| 摘要 | Absent of civil war, Venezuela is suffering the world’s worst humanitarian crisis in recent memory. Malnourished children search for their next meal. Parents lack access to even the most basic medicine for their families. Rampant inflation makes money instantaneously worthless, while general lawlessness provides a breeding ground for illicit trade with tentacles that reach from the Americas to Europe and beyond.$It is an astonishing crash for a country bestowed with the world’s largest oil reserves and that was once a beacon of prosperity and a thriving democracy. Today, twenty years after Hugo Chávez became president and six years after his successor, Nicolás Maduro, inherited the presidential palace, Venezuela’s breakneck descent into one of the world’s top crises has renewed a push for democratic change. Following Maduro’s assumption of a fraudulent new term in office, much of the world’s attention and optimism turned to Juan Guaidó, president of the National Assembly, and as of January 23, 2019, the interim president of Venezuela, as now recognized by more than fifty democracies.$But Guaidó and other democratic forces face headwinds for reasons beyond
the repression and violence unleashed by the Maduro regime. External actors are
using Venezuela as a battleground for their own selfish national interests,
bolstering the corrupt and faltering Maduro regime. Cuba, Turkey, China, and,
importantly for this analysis, Russia, are key actors that have provided
lifelines of support to Maduro and his cronies. These external forces, each in their
own way, are frustrating the will of the Venezuelan people to restore
democracy. A poll taken in April 2019 by the Atlantic Council’s Adrienne Arsht
Latin America Center found that 62 percent of Venezuelans see Russia in either
a negative light or as a direct threat to peace or national sovereignty—a clear
repudiation of Russia’s increasingly assertive role in Venezuela.$Why has Moscow thrown its weight behind Maduro? The answer is rooted partly
in the increasingly difficult relations between Moscow and Washington over the
past fifteen years, as well as in Russian President Vladimir Putin’s original
foreign policy vision dating back to his first days in office.$That vision has several critical elements, which have driven Kremlin
policy for most of the millennium and buffet traditional Russian, and Soviet
objectives in the Western Hemisphere:$A late addition to the list was the imperative to thwart “color revolutions,” in which civil society groups drive anti-democratic leaders from power—as seen by Putin’s response to the Rose Revolution in Georgia in 2003 and the Orange Revolution in Ukraine in 2004. $Consistent with these policy drivers, the Kremlin has pursued an increasingly robust and mutually advantageous relationship with the leftist regime in Caracas since Chávez first reached out to Putin in 2000. By 2003, the two had met three times. For Putin, these contacts would be particularly useful as relations between the United States and Russia entered a downward spiral. The next decade and a half would bring the Rose and Orange revolutions, Putin’s sharp denunciation of the United States and the West at the Munich Security Conference in February 2007, the Kremlin’s cyberattack on Estonia in the summer of 2007, its invasion of Georgia in 2008, Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine and annexation of Crimea and war in Donbas in 2014, the Kremlin’s escalation in Syria in 2015 and challenge to American allies and forces there, and Moscow’s interference in the 2016 US presidential election.$The political utility of the tie to Venezuela was evident in 2008, when Moscow sent TU-160 strategic bombers to Venezuela for a joint naval exercise in the Caribbean Sea. This served as a counterpoint to US support for an increasingly pro-Western Ukraine and for Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili during Moscow’s war on Georgia; Chávez offered Russia the use of a Caribbean coastal air base in 2010. $Economic considerations provided additional reasons for Moscow to develop closer relations with Caracas. Venezuela became a significant market for Russian energy companies and arms makers, as Venezuela used Russian credits to buy $4 billion worth of weapons from 2005 to 2008; the principal Russian oil company, Rosneft, began to invest heavily in Venezuela.$$$Moscow’s backing of Maduro supports every element of Kremlin policy listed above. It intends to demonstrate Moscow’s great power reach, thwart US policy in its own hemisphere, and underscore that a multipolar world will replace the era of American predominance. For some Russian thinkers, it presents a potential “spheres-of-influence” bargain: Moscow could drop Maduro in exchange for Washington giving Moscow free rein in its own sphere of influence in Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova. Moreover, Kremlin policy seeks to undermine the international liberal order by supporting a friendly authoritarian ruler fraudulently “re-elected” and on the verge of falling to a democratic movement.$In Venezuela as well as Syria, the Kremlin defends its strongman allies against the consequences of elections or protests, at least in part to keep the contagion of regime change from spreading to its own shores. The success of Moscow’s policy in Venezuela rests on its military, economic, and financial clout. Russia’s investments and loans to Venezuela are certainly sizeable, but they have only kept Maduro afloat. As of July 2019, Venezuela currently owes $10 billion for the purchase of 36 Russian Su-30MK2s fighter jets, $1.1 billion for Rosneft investment into Venezuelan oilfield development, and has received more than $4 billion of investment from Russia, according to Russian Economic Development Ministry. Given Russia’s present economic status, it is clear while these numbers are only a fraction of Russia’s total assets, Moscow continues to show a strong political commitment to Venezuela through its sale of military equipment, sending military advisors, and receiving high-profile visits from Maduro and members of his regime to the Kremlin.$Counting its nuclear and conventional arsenals, Russia is the world’s second-ranking military power, and over the past five years, Moscow has demonstrated its ability to deploy forces well beyond its neighborhood. Russia’s principal area of forward deployment has been Syria, where it has deployed the S-300 surface-to-air missile system, scores of surface-to-air bombers, Spetznatz forces, and the Wagner mercenary group. Moscow has also deployed Wagner to Africa and Latin America.