TruthArchive.ai - Tweets Saved By @amrenewctr
Posted - November 14, 2024 at 3:17 PM
Saved - November 14, 2024 at 4:14 PM
reSee.it AI Summary
The conversation begins with a claim that the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua is operating in every city in Tennessee, prompting a call for mass deportations. In response, one participant explains that Tren de Aragua is a mega-gang originating from Venezuelan prisons, which has spread throughout the Western Hemisphere due to migration. Another participant brings up Frank Gaffney, criticizing his past work and suggesting he contributed to misleading narratives related to the War on Terror.
@amrenewctr - Center for Renewing America
The Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua is reportedly operating in "every city in Tennessee.” We need mass deportations NOW! https://t.co/4ovZHdNR6I
Video Transcript AI Summary
A dangerous gang, Trende Aragua, is expanding its influence across Tennessee, affecting all major cities. DBI director David Rausch warned Governor Bill Lee about the rising threat during a budget hearing. The Venezuelan gang is involved in human trafficking and is known for violent public attacks. Rausch highlighted a recent incident where gang members shot a rival cartel member 31 times in broad daylight and shared the video on social media. He noted that the gang is likely to increase retail theft activities before moving into the drug trade.
Full Transcript
Speaker 0: The DBI says not only is a dangerous gang growing nationwide, but it's impacting every major city across Tennessee.
Speaker 1: They have a a pathway to more violence.
Speaker 0: The DBI director David Rausch warning governor Bill Lee in a budget hearing Tuesday about the rising threat of a violent criminal group, Trende, Aragua.
Speaker 1: They're back in all of our major cities. They are, running human trafficking operations.
Speaker 0: Rauch says the Venezuelan gang does not hesitate to attack their opponents in public.
Speaker 1: Recently, there was a a video that they shot, where they they shot an individual, a cartel member, 31 times, broad daylight on video and posted it to social media.
Speaker 0: Rausch says they'll next engage in more retail theft before taking on the drug trade. These cons
@KimWexlerMAJD - Kimberly “Kim” Wexler MA JD
@amrenewctr 🔥🇻🇪HUMIRE: “Tren de Aragua is a Venezuelan mega-gang that was born inside the prisons of Venezuela. It was then exported throughout the entire Western Hemisphere because of Venezuelan migration. Tren de Aragua specialize in how to infiltrate those migrant trails ….”
@KimWexlerMAJD - Kimberly “Kim” Wexler MA JD
🔥🌐JOSEPH HUMIRE on Securing America w/ FRANK GAFFNEY @jmhumire @frankgaffney 🔶Tren de Aragua’s connections to Maduro 🔶Hezbollah presence & activities in LatAm 🔶Iran’s calculations on coming Trump admin 🔶China’s asymmetric intrusion into Peru and elsewhere in LatAm
Video Transcript AI Summary
The Western Hemisphere, particularly Latin America, has been largely neglected by U.S. administrations, allowing hostile powers like China, Russia, and Iran to gain influence. The Venezuelan mega gang, Tren de Aragua, has emerged from prison systems, exacerbating security threats as it expands through the region, aided by the Venezuelan government. This gang's operations, characterized by territorial invasions, pose significant risks to the U.S. homeland. Additionally, Iran and Hezbollah exploit Venezuela as a base for illicit activities, potentially targeting U.S. interests. The need for a comprehensive response, such as Operation Aurora, is critical to counter these threats and secure borders. The shifting political landscape in Latin America, with increasing autocratic regimes, further complicates U.S. engagement and necessitates a strategic approach to support democratic forces in the region.
Full Transcript
Speaker 0: The state of the Western Hemisphere. Despite its obvious importance to the security, as well as the economy of our country, Latin America has generally been subjected to, at best, benign neglect by successive US administrations, both Republican and Democrat. Our enemies have filled the vacuum. Notably, the Chinese Communist Party has made huge headways in colonizing the region, creating ports, electric grids, and other critical infrastructure. Some of these assets owned, as well as operated, by the Chinese.
The Russians are providing, among other things, advanced arms, and Iran's regime and what remains of its foreign legion, Hezbollah, operate with impunity in key countries across Latin America. Unfortunately, much of the rest of the world is aflame, thanks to what I call World War G, a product of the strategic arson at the hands of the Chinese dictator Xi Jinping, and the ineptitude, or worse, the complicity of the outgoing Biden Harris administration. So the temptation to give short shrift to nations and challenges closer to home will likely arise again. But we cannot safely ignore, let alone acquiesce to, the subversion and the capture of our neighborhood by hostile foreign powers in a manner President James Monroe prescribed 200 years ago. Let me bring in Joseph Humayre, one of our country's real preeminent experts on all of these topics.
