Venezuela: Arms Deals, Big and Small
April 05, 2005 19 03 GMT
Summary
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez announced the planned expansion of his
Bolivarian military reserve force from its current level of 80,000
members to nearly 2.3 million armed volunteers. Reportedly, he also
hosted a quiet visit by a delegation from North Korea the week of March
27 to April 2. As Chavez weighs the costs of arming and equipping his
military reserves, he could be thinking about buying fewer MiGs in
favor of adding a North Korean missile deterrent to Venezuela's
national armed forces.
Analysis
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said April 3 on his nationally
televised weekly program, "Hello President," that he plans to expand
the military reserve he created less than a year ago from its current
total of 80,000 members to as many as 2.3 million volunteers, or 10
percent of the Venezuelan population. Chavez said this reserve would be
trained and equipped militarily. Separately, sources close to the
Venezuelan Foreign Ministry said April 1 that a North Korean delegation
visited Caracas quietly last week for meetings with senior Chavez
government and military officials.
Chavez already is committed to buying more than $2 billion worth of
infantry, naval and air force weapons, radar systems and transports
from Brazil, China, Russia and Spain. Arming a military reserve force
of 2.3 million members with assault rifles at a price of approximately
$500 per rifle would cost the Chavez government approximately $1.15
billion -- about 20 percent of the reported $5 billion cost of
purchasing 50 Russian MiG-29 Fulcrum fighters. As a result, Stratfor
believes that Venezuela's government is rethinking plans to buy the 50
MiG-29s and is instead considering the possibility of purchasing
missiles from North Korea to create a strategic deterrent against
external aggression from Colombia and the United States. The Chavez
government could use the savings achieved by purchasing cheaper North
Korean missiles instead of MiG-29s to arm and equip its Bolivarian
military reserve.
The MiG-29s theoretically would give the Chavez government air
superiority over neighboring countries such as Colombia. However, in an
armed confrontation with the United States -- which Venezuela's new
national security doctrine portrays as the Chavez government's greatest
enemy -- most of Venezuela's MiGs likely would be destroyed on the
ground by U.S. cruise missiles, which would strike without warning. The
handful of MiGs that might get into the sky likely would be shot down
by U.S. fighters before the Venezuelan pilots could locate and engage
U.S. targets.
The Chavez government knows this because it has studied U.S. strategies
and tactics in the Iraq war with the help of its expanding military
links with China, Cuba and Russia. Venezuelan military strategists know
their radar, communications and air force assets would be the first
targets of a U.S. military strike. In fact, Eliecer Otaiza, president
of the National Land Institute and a key figure in the Chavez
government's militia defense networks, said April 1 that the government
knows the national armed forces (FAN) would be obliterated "in two
days" if the U.S. military ever invaded Venezuela.
However, the purchase of a few dozen North Korean missiles with the
capability to strike targets hundreds of miles away would give the
Chavez government a strong strategic deterrent against attack by the
U.S. or Colombian armies. Moreover, North Korean missiles would be
easier to conceal and more difficult to destroy.
Pyongyang would not sell nuclear weapons to the Chavez government.
However, Stratfor believes North Korea would happily sell Scud missiles
to Caracas for profit, or to gain political leverage in its
confrontation with the United States. Pyongyang might even consider
selling a few Nodong-1s to the Chavez government, which would give the
FAN the ability to launch missiles armed with large conventional
explosives warheads at targets deep in Colombian territory, including
Bogota.
The North Korean government has both practical and strategic reasons
for negotiating the sale of missiles and other weapons systems, such as
minisubmarines and armored vehicles, to Venezuela. Besides the
hard-currency earnings from selling arms to Caracas, Pyongyang could be
seeking some political leverage in the stalled six-nation talks on
dismantling its nuclear weapons program. If North Korea is just looking
for a fast profit, it likely will try to keep the deals quiet for as
long as it possibly can. However, if Pyongyang wants to pressure the
Bush administration, it will intentionally leak any deal it reaches
with Caracas.
