Wasn't Abrams linked to this same tactic during Iran Contra? Aid shipments used to smuggle arms to revolutionary groups? https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019...ns-venezuela-linked-cia-black-site-renditions US Company That Smuggled Weapons Into Venezuela Linked To CIA "Black Site" Renditions by Tyler Durden Thu, 02/14/2019 - 17:20 0 SHARES Twitter Facebook Reddit Email Print Authored by Whitney Webb via MintPressNews.com, Two executives at the company that chartered the U.S. plane that was caught smuggling weapons into Venezuela last week have been tied to an air cargo company that aided the CIA in the rendition of alleged terrorists to “black site” centers for interrogation. The troubling revelation comes as Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has rejected a U.S. “humanitarian aid” convoy over concerns that it could contain weapons meant to arm the country’s U.S.-backed opposition. Last Tuesday, Venezuelan authorities announced that 19 rifles, 118 ammo magazines, 90 radios and six iPhones had been smuggled into the country via a U.S. plane that had originated in Miami. The authorities blamed the United States government for the illicit cargo, accusing it of seeking to arm U.S.-funded opposition groups in the country in order to topple the current Maduro-led government. A subsequent investigation into the plane responsible for the weapons caché conducted by McClatchyDC received very little media attention despite the fact that it uncovered information clearly showing that the plane responsible for the shipment had been making an unusually high number of trips to Venezuela and neighboring Colombia over the past few weeks. Steffan Watkins, an Ottawa-based analyst, told McClatchy in a telephone interview that the plane, which is operated by U.S. air cargo company 21 Air, had been “flying between Philadelphia and Miami and all over the place, but all continental U.S.” during all of last year. However, Watkins noted that “all of a sudden in January, things changed” when the plane began making trips to Colombia and Venezuela on a daily basis, sometimes multiple times a day. According to Watkins’ analysis, this single plane had conducted 40 round-trip flights from Miami International Airport to Caracas and Valencia — where the smuggled weapons had been discovered — in Venezuela, as well as to Bogota and Medellin in Colombia in just the past month. Publicly available flight radar information shows that the plane, although it has not returned to Venezuela since the discovery of its illicit cargo, has continued to travel to Medellin, Colombia, as recently as this past Monday. Multiple CIA ties In addition to the dramatic and abrupt change in flight patterns that occurred just weeks before U.S. Vice President Mike Pence prompted Venezuelan opposition member Juan Guaidó to declare himself “interim president,” a subsequent McClatchy follow-up investigation also uncovered the fact that two top executives at the company that owns the plane in question had previously worked with a company connected to controversial CIA “black sites.” Indeed, the chairman and majority owner of 21 Air, Adolfo Moreno, and 21 Air’s director of quality control, Michael Steinke, both have “either coincidental or direct ties” to Gemini Air Cargo, a company previously named by Amnesty International as one of the air charter services involved in a CIA rendition program. In this CIA program, individuals suspected of terrorism were abducted by the intelligence agency and then taken abroad to third-country secret “black sites” where torture, officially termed “enhanced interrogation,” was regularly performed. Steinke worked for Gemini Air Cargo from 1996 to 1997, according to a 2016 Department of Transportation document cited by McClatchy. Moreno, although he did not work for Gemini, registered two separate business at a Miami address that was later registered to Gemini Air Cargo while the CIA rendition program was active. McClatchy noted that the first business Moreno registered at the location was incorporated in 1987 while the second was created in 2001. Gemini Cargo Logistics, a subsidiary of Gemini Air Cargo, was subsequently registered at that same location in 2005. 21 Air has denied any responsibility for the weapons shipment discovered onboard the plane it operates, instead blaming a contractor known as GPS-Air for the illicit cargo. A GPS-Air manager, Cesar Meneses, told McClatchy that the weapons shipment had been “fabricated” by the Maduro-led government to paint his government as the victim. Meneses also stated that “the cargo doesn’t belong to 21 Air and it doesn’t belong to GPS-Air” and that it had been provided by third parties, whose identities Meneses declined to disclose. Contras redux? The revelation that the company that operates the plane caught smuggling weapons into Venezuela has connections to past controversial CIA programs is unlikely to surprise many observers, given the CIA’s decades-long history of funneling weapons to U.S.