I'm sorry to say he's one of the relative few that I believe have both that kind of expertise and a very sensible attitude towards the challenges that we're facing, as well as the sorts of steps that we need to be taking to address those challenges in our front yard, if you will. Joseph, it's terrific to have you back, and and thank you so much for giving us a full hour of your time. There's so much to talk about, and, I'm ecstatic about being able to spend the time with you going through as much of it as we can. It's good to have you.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, Frank. It's a pleasure to be on always.
Speaker 0: Thank you. So, you know, in the course of the election campaign just concluded, happily, we did hear a good bit about, an outfit called, some outfit I'd never heard of before, frankly, until it burst on the scene in some, we were told, apartment buildings in Colorado. Tell us a little bit about this group, why we should care about it, and in a way, what it suggests about the real perils associated with not paying attention to what's going on in our hemisphere, let alone letting just anybody from those countries into ours.
Speaker 1: No. Absolutely. So this has been, pretty much the latest phenomenon that's been happening, for law enforcement to tackle this problem. Trende Aragua is a Venezuelan mega gang that was born inside the prisons of Venezuela. It was then exported throughout the entire western hemisphere, because of the Venezuelan migration, essentially the the largest mass migration in the history of the western hemisphere and the largest currently in the world is Venezuelans.
There's about upwards of 8,000,000 Venezuelans that have fled that country since 2014. And the trend that I was specialized in how to, basically infiltrate those migrant trails and and use them through for human smuggling, human trafficking operations.
Speaker 0: Can I ask you a question?
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 0: They had to get out of jail first. Were they freed by their compadres? Or
Speaker 1: There's been a lot of discussion about that, especially with the press and, you know, obviously, president Trump made a lot of comments during the campaign about their releasing their criminals from the jails, and he was referring specifically to Venezuela, among some other countries, but mainly Venezuela. And president Trump was absolutely right. This is a 100% empirically a fact. Many fact checkers, so called factors actually tried to debunk it, but the debunking was based on we can't find any evidence. Right?
Well, of course, you're not gonna find evidence in a totalitarian country that's not just gonna publish it on websites. You have to actually know how to do research in those countries as as we have done in others to be able to understand. And I'll give you the the the bottom line, the facts. So, Venezuela the Venezuelan penitentiary services, which is controlled by, socialist regime, very much got in bed with these organized crime groups to allow the prisoners to take control of the prisons. Basically, the prisoners were the wardens of many of the prisons in Venezuela because of because they couldn't handle it, they didn't have enough resources, they were overcrowded, so they just basically gave the the prisons to the prison the the prisons to the prisoners.
And and and through that, the prisoners
Speaker 0: Reminds me of the old line about the lunatics running me asylum. This sounds pretty dangerous.
Speaker 1: Yeah. No. Very much. And and and I think they'll really understand the logic of that because they gave a logic. Their logic was that it had to do with this idea of rehabilitation rather than punishment of criminals, but that doesn't make any sense.
What it really had to do with is the nature of the Venezuelan regime embedded with organized crime. That's that's really what this is about. And so what happened here
Speaker 0: ask you, I've actually had people say, Joseph, on the program that, the Venezuelan government is actually just one giant cartel. I mean, it is a drug trafficking operation of the first order.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And beyond drug trafficking Exaggeration? No. It's not an exaggeration. It is beyond drug trafficking.
It's all kinds of illicit operations, terrorist networks. The best way I describe it is as a platform. It's a platform for, organized crime, for terrorism, for external actors, for hostile actors in the United States, for all the bad actors in the world to get together in the western hemisphere where they can be closer to the United States and engage in all kinds of asymmetric operations. So kinda kinda shifting back to the trend
Speaker 0: that I was Also with, Venezuelan passports, no way
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah. And that's part of it. I mean, their their immigration services provide documentation to these individuals to legitimize their their travel, their movement throughout throughout the hemisphere. Going back to Trinidad real quick, they took over these prisons, and and what fundamentally happened was they got a lot of power and control because the Venezuelan government gave them concessions.
