Arming Venezuelans.

• Author: Waller, J. Michael
• Position: WORLD WATCHER - Supporting Venezuelan insurgency against Nicolas Maduro

THE U.S. SHOULD help Venezuelans take their country back, but not by starting another war of choice. Instead, the U.S. should provide arms, equipment, training, intelligence, and logistical support to worthy Venezuelans to organize their own insurgent force and fight for their nation.

The Trump Administration actively is seeking ways to solve the crisis in Venezuela and the President has ruled nothing out. In his Sept. 25 speech to the United Nations General Assembly, Pres. Donald Tramp encouraged nations to exercise their sovereignty while seeking support "for the restoration of democracy in Venezuela." He later made more pointed comments.

"Restoration of democracy" talk is the unfortunate rhetoric of armchair strategists who cook up American-led military invasions to change a regime and occupy the country. The U.S. must not become involved in more wars of choice. Yet, the Bolivarian regime in Venezuela, kept in power by Cuban security personnel, is an international threat. The Venezuelan people themselves can solve the problem, provided the U.S. and others can help them to mutual benefit.

Venezuela's socialist Bolivarian regime presents a range of threats to the U.S. and the region. During the years prior to its near-collapse, the regime was the source of deliberate and planned regional subversion and destabilization. Hugo Chavez's chosen successor, Nicholas Maduro, continues to sustain with his country's declining oil exports the dying Communist tyranny in Cuba that, in tum, secures and otherwise props him up. Madura's narco-regime also hosts jihadists and their terrorist groups, like Hezbollah. It has ominous relations with Communist China, Iran, and Russia. Its economic and social collapse has created humanitarian and refugee crises that threaten the hemisphere.

The Organization of American States (OAS) is a hemispheric body intended to resolve such problems. Its socialist leader, Secretary General Luis Almagro of Uruguay, strongly has criticized the Venezuelan regime, but thus far has offered no affirmative solutions, apart from denunciations and sanctions. The Obama Administration neglected the OAS while Almagro curtailed and dismantled the organization's security architectures and programs. While Almagro makes little effort to hide his hostility toward the U.S., he has, nonetheless, bought favor with the Trump Administration and many in Congress by harshly denouncing the situation in Venezuela.

Some of Venezuela's neighbors may be...