-backed opposition fighters in Latin America, Southeast Asia and other conflict areas around the globe. One of the best-known examples of the CIA using airliners to smuggle weapons to a U.S.-backed paramilitary group occurred during the 1980s in what became known as the Iran-Contra scandal, in which the Reagan administration delivered weapons to the Contra rebels in order to topple the left-leaning Sandinista movement. Many of those weapons had been hidden on flights claiming to be carrying “humanitarian aid” into Nicaragua. The parallels between aspects of the Contra scandal and the current situation in Venezuela are striking, particularly given the recent “outrage” voiced by mainstream media and prominent U.S. politicians over Maduro’s refusal to allow U.S. “humanitarian aid” into the country. Maduro had explained his rejection of the aid as partially stemming from the concern that it could contain weapons or other supplies aimed at creating an armed opposition force, like the “rebel” force that was armed by the CIA in Syria in 2011. Though the media has written off Maduro’s concern as unfounded, that is hardly the case in light of the fact that the Trump administration’s recently named special envoy in charge of the administration’s Venezuela policy, Elliott Abrams, had been instrumental in delivering weapons to the Nicaraguan Contras, including hiding those weapons in “humanitarian aid” shipments. In subsequent testimony after the scandal broke in the 1980s, Abrams himself admitted to funneling weapons to the Contras in exactly this way. With the recently uncovered illicit weapons shipment from the U.S. to Venezuela now linked to companies that have previously worked with the CIA in covert operations, Maduro’s response to the “humanitarian aid” controversy is even more justified. Unfortunately for him, the U.S.-backed “interim president,” Juan Guaidó, announced on Monday that his parallel government had received the first “external” source of “humanitarian aid” into the country, but would not disclose its source, its specific contents, nor how it had entered the country.
How could Trump be serious about "draining the Swamp" when he has hired some of worst Swamp Monsters imaginable in Mr. "Lie, Cheat, Steal" Pompeo and the dual-citizens Bolton and Pompeo, the latter a convicted felon and war criminal using the same old demonic playbook that he used during Iran Contra.
Leaked: USA’s Feb 2018 Plan for Coup in Venezuela Eric Zuesse Admiral KW Tidd, of US South Command, the author of the leaked memo A detailed plan from “UNITED STATES SOUTHERN COMMAND” dated “23 FEBRUARY 2018” was issued with the title “PLAN TO OVERTHROW THE VENEZUELAN DICTATORSHIP ‘MASTERSTROKE’” and is here presented complete. This document was personally signed by Admiral Kurt W. Tidd, who was the Commander (the chief), at SOUTHCOM, and he was thus the top U.S. military official handling Venezuela. But this was far more than just a military plan. It was comprehensive — directing military, diplomatic, and propaganda, policies — regarding the Trump Administration’s planned “Overthrow” of Venezuela’s Government. His plan has since guided the Administration’s entire operation, including “the capacities of the psychological war,” regarding Venezuela. It instructed SOUTHCOM: Encouraging popular dissatisfaction by increasing scarcity and rise in price of the foodstuffs, medicines and other essential goods for the inhabitants. Making more harrowing and painful the scarcities of the main basic merchandises.” … intensifying the undercapitalization of the country, the leaking out of foreign currency and the deterioration of its monetary base, bringing about the application of new inflationary measures.” … Fully obstruct imports, and at the same time discouraging potential foreign investors in order to make the situation more critical for the population.” … compelling him to fall into mistakes that generate greater distrust and rejection domestically” … To besiege him, to ridicule him and to pose him as symbol of awkwardness and incompetence. To expose him as a puppet of Cuba.” … Appealing to domestic allies as well as other people inserted from abroad in the national scenario in order to generate protests, riots and insecurity, plunders, thefts, assaults and highjacking of vessels as well as other means of transportation, with the intention of deserting this country in crisis through all borderlands and other possible ways, jeopardizing in such a way the National Security of neighboring frontier nations. Causing victims and holding the Government responsible for them. Magnifying, in front of the