In around 2019, the Ministry of Prisons of Venezuela began early release programs, early parole programs of these prisoners. Basically, people that were convicted of homicide that had maybe a 20, 30 year sentence were getting out in 3 to 4 years. Right? And the accountability of these people that were getting out in these early parole programs with no idea no idea where these went. And this happened right at the time where the mass migration was pushing out of Venezuela.
The second one is the the main prison where the train that I was born is this prison in the state of, Aragua. That's why they call the train Nicaragua in the city called Maracay, and it's called the Tocoron Prison. Right? That's the colloquial name for the prison. In September of last year, the Venezuelan regime shut down the prison.
They should they raided the prison. They used over 12,000 soldiers and they shut down the prison, and they so captured the leaders of the Trinidad Agua. That's at least what they said in their communications. But when they reported how many prisoners they transferred from that prison, they reported that they transferred 1600 inmates. They said, you know, we shut down this prison.
We transferred 1600 inmates. The problem is according to very credible reporting by NGOs in Venezuela, there was over 3,000 inmates. They weren't able to they have no accountability of either the the prisoners that were released for these early parole programs nor to these prisoners that just went missing when they closed down the prison. So the fundamental logic would extend that, these prisoners probably left the country and are probably in other countries throughout the western hemisphere. I travel a lot to Latin America, and when I speak to some of our partners in Central America, they told me, firsthand that these a lot of these prisoners, they believe, went to the United States.
And so, I'm giving you data, that suggests that what president Trump said that they're sending their criminals is a 100% accurate. The media is making a huge mistake in trying to underestimate this problem, because, if the past is precedent, all you gotta do is go to the all the countries in South America that have been terrorized by this gang. You could talk to Chile, You could talk to Peru. You could talk to Colombia, among many others. And their authorities are gonna tell you, do not underestimate this gang because they will grow very rapidly.
They have specific tactics that go extend beyond other transnational criminal organizations. And the fact that they are state sponsored by the Venezuelan regime gives them that added impetus to be able to grow much and expand much, much quicker.
Speaker 0: But you're saying that they're actually sponsored by and made more dangerous as a result by a government. Yeah. Hands up. You call it an international socialist. I I I think it's communist regime, is it not?
Speaker 1: I mean, it's really a criminal regime more than anything. You know, their ideologies are, you know, tied to socialism. They have communist elements from Cuba, but they have also Islamist elements, you know, so they're just got a hybrid of a different, you know, failed ideologies combined with a criminal apparatus. And so yeah. No.
The the the state of the state of Venezuela not only, helps provide support to them, I believe they created them. And I'll be very quick and I'll strike that because of the origin of this. First of all, the origin of Trinidad was very murky. Like, no one really knows how they began inside that prison in in in Maracay. There was other trains that got so the way the criminal system in Venezuela is termed is inside the prison, they're called cars and the the movement of the criminal economy from inside the prison to surrounding neighborhoods is called trains.
That's that's what so there was other trains in Venezuela, train the Pacifico, train the llanos, and this all started to rise to the surface during the period of Hugo Chavez. The train that Aragua wasn't born until about 2013 or 2014, and what I believe the Venezuelan government did is it used this train. They created this one to consolidate and capture all the other ones. Today, all those other trains rarely rarely exist, and the only one exist is train that I was, And they operate much the same way that Hezbollah operates for Iran. Right?
They're like a a proxy element. They're a way to destabilize countries. They're a way to spy on their dissidents and engage. Yeah. Exactly.
Engage and illicit revenue schemes.
Speaker 0: This could really represent a very serious national homeland security threat inside the United States. Donald Trump made it clear he was gonna treat it as such. Do you think that that is now in prospect, and and what would you recommend be done knowing what you do about this outfit?
Speaker 1: Yeah. So a couple of things, Frank. I I actually have an op ed that was ran the day before the election in town hall, called Operation Aurora is absolutely necessary to tackle this gang, Tran Nicaragua. And what Operation Aurora is is something that president Trump said during his visit to Aurora, Colorado, and people, often term that as a campaign stop. It actually wasn't.
It was it wasn't a rally. It was a remarks that he made in the midst of his campaign to separate a little bit from the rallies that he was doing to talk about a policy issue at a very serious, level. And what he described
Speaker 0: It was it was a fact finding.
