the policies of the current US administration also are against authoritarian regimes that threaten opposition with jail or hanging...
http://www.marxmail.org/msg34091.html
Re: [Marxism] CIA Operation "Pliers"???
* To: "'Activists and scholars in Marxist tradition'"
* Subject: Re: [Marxism] CIA Operation "Pliers"???
* From: "Joaquin Bustelo" [email protected]
* Date: Thu, 29 Nov 2007 06:31:22 -0500
* Delivered-to: [email protected]
* In-reply-to: <1196303296.4993.23.camel@localhost>
* References: <1196303296.4993.23.camel@localhost>
* Reply-to: Activists and scholars in Marxist tradition [email protected]
* Sender: [email protected]
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Golinger is quoted as saying: Last night CNN en Español aired the above
image, which captions at the bottom "Who Killed him?" by "accident". The
image of President Chavez with the caption about killing him below, which
some could say subliminally incites to assassination, was a "production
error" mistakenly made in the CNN en Español newsroom.
* * *
It was a production error, and not an uncommon on live TV. What was involved
war not stories but a sequence of headlines at the top of the show. The
anchor reading the headlines made it clear at the time, indicating those
were the wrong pictures and re-reading the headline emphasizing "in the
United States" there is an investigation about this guy's death (I think his
name was Taylor, a famous sports guy if I remember right).
The reality is that news channels like this ideally would have someone
dedicated, or at least in a position, to systematically double check the
scripts and sequencing of video clips. However, automation has replaced the
people who would have done that in the past -- the people loading cassettes
with videos into players and cuing them for playback -- and as a result you
see an increased number of such errors, not just on CNN en Español but on
all news channels and local news, as anyone who watches it can testify.
For a CIA conspiracy to exist behind this, it would have to extend to
encompass everyone in an operation where there is a diversity of points of
view, including some who everyone knows are sympathetic to Chavez, as well
as a bunch of people who plain don't care. As for one or a couple of
individuals making the mistake consciously, at least half the time or more,
in my experience, such mistakes are avoided by an alert person in the
newsroom who sees the cued video in the preview monitor and looks at the
prompter display and sees it is Taylor not Chavez or Uribe coming up, and
then there's always the alert anchor, like the one last night, who saw it
was the wrong video out of the corner of his eye on the air monitor next to
the prompter display and corrected it.
The excerpt from the show is on youtube and people can check it out for
themselves.
Joaquin
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* References:
o [Marxism] CIA Operation "Pliers"???
+ From: Jon Flanders [email protected]
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/11/28/18227/641
A CIA plan to destabilize Venezuela...
Permalink | 112 comments
http://tinyurl.com/2be9r6
for the daily kos diary
"Menshevik" is the responder when the Peter Ackerman/Jack DuVall/International Centre on Non-Violent Conflict (ICNC)group or the Gene Sharp/Robert Helvey/Albert Einstein Institution group are exposed. This must be one of their memos.
If Menshevik is a Marxist, then I am the King of Spain. Why don't you shut the f#ck up.
Venezuela's Constitutional Reform
http://tinyurl.com/2p9o45
Venezuela News And Views: Miguel is sending his pictures from Bolivar avenue, at the Students March
http://tinyurl.com/3ymons
"...Or that artificial price controls on everything from food to currency is sound economic policy?"
Oooooh.. so TWR is a neoliberal, then?
Afraid to see another nation succeed under a mixed economy, are we?
Afraid that the world will take notice and make the disaster capitalists compete with the rest of us smart, creative, innovative working people?
Face it, fascists can't compete unless the game is rigged and neoliberals are just fascists in better suits.
Dummies,
If this were an actual operation it would not be "Memorandum Confidential". As it is listed on the website. It would be "TOP SECRET". Get a clue. The Perp’s of this silly little story do not even know protocol.