world, the humanitarian crisis in which the country has been submitted to.” Structuring a plan to get the profuse desertion of the most qualified professionals from the country, in order ‘to leave it with no professionals at all’, which will aggravate even more the internal situation and along these lines putting the blame on of Government.” the presence of combat units from the United States of America and the other named countries, under the command of a Joint General Staff led by the USA.” It was posted online at the Voltairenet site, and was first copied to a web archive on 14 May 2018. So, it has been online since at least that date. However, because the photo in it of the document wasn’t made available via software which includes the individual symbols, but presented only the full visual image of the paper document, it still hasn’t yet gone viral on the Web. Here, therefore, is the first appearance, on the Web, of the full document, that’s manually copied, character-by-character, so that each phrase in this document becomes, for the first time, web-searchable, and thereby conveniently available for journalists and historians to quote from. This prophetic document — the source for what has happened afterward in and to Venezuela — might therefore finally receive the public attention that it so clearly merits. The document starts with propaganda against Venezuela’s existing Government (and it totally ignores the extent to which the pre-existing U.S. economic sanctions against Venezuela had actually caused these problems), and it then proceeds to present the U.S. plan to overthrow the ‘dictatorship’. (Tidd refers to Maduro only as “the Dictator,” except at the very start and very end. At the end, he commands “the denouncement toward Maduro’s regimen” and he also uses the phrase “the enemy” to refer to him — as if there had been the U.S. Constitutionally required authorization, by the U.S. Congress, of this “war.” The close urges “the dispatch of a UNO military force for the imposition of peace, once Nicolas Maduro’s corrupt dictatorship is defeated.” The U.N. is militarily to “impose” “peace,” after the U.S. and its allies have conquered Venezuela.) Although Tidd placed 100% of the blame for Venezuela’s problems upon Maduro, and ignored the crucial extent to which U.S. economic sanctions had caused them, his plan emphasized that the U.S. must actively make things even worse for the Venezuelan public than America’s economic sanctions had yet done. His coup-plan is loaded with such statements, and, in fact, opens with one: “Encouraging popular dissatisfaction by increasing scarcity and rise in price of the foodstuffs, medicines and other essential goods for the inhabitants. Making more harrowing and painful the scarcities of the main basic merchandises.” So: he wasn’t naive. America’s induced suffering upon Venezuelans was part of his plan for Venezuelans, in order to get them to do what the U.S. regime wants them to do — overthrow Maduro. Furthermore, the United States Government has had extensive successes in previous such operations. One example is that this was how Chile’s Salvador Allende was brought down in 1973 (at a time when the U.S. Government’s claims to have done it for ‘national security’ reasons had much more credibility than its current excuse of helping the Venezuelan people does, because the supposedly ideological Cold War was still on). The only excuse that the perpetrators can come up with, this time around, is “to put an end to the Venezuelan nightmare and the awakening of theirs beloved nation at a luminous dawn, in which the vision of fortune, true peace and tranquility predominate for their fellow citizens.” Impoverish the nation, in order to help Venezuelans attain “true peace and tranquility.” That’s the plan. Here is the document’s entire text..." https://off-guardian.org/2019/05/02/leaked-usas-feb-2018-plan-for-coup-in-venezuela/
Yeah they are, they are revolutionaries so it is no surprise. I also wouldn't be surprised if the refusal to take part in elections was simply a ploy from the beginning to overthrow Maduro with Guido already in place to make it happen and in position to assume the presidency. I think Trump will milk the tensions there for the election cycle political capital before doubling down. I don't think Russia is going to do much besides play defense there much like they have in Syria. All they have to do is stave off his overthrow and they win so to speak. If we are so concerned about starving Venezuelans we would lift sanctions. We are not so we won't. It's always the same humanitarian crisis blame game every time. It's not working, neither are disrupting public services and people see through it so soon we will see a major "crisis event" to shift the momentum and try to drum up support. Revolution 101.