Speaker 1: Yeah. It was basically fact finding. And what he said in Aurora, Colorado, and and he said, he is going to launch this operation Aurora at the federal level to essentially root out this gang, from, the streets in the neighborhoods of the United States as a first order of his new administration. Now that we know he's the president-elect of of of of the United States, I I absolutely believe that this is what he's gonna do. And so the name
Speaker 0: And and that it's absolutely essential that he do
Speaker 1: it more. No. I mean, so it's not only, yeah, very essential and everything, but it's also tied to other threats. Right? So because because it's tied to the Venezuelan regime, you're tied now to Hezbollah, you're tied now to Iran, you're tied to China.
And then, you know, we talked a lot throughout this year also about Chinese, mafia fentanyl gangs that are moving into capturing territory or or trying to buy farmland inside the United States. So all these threats start to, converge and and create a conditions inside the United States that paralyzes us and doesn't enable us to react to the broader national security landscape throughout the world. And so that's why I think the border
Speaker 0: is like the agenda, is it not? No. That is. It's not an accident.
Speaker 1: Absolutely. It's not an accident because that the board that's why the border is just so important because you cannot deal with, you know, whether it's Ukraine or whether it's helping Israel, the Middle East. You can't do any of these issues with the poorest border or basically threats are just infiltrating your country. So I think president Trump's absolutely right. That's gonna be, I think, a top priority.
And and the interesting thing was he got the name because, the center of gravity right now for the Trinidad Agua is in Texas. That's where they're really, expanding very rapidly. They're in Fortis in Texas at least. And San Antonio, which had a similar incident to what happened in Aurora, Colorado, they're taking over of apartment complexes, they dubbed their operation in Texas by the Texas Department of Public Safety, Operation Aurora, giving giving a resonance to what happened over there because that was the 4th time it was reported. So president Trump learned about that and said we need to replicate this operation, but give it the federal government muscle to do it throughout nationwide.
And so I think that that's gonna be a major development that we're gonna hear about in the near future.
Speaker 0: What does a project like Operation Aurora actually require? I mean, securing the border has got to be a condition proceeding, doesn't it? But can law enforcement, can even ICE federal authorities, brought into bear, contend with this kind of cancer, do you think?
Speaker 1: So that's a good point, Frank, because when president Trump mentions he's gonna use a federal, programs, I think he's talking about whole of government programs. Meaning, this is not just gonna fall on one agency. ICE obviously could be a lead agency, and they should be because they're in charge of deportations, but they're gonna get support from multiple agencies, including the Department of Defense, I believe, which is under something that's called DOD support to civil authorities.
Speaker 0: I I asked you a question about what we need. You've you've said a whole of government response to, effect this kind of operation Aurora to take down well, I I guess it must be said this cartel is a particularly dangerous one, but there are a bunch of of others of them that are also now apparently operating with considerable impunity inside our country. Is that also gonna be covered, do you think, or must it be?
Speaker 1: Yeah. I don't think this is gonna be exclusive to Trinidad. Well, I think Trinidad was a specific target, because of the rapid and manner in which they're expanding and they have specific characteristics of concern. But I think, you know, going back to what
Speaker 0: And just quickly, what would you say those are? Are they particularly vicious? Are they particularly successful in recruiting? What what's what's the characteristics that you're most concerned about?
Speaker 1: So they're what makes them different than MS 13 and and the Mexican cartels and others that are very brutal and cause a lot of damage as well, it will obviously is the state sponsorship, but what that actually manifests into is a certain ideology that this transactional criminalization has about taking over property. And so when you hear them taking over apartment complexes, taking over apartment buildings using squatting tactics, it's because it goes to this ideology that they call invasions. They literally call it invasions. In Venezuela, they know about this. They call emaciones.
And so they invade property because they believe taking over territory is the key to creating power. And so that's a little bit different than MS 13 in the Mexican cartels. We're much more profit oriented. These guys are profit oriented too, but they have that ideological component that, to me, in my mind, makes them more dangerous.
Speaker 0: So these other gangs not control territory effectively? Is that different from specific property
Speaker 1: do, but they do it the kinda old fashioned way, which is basically just flooding the zone with illicit crime and this and then weakening the governance structure. These guys actually take a building. Almost like an army would take a building, but they they seize a building, but they don't do it with, like, like, high sophisticated weaponry. They do it through legal mechanisms, through lawfare, through the announcements on the police about human rights violations or creating disinformation networks that they're being abused, victimization tactics. Things that you see from authoritarian regimes, they apply that to the world of transnational organized crime, which is which I think is why they're targeting sanctuary cities because those are the sitting ducks for that kind of activity because the laws in those cities don't allow the police to respond with the at the level of welcomed in.