Even a co-worker with Eva Gollinger
("Jeremy Bigwood & Eva Golinger: the shady duo"
http://www.vcrisis.com/index.php?content=letters/200503250937 )
thinks the document is a fake.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/30/world/americas/30venez.html
>...Reports of such plots are not in short supply here. The main state
television network broadcast coverage this week of a memorandum in
Spanish that it claimed had been written by the C.I.A. in which
destabilization plans against Mr. Chávez were laid out. American
involvement in Venezuelan politics remains a particularly delicate issue
here, after the Bush administration tacitly supported a coup in 2002
that briefly ousted Mr. Chávez.
"We reject and are disappointed in the Venezuelan government's
allegations that the United States is involved in any type of conspiracy
to affect the outcome of the constitutional referendum," Benjamin Ziff,
a spokesman for the United States Embassy here, said in a statement.
A C.I.A. spokesman called the document "a fake," while analysts,
including investigators who had previously uncovered financing of
Venezuelan opposition groups by the United States government, expressed
doubts about the authenticity of the memo.
"I find the document quite suspect," said Jeremy Bigwood, an independent
researcher in Washington. "There's not an original version in English,
and the timing of its release is strange."
Well, aporrea.com posted something on what Chavez has replied. Basically:
-Any media outlet found to be involved in this type of subversive activity will be closed down, foreign media will be expelled.
-If such a thing does occur with US backing, he will suspend gas shipments to the US.
The oligarchy's massive propaganda system is hard at work in the USA in their efforts to destroy democracy in Venezuela. The ignorant fools have no love in their hearts for the people. Morally they are bankrupt, and their are destined to fall. Chavez should kick out those who are trying to disrupt government by and for the people. It's time to get tough with the bastards.
Where will the original document be published? Is a Spanish transcription available? Is there any information on the provenance of the document? The CIA has called it a "fake," State has denied -- after April 2002, how much credibility does State have on the issue? -- and Jeremy Bigwood is quoted in the NY Times as casting doubt on it because "There’s not an original version in English, and the timing of its release is strange." That seems like a fair point, at any rate. The NY Times is the only major news organization I can find that even mentions the matter. It is also charged that SIP-IAPA is cooperating in falsifying opinion poll results. (Headline in EL TIEMPO the other day: "5 of 6 polls indicated advantage for NO," while other papers are reporting "a technical tie.") After the Casas Memorandum incident in Costa Rica, and the behavior of Susan Schwab, and other peculiar incidents of weirdly slanted reporting from the likes of AP and Reuters, this sort of claim seems plausible. But it needs solid documentary backing, preferably before the vote, if the Hugoites want to dispel charges that this is an "October surprise"-style publicity stunt. Personally, as a member with full privileges myself (well, maybe not FULL privileges -- I am not a Bush Pioneer), I would just like to know if it is a fact that we pay gazillions in taxes to these people to keep secrets, and then they prove to be unable to (Valerie Plame). Look, I would not vote for Chávez myself, for mayor of New York City, say (I voted Bloomberg). But then again, I am not Venezuelan, so I figure it really isn't any of my business. I would just like to know what my tax dollars are paying for, if not dropping a smart bomb on Osama bin Laden. Now THAT I would be willing to pay for.
There is no "Democracy" in the USA, it is a place where a small elite class imposes its will on the majority. This was not the case after the US Revolution.
It has gotten to the point where Mayors and Governors impose taxes and the middle class is disappearing. Jobs are going to other countries. No vote by the people is ever taken on any of these issues. Look at the immigration debate, no one is listening to the people and the people are starting to become violent towards Latinos, all over the country. No one is listening to the people about the war either. No one in the US listens to the people anymore.
Venezuelans, whether you vote "Si" o "No", you get what we in the US do not; a vote that matters.
In the years I lived in Central / South America, in all the years under real Dictators, even under the US system; there is one thing neither me nor my family ever got to do ... vote for something that counts. You do not have to pay lobbyists to pay Officials for a decision. YOU get to vote.
Make your vote count.
A Dios te pido.
Perdoneme Eva for the multiple posts, there seems to be something wrong on my end today.
Hello Eva
I have a lot of respect for you and the work that you are doing. I wanted to ask you something...