If Venezuela's government decides to go for missiles instead of
MiG-29s, Pyongyang has a menu of options that likely would meet
Chavez's political and strategic requirements. The likeliest options
include the Scud-B, which has a range of about 200 miles; and the
Hwasong-6/Scud-C, with a range of about 300 miles. However, Pyongyang
also produces the Nodong-1, with a range of about 800 miles, and the
Nodong-B missile, with a range between about 1,700 miles and about
2,500 miles.
Pyongyang's price list for these systems is highly classified. However,
in July 2000 during missile talks between the United States and North
Korea, Pyongyang offered to suspend its export of missile technology in
exchange for $1 billion a year to compensate for the loss of export
revenues; the United States reportedly counteroffered with indirect
food and humanitarian aid.
The acquisition of North Korean missiles would significantly increase
Venezuela's political leverage regionally. During his March trip to
France, India, Qatar and Uruguay, Chavez said -- in one of many
speeches accusing the U.S. government of aggression -- that his enemies
would soon be claiming that Chavez is expanding ties with North Korea.
In fact, political ties between Caracas and Pyongyang are already being
strengthened, and the impetus for closer relations is coming mainly
from the Chavez government, a source in the Venezuelan Foreign Ministry
reports.
For a force of 2.3 million volunteer reservists, meanwhile, the
small-arms and other infantry equipment requirements would be immense.
Russian arms suppliers would be first in line to sell more weapons to
Venezuela since they already have sold 100,000 AK-103 and AK-104
assault rifles and 40 helicopters to the government. However, the
Chavez government also probably will purchase small-arms and infantry
equipment from South Africa in coming months.
South Africa is an important strategic ally among the multipolar
relationships that Chavez seeks to build. South Africa also has a large
and diversified arms export industry that is hungry for new markets
abroad, and a government that is desperate to grow the country's
economy more robustly. With arms suppliers in Russia, Spain, Brazil and
China rushing to close deals with Caracas, South Africa's arms
exporters will jump into the action as soon as they get a chance.
The Chavez government's actions belie its claims that it is not
entangled in a regional arms race. As originally envisioned, the
military reserve under the president's direct command was to have
totaled 100,000 volunteers deployed mainly in poor neighborhoods, or
barrios. A force of that size clearly had two objectives. One was to
serve as an instrument of internal repression if the government's oil
wealth vanished and popular support turned to angry rejection. The
other purpose was to defend the government if the FAN ever revolted
against Chavez.
However, a greatly expanded military reserve of 2.3 million members is
not a force for internal repression. Strategically, it could be
conceived by the Chavez government as the foundation of a people's
guerrilla war against invading conventional U.S. forces, but a force of
even 600,000 armed reservists could be utilized for offensive purposes.
This would seriously destabilize the balance of military power in South
America, where the largest army until now has been Brazil's with a
total force of 189,000 personnel. Moreover, it would flood Venezuela
with hundreds of thousands of new infantry weapons, some of which
likely would leak to militant groups in neighboring countries given the
high level of corruption in the FAN.
The only things potentially standing in Chavez's way are money
constraints and possible internal resistance to major arms buys within
the Chavez government. Military and civilian leaders are locked in a
power struggle over who will have the greatest political influence --
and thus the greatest access to the fiscal resources flooding into the
Bolivarian revolution's treasury. External pressures, on the other hand
-- like U.S. disapproval -- will not deter Chavez.
That said, the Chavez government's small-arms and conventional-weapons
purchases probably will advance more rapidly in coming years than its
acquisitions of more sophisticated weapons like Russian MiGs and North
Korean missiles. Transactions involving small arms, armored vehicles,
helicopters and similar items involve many contracts with many foreign
suppliers. These contracts are subject to little public scrutiny.
However, the purchase of larger and costlier weapons systems like
advanced fighter aircraft and missiles invite more public scrutiny,
bring greater international pressure, and take longer to negotiate
because of the complex technological issues and large sums of money
involved.
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