Yeah. Exactly. Yeah.
Speaker 0: Okay. So, Joseph, this is fascinating and and extremely, concerning, and I pray that you're right that Donald Trump will address these issues as first order of business. But let me back the lens up a little bit more. You touched on several aspects of why the Venezuelan government is so problematic. Give us a little bit more detail on, for example, and you've made a close study of this, what the Iranians and their foreign, you know, alleged Hezbollah, which I gather is, you know, now coming apart at the seams in the Middle East, but, it's got a considerable footprint here.
Talk about that and how it relates specifically to the danger we face from Venezuela.
Speaker 1: No. So yeah. Venezuela has become, as I mentioned before, kind of a platform. It basically invites all of, the actors in the world that either wanna be involved in illicit activities or they wanna attack the United States or hurt the United States. They have a safe space inside the the country of Venezuela.
Among the top of the list is Iran, and Iran has used Venezuela as as a platform to be able to create military programs, to be able to insert terrorists, to be able to create disinformation networks, and and basically an array of things to increase their ability to diminish the geographic disadvantage that they've had over time with the United States, understanding that Iran views the United States as the great satan. Right? The big obstacle for them to have regional hegemony.
Speaker 0: So Are there still these special flights that, go back and forth between
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, the flights to to the flights to between Iran and Venezuela, between Caracas and Tehran is they they're multiple flights and they they have multiple routes, and they don't just go to Iran. They often stop in places like Syria, they stop in places like Russia and Serbia, they even go to most of the time, they'll stop in Africa and Algeria, one of those countries before they get down. So what we used to be just one flight, but maybe like 10, 15 years ago that everyone's looking at they called Adelteror is now multiple flights, and and and codeshares and all kinds of things. So they have plenty of logistical connections.
Speaker 0: Talk about metastasizing.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So the thing I'm looking at, Frank, is, you know, as we're looking at what's happening in in in the Middle East and what's happening what's happening specifically with Israel, both in Gaza, but even beyond Gaza in the northern part with Hezbollah. And Israel has basically decided to take the fight. Right? The the, your best defense is a good offense, and and they basically made that very clear.
They dismantle the leadership of both Hamas and Hezbollah in a matter of weeks, really, which is very impressive. But the thing that everyone I think, like, what I'm looking at, I think everyone asked me is, well, when are they gonna activate the Latin American networks? Right? Because we know they're there. And I think, you know, obviously, dismantling the leadership does impede that a little bit because it's not clear where the communications are gonna come from and how they're gonna like, Because Hezbollah is permanently active in Latin America in doing illicit finance, basically running drugs, money laundering operations, contraband to make money to be able to feed the war effort in the Middle East.
But the time that that And
Speaker 0: some of those flights may have something to do with. Yeah.
Speaker 1: The flight and so on. Right? Yeah. And all these front companies and stuff. But the all that, can flip on a dime or the minute that Iran or Hezbollah tells these people in Hezbollah in Latin America to say, now target terrorist attacks.
Now now let's start engaging. So since October 7th last year, we've seen an uptick of these kind of, like, operations, at least at least starting to study the landscape to carry out either terrorist attacks, targeted assassinations, kidnapping plots, mostly against Israeli targets or Jewish targets inside the region. There's been at least 3 major arrests since October 7th last year, one in Brazil, one in Colombia, one in argent, one in Peru that were tied to these type of operations. And something I wanna put attention to, the Argentine government who, as you know, under president Javier Malay, has been very bullish both as an ally of Israel and the United States, but also against Iran and Hezbollah because they were attacked by them. Last a few weeks ago, they announced something that I thought was very, relevant for discussing is they reveal the identity of the leader of Hezbollah for Latin America, a person that many people did not know.
And I can even say I've studied this very closely. I just learned about this guy a couple years ago. Like, this guy would've been very clandestine and nobody knew his name. His name we all now know is Hussein Ahmad Karaki, and he was involved both in the 9 92 bombing of the Israeli embassy in in, Buenos Aires in 94, bombing of the Army Cultural Center, the takedown of the Panamanian plane in 94, Alex Chiricanas. And he was involved in these plots, these recent plots, especially the one in Brazil about, doing targeted assassinations against Israeli citizens.