I spoke to the side of my family in Caracas who are pro-Chavez yesterday and they surprised me as even they were against the proposed changes to the constitution and said they would be voting NO. There is a lot of anxiety surrounding some of the proposals that are maybe just too radical for people to ratify. The idea of the State taking kids away from their parents when they reach a certain age and having state control over the kids in order to educate them is causing particular alarm and outrage it seems. I must admit I am still trying to find more info on this proposal to understand just exactly what has been proposed. Can you shed some light on this proposal?
Many thanks for your time
Jason,
The problem is not so much that the state takes your children at a certain age but its more that they eat them after they have been educated.
And doesn't that really point out the fundamental difference between Chavez and someone much better like Carlos Andres Perez.
Andres always ate them uneducated. To waste educational resources like that is just ridiculous
By all means, you and your Caracas family scurry on out and vote a big "NO" to eating educated children
Further to my last comment; it appears that U.S. companies are behind much of the anti-reform propaganda that was spread prior to the referendum vote.
One of the most scandalous was an anonymous two-page spread in the country’s largest circulation newspaper, Últimas Noticias, which claimed about the Constitutional Reform:
“If you are a Mother, YOU LOSE! Because you will lose your house, your family and your children (children will belong to the state).”
The illegal ad, which was caught and suspended by the Venezuelan National Electoral Council (CNE) after a few days in the press, has received relatively high-profile attention in the Venezuelan press, and even Chavez joked about it last Friday on the nightly pro-Chavez talk show, La Hojilla. What appears to have gone completely ignored, however, is the fact that the ad itself was placed by an organization which has at its core, dozens of subsidiaries of the largest US corporations working in Venezuela.
The problem appears to be that many thousands of Venezuelans, many of them Chavez supporters, have bought the exaggerations and lies about Venezuela’s Constitutional Reform that have been circulating across the country and the impact that this propaganda has on today’s vote could be key.
As I said earlier, my own family in Caracas have been frightened by the exaggerations enough to turn against the reforms and withdraw their support.
For more info see http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/2904
Tio
Further to my last comment; it appears that U.S. companies are behind much of the anti-reform propaganda that was spread prior to the referendum vote.
One of the most scandalous was an anonymous two-page spread in the country’s largest circulation newspaper, Últimas Noticias, which claimed about the Constitutional Reform:
“If you are a Mother, YOU LOSE! Because you will lose your house, your family and your children (children will belong to the state).”
The illegal ad, which was caught and suspended by the Venezuelan National Electoral Council (CNE) after a few days in the press, has received relatively high-profile attention in the Venezuelan press, and even Chavez joked about it last Friday on the nightly pro-Chavez talk show, La Hojilla. What appears to have gone completely ignored, however, is the fact that the ad itself was placed by an organization which has at its core, dozens of subsidiaries of the largest US corporations working in Venezuela.
The problem appears to be that many thousands of Venezuelans, many of them Chavez supporters, have bought the exaggerations and lies about Venezuela’s Constitutional Reform that have been circulating across the country and the impact that this propaganda has on today’s vote could be key.
As I said earlier, my own family in Caracas have been frightened by the exaggerations enough to turn against the reforms and withdraw their support.
For more info see http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/2904
Tio
Thank you for revealing this. The CIA has used a similar strategy in Ayiti. We have posted on HaitiAnalysis.com
Please post a copy of the original before it gets "lost".
What a joke you have become.
Interesting article eva
its quite a clever strategy the US are employing. Destabilise the country through propaganda that argues that Chavez is an opponent of democracy (mixed with more insidious attempts at destabilisation, threats of violence, attacks on democratic processes etc) and then when destabilisation does occur and Chavez is forced into a situation where he has to declare a state of emergency- bang- the US appear to have been right all along. from there we presume less clandestine operations can begin
Found the original document yet? We'd love to see it.
Eva, great blog. I am interested in how you got involved in the Bolivarian movement and made the move to Caracas, and how you are finding life now that you are there. Did you have connections previously? Is there a program for interationalists to wish to participate?
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