Thread by @naunihalpublic

Thread on Venezuela: Some of you asked for my reaction early on. I was chuffed that you checked in with me, but had little to say until I had time to read. My apologies for the delay. Also, let me put the disclaimer up front. SPEAKING FOR MYSELF AS A SCHOLAR. (1/n)

What happened in Venezuela is not yet a military coup. I think it is clear that the opposition and its supporters would like a transfer of power via a soft coup, a non-violent withdrawal of military support for the ruling party. But that hasn't happened yet & may not (2/n)

My book is focused on what happens during a coup attempt once it starts, and that hasn't happened. My remarks here are based on a broader understanding of coup conspiracies and deterrence. These are areas I have studied less well or have weaker conclusions about, but still (3/n)

Hopefully these remarks are informed and considered. So who might be likely to mount a coup in Ven & what would it take for them to succeed? I think the opposition would most prefer to see the Zimbabwe option, where the top brass of the military switch allegiance (4/n)

When this happens in conjunction with popular mobilization, as in Tahrir Square in Egypt, it gives a lot of legitimacy to the incoming administration and makes it seem that the military has "bowed to the will of the people" (5/n)

However, the senior ranks in Venezuela do not yet appear to be willing to discard Maduro. All reports indicate that they are well compensated, and they may not trust Guaidó to give them as good a deal. They may also be ideologically attached to Maduro (6/n)

Where Ven differs from Zim is that Mnangagwa was a regime insider and so the top brass could force Mugabe to retire while still claiming they supported ZANU-PF. Supporting Guaidó would be a bigger ideological step (7/n)

That said, I'm not sure how thick the Bolivarian ideology is at this point. I doubt it would hold the Generals in place if they stopped making money. I suspect Guaidó is trying to offer them a better deal, but his offers may not be credible. (8/n)

Another difference between Zimbabwe and Venezuela is that in Zimbabwe, the major external regime supporter, China, appears to have approved of the change in government. In Ven, Russia and Cuba and China are all against regime change. (9/n)

The middle and lower tiers of the military are much worse off, and therefore have greater incentives to organize. Apparently there are small scale mutinies and defections happening at the bottom of the military, but these have not yet spread (10/n)

I take the possibility of a wildcat mutiny, one not organized but spontaneous and spreading across the country very seriously. People are hungry. The massive refugee exodus has operated as a release valve to a certain extent but the situation remains very bad (11/n)

If I am Maduro, right now I am talking to the Russians and the Chinese, trying to get food to low ranking soldiers, just enough to make them believe they are better off inside the military supporting the government. I find it very hard to predict when and how mass mutinies (12/n)

Will happen, other may have a better grasp on this (@MagDwyer for example). But this is in my mind the largest threat, but also the hardest to predict. (13/n)

Why hasn't there been a coup attempt from the middle yet? My guess is that this is where the Cubans come in as counterintellegence and as a possible coup counterforce. I have no direct knowledge though, I am going off the remarks of others that suggest such a thing (14/n)

This article, which quotes @htrinkunas has some useful remarks on small scale mutinies in Ven "On Monday, about two dozen National Guard members raided an arms depot in Caracas and called for a popular uprising before they were arrested" npr.org/2019/01/25/688… (15/n)

@htrinkunas (who is the expert on Venezuelan civmil) also talks about how effective counterintelligence is stamping out plots and keeping them small so they are more easily hidden. This makes them much less effective. (16/n) npr.org/2019/01/25/688…

Most interesting to me was this comment "Rather than pushing for a traditional coup, he adds, the opposition is trying to convince officers they should simply keep their troops in the barracks and allow anti-government demonstrations to build until Maduro is forced out." (17/n)

If accurate, it would suggest that midlevel and senior members of the military are too afraid to organize an effective coup plot, and the opposition is hoping merely to keep them on the fence and use street protests instead. (18/n)

If military actors refuse to suppress popular demonstrations, and this leads to Maduro's removal, it will still be a coup, but one which requires no extensive plotting and one which leaves the incoming govt looking respectable (19/n)

But it's also a fairly weak hand to play. It accepts the fact that few within the military are both interested in making a coup and believe they can succeed in a coup attempt. It also relies on increasing civilian protest & Maduro's use of the military to suppress protest (20/n)

But Maduro has other options. He can use his paramilitary organizations for police functions, or the actual police, or a few loyal commanders. Perhaps he will be foolish enough to try to drag military commanders into a bloodbath, but this seems easy enough to avoid. (21/n)

This has been rambling, my apologies. Let me try to wrap this up. TLDR1: I suspect Maduro has enough ability to buy off some military actors at the top and deter those in the middle that he can ride out the opposition challenge for now (22/n)

TLDR2: I think the biggest risk to Maduro is a mutiny that gets intertwined with a civilian uprising and produces a revolution, but this is still a low probability outcome. Revolutions are rare, esp when the incumbent has strong foreign support (23/n)

TLDR3: In short I am having trouble understanding how this horrible humanitarian catastrophe ends, but I do not think a Guaidó takeover is very likely. (24/n)

TLDR4: This suggests that if we care about the people of Venezuela, perhaps the best way to help them in the short term is with humanitarian assistance, even if that leaves in place a government that is responsible and making things worse (25/n)

Last: I am very conscious that my analysis is rickety in some places. I'm just talking out loud here, but I wish I had more knowledge of what was happening inside the Ven military than I do [FIN]

@threadreaderapp unroll me please

CORRECTION: #16 should read Harold Trinkunas @htrinkunas who is the expert on Ven civ-mil.