So, the yeah. He's in Lebanon. And so they were they're in the press conference that the Argentine government put out, they confirmed that he's in Lebanon, they confirmed that he's still alive, and they confirmed that he's still operational. So they issued an arrest order and a red notice for his capture. And to me, this was a big move by Argentina to put them on notice to say, don't try to bring your shenanigans over here because we're gonna punch back.
Speaker 0: Well, if they were just shenanigans, it'd be one thing, but obviously, it's murderous Yeah. In extreme. Let me ask you, Joseph, because I I think that one of the key points here is that, what's in Latin America doesn't necessarily stay in Latin America. We talked about, you know, TDA as an example, but talk a little bit about Hezbollah, and its ability if they do go active in the terrorist mode, to either get people inside the United States who aren't here now for the purpose or tap into existing cells of Hezbollah that are believed to be here in some number.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So I think outside of, you know, these major criminal gangs and and, you know, cartels and other things, I think the main terror element that is, taking advantage of our porous border has been Hezbollah. I think Hezbollah has been moving through up into and through our border for several years now. I know specific cases where what do we call Hezbollah facilitators? They may not be operational members of Hezbollah.
They're both the part of networks that help Hezbollah coming in through the border and landing in places like Dearborn, Michigan and other places where they've already have an established presence. So my my sense is that Hezbollah has capitalized on the open border for the last several years to be able to preposition itself inside the United States. I think what's holding everybody back was this election because they wanted to see what was gonna happen. If Kamala Harris had won this election, it's almost open season to start targeting Americans. But because she did not win the election and president Trump said, they have to adjust.
They have to reassess. And Iran to me who's the, you know, kind of the mastermind behind a lot of this stuff, Iran's calculations on how to react, I think depend on how they're gonna be able to deal with president Trump. So, my sense is in Israel and in in the Middle East, their plan a, their top strategy isn't to just use terrorism. Their top strategy is to use this information to delegitimize Israel and the international community. And I think that now they have to readjust because more than likely the United States is now gonna be the top diplomatic arm to support Israel around the world.
So I think that that's gonna change the equation, and I think that's the reason we haven't probably seen a lot of this stuff manifest itself into violence, but they're preparing to to have that option if they choose to do so. Yeah.
Speaker 0: Might they go for it during this sort of interregnum when they know they've got a fairly weak administration vis a vis people letting them in and all the rest of it and before Trump gets back in office.
Speaker 1: There's certainly a vulnerability transitions as you know, Frank, very well. You've been involved in many of them, and there's always a bit of chaos and confusion. And there's also a kind of an opportunistic element to where you don't have necessarily a clear lanes of authority. Right? Like, no one knows exactly who's calling the shots on what.
So, obviously, because of those, conditions, you could say that, yes, there's a heightened sense of vulnerability for this. However, I would also think that, Iran to me has a lot of, how do you describe? I think they have a lot of apprehension, because I think that they want to negotiate with president Trump.
Speaker 0: You know? They know that He he thinks so too, which is an interesting question.
Speaker 1: And in, Latin America, and we'll get into Peru in a second, they look at it as a the other side of the Pacific. Right? So the PRC has looked at this as having a whole Pacific strategy. Like, what happens after they break the chain of island nations and they're able to get into the blue wash blue ocean? They need to actually have a source destination.
And so they've been serving the landscape in Latin America to look at ports, ports that they can use, to be able to in the case that they have their military deployment, to be able to to land into Latin America through with with naval ships. So they tested this out throughout the this several years, but they understand that if they came to Latin America immediately with an offer of, military cooperation on ports, it probably wouldn't have sold very well. They would have allowed a resistance because the United States and and other things like that. So they did it commercially. And as you know, Frank, that in China, everything commercial is tied to the military.
It's just the way their laws are written and the way their government structured. So, they essentially created commercial agreements to either expand ports or build new ports. In the case of Peru, they built a new port in in the city of Chancay that's basically gonna become operational this year, in a matter of weeks actually. And so they're gonna become operational. And the thing about it is it's a mega port.
It's it's largest port on the Pacific Ocean. It's it's gonna be able to carry or I'm just able to receive, what they call triple e class cargo ships, which is the largest class of cargo ships. And obviously, this is gonna, create a a volumes of dependency on Peru from China in terms of trade and commerce. But as the head of the SOUTHCOM, the up until a change of command ceremony that's gonna happen very soon, Laura Richardson, general, she what she said is that, that absolutely this port can be utilized by China for military purposes. This is her this is the command the head of southern command saying this on the record, before the United States Congress.