It reads like a play by play of the Syrian crisis and war. It began the exact same way. Repeated disruption of public utilities, internet, and transportation, escalation into protestors being shot by snipers, and culminated in repeated chemical attacks anytime the US threatened to leave or decrease personnel.
R67 put down President Trumps prayers for the people of Venezuela and his comments against Socialism. R67 is blaming the US for what is occurring in Venezuela, not Maduro and company. Therefore, he is supporting Maduro. 2 + 2 = 4 Don. This is post of yours is brainwashing, you have already come up with a narrative for something that hasn't occurred yet. This is very, very sad. Russian trolls do the sort of thing that you and R67 are doing. Just like Russia, R67 wanted Trump to win in 2016 but now that Trump is helping bring America back to God and has been very positive for the USA in general, R67 doesn't have a good word for Trump, quite the opposite. I get all of R67's concerns over the Neocons, etc. but come on. In addition, Trump is trying to clean out the Deep State which is obviously not going to occur over night. I do think that most members on MOG have figured this out about R67 and possibly you too, and they ignore a lot of the nonsense that you both post. I know I do. R67 isn't too happy with any of Trump's positive results. I'm not sure that you are either, actually. Sad, sad, sad. Both Raymond Arroyos and Bill Donohue acknowledged all of President Trump's very positive accomplishments on the World Over last night, in case you missed it I posted it below. I also want to point out that I am not saying that we should not criticize anything that Trump and his administration does but I posted a video of Trump's talk at the National Day of Prayer yesterday and I mention how he asking for prayers for Venezuela and R67 attacked it and you come to his defense, really? And yes, I believe that Maduro and co. is still living in comfort and I highly doubt that Guaido is, that was the point to my other post - just in case you missed that too.
It is not the USA who caused the suffering of the people in Venezuela, it was Maduro and Chazez. So long as you don't believe this fact, you will never be able to have a reasonable discussion about Venezuela. You can rehash all of the past which is unrelated to Venezuela as much as you like but it won't change the fact that it was the corruption of Venezuela's own government that got them to the place where they are now. Venezuela has all the natural resources to sustain a thriving nation but yet they are where they are now due to corruption and greed.
American companies lost in a huge way when Chavez was elected. So, Richard stop blaming all of America for Venezuela’s socialism. Socialism sneaks in because of corrupt governments. Yes, there is a group of leftist Neo Cons in the U.S. government that want global control. And they plan to achieve this every way they can - “the ends justifies the means” mentality” is their motto. And that motto has been used time and time again by our own CIA and State Dept. Especially on the 4th Floor of the State Dept. But discover who has been behind the Department wheeling and dealing and you will discover the culprits. Left wing billion dollar families that have controlled for decades like the Rockefeller’s. Today we have the Soros family causing havoc. One can’t differentiate between these mafia family lackeys and our agencies anymore. It’s the same people. And most of our Presidents have enriched themselves by turning a blind eye to the corruption in our own government, like Obama. If a country falls in the hands of corruption as Venezuela and Cuba, our sleazy leftist State Dept takes over, but only if there is a strategic interest in it for them. They don’t want an anti Socialist country that is sovereign because they won’t have complete control of their illegal dealings. So, Richard freeing Venezuela from socialism would actually destroy the very people you speak so ill of. I think Trump and his small anti communist group are doing a great job in unveiling this. Remember Trump was raised to loathe communists. He knows this culture of drugs, immorality etc., is a communist plot to destroy our youth and future. If he is able to do this and survive it would be a miracle. Those of us who want to end the era of the Rockefeller’s and Soros’ are hoping he wins. It won’t be easy, but if he forms a coalition with hawks who see the real enemy - communists - then there is a chance. The Democrat party is now a full fledged communist party. Today we know who is who in both party’s. The American public is much more aware of the dangers by watching the deterioration of a rich nation like Venezuela. We are becoming educated by right wing thinking. No longer is the public believing the Mainstream media. They are losing their constituents. That is a small victory.
