ALERT MEMORANDUM FOR: The President
FROM: VETERAN INTELLIGENCE PROFESSIONALS FOR SANITY (VIPS)
SUBJECT: What Wider War in Venezuela Would Bring
Dear President Trump:
We are deeply concerned about where the United States seems to be headed in its Venezuela policy and urge you to demand that the Intelligence Community give you clear, unfiltered, “truth-to-power” analysis, as well as covert action options in Venezuela.
Flying blind into an unprovoked war against a Latin American government, even one weakened by years of U.S. “maximum-pressure” sanctions, risks a conflagration that could draw Russia into the conflict and offers zero probability of establishing a legitimate, pro-U.S. successor government.
We see a classic storm of politicization brewing in the Intelligence Community, to which we devoted our careers, as a result of blatant pressures that it give you the “right” answer – fabricating or exaggerating a pretext for direct military intervention in Venezuela.
The State Department’s cancelation of views that don’t coincide with its own, and the intelligence community leadership’s firing of senior analysts whose classified, honest analysis contradicted unfounded Administration allegations that Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro controls the Tren de Aragua gang and is using it to attack the United States have chilled collectors’ and analysts’ willingness to provide you unbiased, neutral, accurate intelligence.
We have seen this before – during numerous intelligence and foreign policy debacles, including the fake allegations about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. And we remember the disastrous consequences for the country and its leaders.
There is room for some debate on the rationale for some sanctions on Venezuela. Maduro’s management of elections has been correctly questioned, for example. But U.S. opposition to the changes ushered in by the late President Chávez’s election in 1999 has been, for most of these 26 years, implacable.
The U.S. government, under Presidents from both parties, has imposed sanctions to paralyze the country’s economy; identified, trained, and funded opponents, including some who have resorted to violence similar to that we accuse the government of; and – even more important – has supported several failed attempts to overthrow the Chávez and Maduro Governments (with varying levels of involvement), including a blatant attempt to assassinate Maduro in plain daylight.
Hellbound and Down 