Speaker 0: And and, Joseph, on that point, is it the case, as I understand it, that China actually owns the port? This is this is not sovereign Peruvian territory anymore effectively.
Speaker 1: So they're not the whole owner, but they are partial owners, of the port. They have, the the they have other concessions from other other companies that that have part of the ports. But, what I've been hearing and and I don't have the details right now on me, but I've been hearing some, discontent by some of the other partner companies that are involved in the port because China doesn't uphold to its commitments. And that's a that's a consistent story in a lot of these things. Right?
Like even the the the inauguration of the port in November, in my understanding and and and and this comes from sources in Peru, is that it actually isn't really ready to be able to be operational, but they're just gonna, you know, announce that it's operational.
Speaker 0: It's scheduled to be open.
Speaker 1: It's scheduled to be open. It's gonna have to be open. GGP is gonna have to make a statement. So it's gotta it's gotta happen even though there's still a lot of deficiencies with the port is what I've been being told. And so what you're gonna see, it's already been receiving, cargo shipments for for several months now.
But but but I don't think it's gonna be able to receive those big ones that you were talking about, because it's it's it's got some issues.
Speaker 0: Well, speaking of big one, it's been sized, as I understand it, this mega port, to accommodate Chinese aircraft carriers and and battle groups accompanying them. Is is that your understanding as well?
Speaker 1: Yeah. So, the what I mentioned before, the triple e class cargo ship is about the same size as the aircraft carrier. So in terms of the capabilities of port loading, docking, deepwater, all the characteristics that are needed to be able to, have a big cargo ship anchor inside your port is the same characters you need for an aircraft carrier with the only added dimension of the security. Right? You you're gonna need the the military.
But in this case, Peru, and and I think China simultaneously has been incrementally increasing its military engagement with Peru through through, invitations to defense academies and defense education, through, the idea of hosting, naval exercises and the other side, like, inviting Navy officers to be participate in naval exercises. So they've been incrementally increasing their military engagement because I think that fundamentally, I think we all know that this port's gonna be a onetime use to host, the PLA's navy. I think I think we all can understand that. The question is when. And now since we have a new administration in the United States, what can the Trump administration do to stop that?
Speaker 0: This location puts them essentially in a position to, intercept or otherwise interfere with vital lines of communication, as the Navy calls them, between places like San Diego, for example, or, you know, other ports on the West Coast of the United States for that matter. And, this is a power projection capability that we ignore at our extreme peril, I believe. We've really just skimmed the surface of so many of these challenges, but, you've been very, very hopeful as always in illuminating them. I did want to return to something we sort of talked about at the beginning, which is, given the sorts of things you've described, the presence in our hemisphere of mortal enemies of this country, and they're working together is makes them even more dangerous. These gangs, these dictators of whatever stripe, the possibility that they're actively working with, you know, cells in this country that wish to do us harm.
Why is it we aren't paying more attention to this? And in your answer, if you would, just, you know, we haven't even gotten to Mexico or Brazil or Chile or other places that are also of considerable importance. Some now in the grips of very hostile regimes to this country as well. But there's got to be a better reason than that we've just got a lot of other things going on. Or is there?
Speaker 1: So, Frank, I think the the big question that you're asking about why is the US neglected Latin America, you know, it's a combination of factors, but I think it's kind of an extension of a failed foreign policy thinking that's been happening in Washington for for decades, really. And that failed foreign policy thinking has to do with kinda like democracy promotion and using basically the ability of the military to try to promote all these other things that are not intended to do other than chase bad guys. And has it this notion of essentially trying to think of, Latin America is kind of like a a region that's relatively peaceful and it's only trade and some cartels. And so that that to me, I think that is an argument that a lot of our, a lot of our permanent diplomatic military and other class has been presenting about Latin America. So I I think we have to assume part of the failure because, a lot of people that have worked on Latin America for a long time and I and I know these people because I've, you know, been in meetings and I've argued, and they've always presented this kind of perspective that, the region's relatively, tranquil.
It's it's really calm relative to wars in the Middle East and everything that's going on in South Asia as that basically we don't have these interstate conflicts and we don't have these big terrorist networks. Latin America is just some drugs and then we have a lot of trade opportunities. And I thought that was a very, mischaracterization of what was bubbling underneath, which was this autocratic network, this this network type of Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua tied to our hostile enemies. So I think it was it was basically a foreign policy failure. I think we missed we missed it because our our our our, you know, kind of our, you know, our our government really didn't, think of it as as as as serious as it should be.