It is primarily the United States that has caused the ongoing suffering in Venezuela because it is the United States which has been engaging in attempted regime change in Venezuela for over a decade across multiple Administrations. The fact that you continue to ignore and defend the United States' evil economic sanctions (designed to cripple the Venezuelan economy) and Team Neocon's violent attempts at regime change for over a decade, tells me that you are doing exactly what you accuse me of doing: trolling.
Trump was elected, in part, to end the Neocon foreign policy agenda, not expand it. Trump was elected to drain the swamp, not hire swamp creatures like Pompeo, Bolton, and Abrams. I voted for Trump for these reasons and because I believed his campaign rhetoric. But his subsequent actions have proven him to be a fraud. Personnel is policy. No one forced Trump to hire swamp creatures to lead his foreign policy agenda. He could have hired some genuine America First statesmen to lead a responsible, just foreign policy - one that reflected the founding principles. But Trump has rejected that path and has embraced the Neocon foreign policy agenda which is anti-American and anti-Christian to the core. Trump could have lifted the sanctions on Venezuela, ended the violent attempts at regime change and allowed Venezuelans to chart their own course. Instead, he is currently engaged in a violent attempt at regime change in Venezuela. I will not excuse him and will continue to rebut fellow Catholics who think it is okay to support and defend the anti-Christian, anti-American Neocon foreign policy agenda.
Well, you have some good company - Rep. Ilhan Omar .... VP Pence slams Ilhan Omar for accusing Trump admin of 'bullying' Venezuela: 'Doesn't know what she's talking about' By Barnini Chakraborty | May 3, 2019 | https://www.foxnews.com/politics/pence-ilhan-omar-economy-trump-fox-interview Vice President Mike Pence took aim at Rep. Ilhan Omar, D-Minn., Friday over her recent comments on the unrest in Venezuela. During an interview with "America's Newsroom," the vice president responded to recent remarks from the freshman lawmaker when she stated Trump administration is partly responsible for the political and civil unrest unfolding in Venezuela because of its "bullying" tactics and sanctions. "The congresswoman doesn't know what she's talking about," Pence said. "Nicolas Maduro is a socialist dictator who has taken what was one of the most prosperous nations in this hemisphere and brought it literally to a level of deprivation and oppression and poverty that we have never seen. Nine out of 10 people in Venezuela live in poverty. Three million people have fled Venezuela. That's not a result of U.S. policies. That's the result of dictatorship and socialism that has been imposed on people of Venezuela by Nicolas Maduro." [emphasis added] Earlier in the week, Omar told PBS' "Democracy Now!" that "a lot of the policies that we have put in place has kind of helped lead the devastation in Venezuela and we have sort of set the stage for where we are arriving today." ILHAN OMAR FACES BACKLASH AFTER COMPLAINING ABOUT US 'BULLYING' IN VENEZUELA “This particular bullying and the use of sanctions to eventually intervene and make regime change really does not help the people of countries like Venezuela and it certainly does not help and is not in the interest of the United States," she added. ... But let me guess your response, you probably label VP Pence as a necon-warmonger too, right?
A rather myopic view of the economic realities in Venezuela. The reality is Richard - the socialist policies of the Venezuelan government & economic ineptitude on a grand scale got them into the mess they are in. Venezuela is proof that socialism doesn't work.
Which one of those countries is currently engaged in economic warfare and a violent proxy coup against Venezuela? And bringing Ilhan Omar into this is about as desperate as a previous poster playing the Hitler and Holocaust cards. And if you seriously think the Freemason-led, pro-Zionist, pro-Saudi West is somehow better than Russia, China, Cuba and Iran you really have drunk deeply from the font of Americanism and Neoconservatism. Out of all those countries mentioned, Russia is the only one led by a practicing Christian. Thank God that Russia has exercised restraint in the face of nonstop demonization and warmongering by Team Neocon. Putin deserves a Nobel. The Neocons deserve chains.