Like, when I would present a lot about Iran and Latin America, you know, that was one of my specialties. I would get resistance from people within the intelligence community and within the military community. But as I was getting resistance maybe at the higher levels, I was getting people coming up to me at the mid levels to some of the lower levels and telling me, Joseph, we're working on this stuff and we're seeing exactly what you're saying. And that's how I built these strong relationships with our defense industry.
Speaker 0: You know, as I mentioned earlier, Joseph in introducing you, I think the thing that has distinguished you to my mind is, you're not only deeply knowledgeable about the region, but you do bring, well, common sense for one thing, but also a more, shall we say, robust mindset about our vital interests in the region and beyond. And I'm heartened to hear that at lower levels inside the government, there are people who are attuned to what you're focused on. But it is distressing that at senior levels, we've been deluding ourselves. So say a few words about some of the nations that I mentioned a moment ago that, we've just seen, I think, a full on communist take power in Mexico. Lula is 1.
Chile, I'm a little unclear how bad that is, but I know there was one elected there a while ago. Is this sort of ideological evolution, much of it I think supported by, Lula's, you know, sort of his Sao Paulo forum, for example, is a vehicle for aiding and abetting the kind of march through these various countries of the Marxists. Just does do we have the luxury, I guess, is the bottom line of persisting in this kind of focus elsewhere? That's really not a problem set.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So I think if you look at Latin America today, first of all, it's it's it's worse than I've ever seen it, to be honest with you. And it's drastically different than when president Trump assumed office in 2017, you know, 8 years ago. And what you're gonna see is you're gonna see 3 chunks of countries. You're gonna see a chunk of countries that are fully autocratic, fully totalitarian, working with China, Russia, and Iran.
And those are the countries you would expect, Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua, and increasingly Bolivia. Then you see another chunk of countries that are, I would say US friendly, are open to do more with the United States. Some feel neglected because United States doesn't really do as much as they should be. The power wise, the Uruguay's, the Costa Ricas, unfortunately, some of the smaller countries. And then you would have Argentina, which is a unique case because it's historically Argentina is kinda a country that's most culturally distant from the United States, except you have probably the most pro US president in the history of Latin America as president today, which is president Javier Malay.
And then you have these middle tier countries, which I would say they're they're countries that have, divisions in terms of they have, leaders, some of many of them that are Marxists, that have sympathies with all these autocrats, but then you have, institutions inside the country that are used to basically working with the United States and doing more engagement with democratic partners. And so those countries are in a tug of war, and I think the United States needs to help those countries basically when the democratic forces win that tug of war. One of the prominent ones is Brazil. In Brazil, you have, essentially this new kind of wave of lawfare and and using essentially judicial measures to install kind of a dictatorship. Right?
So Lula da Silva, the president of Brazil, is not as relevant right now as the supreme court as and and as the head of the supreme court, Alexandra Marais, and other supreme court justices. So but that doesn't mean that all of Brazil's institutions are captured. There's police institutions. There's military institutions. There's other institutions inside the country that the United States still has a good relationship with.
So when we when president Trump, his administration goes in the government, we have to work with them very closely.
Speaker 0: There are people to work with, I guess, is a key takeaway. There are threats to them as well as to us that are emerging, and we need the focused attention of the Trump administration and our countrymen, the one that for that matter. You bring that to light every day with your work at the Center For Secure Free Society. Joseph Hugh Meyer, I can't thank you enough for that work and for joining us from time to time. Come back soon if you would.
Hope the rest of you come back next time. Until then, go forth and multiply.
@DecentBackup - BackupDecentFiJC
@KimWexlerMAJD @amrenewctr FRANK GAFFNEY: A spy who wrote for Jewish World Review for almost 15 years. Received a “Louis Brandeis Award” (2003) from World Zionist Organization for helping CIA/Mossad craft a “brown people in the Middle East did 9/11” bullshit narrative our “War on Terror” was predicated on.
Posted - August 17, 2023 at 8:59 PM
Saved - August 17, 2023 at 10:35 PM
@amrenewctr - Center for Renewing America
BREAKING: CRA's @JeffClarkUS is the first to push back on Fani Willis' attempt to violate constitutional due process & rush a trial in Atlanta. Holding a trial eight days before the Georgia primary, is stark politics - masquerading as law. Read Jeff's filing below for more