Oh for Pete’s sakes Richard open your eyes! Trump gave you a MAJOR hint today when he spoke to Putin, and then the media. He made it very clear that it’s not the RUSSIANS! He could not have been more transparent. Trumps fight is with those infiltrated in our intelligence agencies, State Dept ., and Pentagon, like General Keane who poses as a conservative, but wants to ignore the Venezuelan crisis. Anyone today who backs a Communist dictatorship in our hemisphere by turning their backs on genocide and giving the excuse that it’s not worth risking American soldiers for, is not in my opinion acting like a decent Christian. What’s wrong with regime change? We wouldn’t be Americans today without regime change. Maybe it’s Abrams and Bolton behind closed doors who gave the order not to put Maduro on that plane. We don’t know. But Trump told us today it wasn’t Putin. There are plenty of those in Washington who can sabotage a peaceful regime change. Unfortunately, the longer Trump waits the easier it will be for Neo Cons to get a civil war going in Latin America. Our chance is now. Otherwise, your Neo Cons will get what they want.
The following statement of yours Carol, is extremely sweeping, disrespectful to both forum members - and frankly quite pompous; "I do think that most members on MOG have figured this out about R67 and possibly you too (here, you're referring to forum member - Don) and they ignore a lot of the nonsense that you both post. I know I do." I would like to offer my support to both, and to apologise for any offence afforded. This insult is not imparted in my name. I find both Don's - and particularly Richard's posts, to be well thought out and presented. It is the blind, patriotic, nationalist 'my-government-is-always-right-when-it-invades-kills-and-pillages-other-nations' posts that I have difficulty with. I genuinely struggle to see how one defends these Western government elites (or whatever they're called). When they advocate and perpetuate abortion; gay marriage; and the abandonment of our Christian heritage. Their mouthpiece --- the press --- is corrupt beyond measure; and spouts utter nonsense aimed at brainwashing the masses (which it has very successfully accomplished). But please hear me, I'm not here having a dig at America. My own country, Ireland, has succumbed too. The difference between America and Ireland is that America has an army - and therefore is of more use to the infiltrators (freemasons, or whatever they're called; all I know is that they're evil and not of God). When these elites finish taking-out the children and people of Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Venezuela etc. and destabilizing entire regions in the process they will then come for us, for our children. How anyone cant see this is beyond me. Every western government should be tried for treason against its people. ...fortunately there is a Just Judge on the horizon. And he'll do just that.
Remember Steve, the free press said the same about Gaddafi, Saddam and others. And remember too that after western, imperial "freedom and democracy" was brought to them ....that their children are now starving and dying and maimed and hopeless and without parents, brothers, sisters etc etc etc Is this really what you want for Venezuela and for whichever country comes after Venezuela??? Come on lad, it has to stop!
Would you mind terribly not patronising me? I am 72 years old and have seen a lot. The situation is very different to those you try to equate this one. I repeat Russia, China, Iran and the extreme left wing in the US (and here in the UK) either support this despot Maduro or turn a blind eye to his kleptocratic dictatorship. Come on lad, yourself!
I am no 'Neocon'. Russia is led by a former KGB agent as is the Russian Orthodox Church. Putin's 'conversion' is about as persuasive as Stalin's and both occurred for the same reason - Russian nationalism. The ROC is being used to advance Russian nationalism and personal greed by both. Their support of Maduro is a cynical ploy to 'stick it' to the US and those countries that have something like a functioning democracy. It is now illegal in Russia to criticise the President and they are now busy 'fencing off' their internet- if that isn't a real give-away that the country is a functioning dictatorship, I don't know what is. They are heading for a Chinese type control of society and are offering such control to Venezuela.