$Russia’s increased intervention in Syria in the fall of 2015 prevented the fall of President Bashar Assad’s regime, which had been steadily losing ground to various opposition groups. Moscow’s growing military cooperation with Caracas from the 2005 arms sales was initially much less ambitious. It served to strengthen a friendly regime through arms sales and to signal to Washington that Russia could operate militarily in the Western Hemisphere. Kremlin strategists saw this as a suitable response to US support for Georgia and Ukraine.$But the starkly deteriorating circumstances in Venezuela over the past eighteen months have added a new urgency to this cooperation. Once again, Putin intervened to shore up an ally who was in danger of losing power. His first play—sending two TU-160s in December 2018—was dramatic but not particularly effective: while it signaled Moscow’s ability to put strategic weapons close to the United States, the bombers would offer Maduro no help against an enraged populace seeking his ouster. But as Maduro weakened in the first months of 2019, Putin supplied the same S-300 systems to Maduro that he had provided Assad. This play had two objectives. First, the S-300s could help deter US military intervention on behalf of Guaidó, whom Washington and other Western countries had recognized as the legitimate leader of Venezuela. (The Trump Administration publicly had left all options on the table for dealing with the growing chaos in Venezuela.) Second, the S-300s came with Russian “experts” (soldiers), who, along with the thousands of Cuban intelligence personnel in country, could provide security for Maduro.$By some measures, the Russian deployment was a success: talk of a US
intervention largely ceased, although it was unlikely the United States would
intervene in the first place, especially given the checkered history of US
military activity in the region. $Economically, too, Russia’s help has been invaluable to Maduro, despite Russia’s own economic vulnerabilities. The Russian economy has stagnated since at least 2012 and has been hit hard the past five years by the decline in hydrocarbon prices and sanctions resulting from its war against Ukraine. After the gross national product (GNP) fell in 2014 and 2015,its recovery has averaged annual growth of around 2 percent since 2016, and the standard of living remains stagnant. $But the Russian economy is still the eleventh largest in the world—down from the ninth-largest in 2013. More importantly, Putin is willing to subordinate economic interests to geopolitical advantage and has done so in Venezuela. In the early 2000s, major Russian hydrocarbon firms Gazprom, Rosneft, TNK-BP, Surgutneftegaz, and Lukoil were looking to invest in Venezuela; Gazprom won the rights to explore for gas offshore Venezuela in 2006. Under Kremlin guidance, Gazprom and other Russian hydrocarbon firms formed the National Petroleum Consortium, which in 2010 signed a contract with Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) to set up a joint venture to extract heavy oil reserves in the Orinoco River Basin.$In 2014, Rosneft, the largest oil producer in Russia and the number two gas producer, bought out Gazprom and the other Russian firms to take control of the National Petroleum Consortium. Led by Putin intimate Igor Sechin, Rosneft’s activities frequently reflect the Kremlin’s geopolitical ambitions. Rosneft’s role in Venezuela was to provide a major subsidy to the government in the form of $6.5 billion in loans to Petroleos de Venezuela in the 2014 to 2016 timeframe for providing 133,000 barrels a day of oil. While Rosneft has become Venezuela’s largest oil trader, taking 44 percent of PDVSA exports in July and 66 percent in August, only a fraction of the energy fields to which it has access have been developed. The value of these holdings and the untapped reserves beneath them provide the Kremlin with ways of clawing back their sunk costs, regardless of the outcome of Maduro’s regime. It could either seek long-term profits and develop energy infrastructure should Maduro stay in power, or, should the regime collapse, it could cash in and sell the rights to other foreign companies before mounting any further losses.$As of 2018, only half of the contracted oil had been delivered, but the prepayments provided urgent funds to Moscow’s Venezuelan partners in time for the 2015 parliamentary elections. Moscow’s willingness to pay this subsidy is also significant because it came as hydrocarbon prices plunged by 50 percent, Ukraine-related sanctions started to bite, gross domestic product (GDP) fell by over 3 percent, and the standard of living dropped by over 9 percent. Even as the Russian economy took blow after blow, the Kremlin took on new economic burdens to shore up its ally in the Western Hemisphere, proving itself a steadfast partner for Caracas.$The Kremlin has also helped dull some of the sting of US sanctions on Venezuela. In 2018, the small Russian bank Evrofinance Mosnarbank began to sell Venezuela’s new cryptocurrency, the petro, created specifically to help Caracas get access to funds despite the sanctions. Evrofinance Mosnarbank is the natural venue to issue the petro: the government of Venezuela has a 49 percent share of the bank and the other shares belong to VTB and Gazprombank—both of which are under sanctions prompted by Moscow’s war on Ukraine. Rosneft currently circumvents sanctions by trading oil as part of debt servicing agreements with Caracas and PDVSA, which currently owes $1.1 billion as of the end of the second quarter of 2019. This system of a direct exchange of debt for oil has allowed both Moscow and Caracas to profit despite the sanctions currently in place, with Moscow becoming the leading marketer of Venezuelan oil and adding to its influence on global markets and Caracas finding new means to service its debt and appease its supporters in the Kremlin. Moves like these allow Moscow to support its ally and help it to create a counter financial system to the one dominated by the West.$$The Kremlin views its policy in Venezuela as a success. Moscow aims to use its relationship with Caracas as a point of leverage over the United States—to respond to US support for governments in Georgia and Ukraine that it does not like. $Moreover, Maduro’s future quickly became more precarious in early 2019, with the United States hinting about using its military to oust him. In response, Putin deployed the S-300s and Russian “trainers” arrived to prop up Maduro. Washington paused talk about all options being on the table. So Putin places Venezuela alongside Syria as a place where he saved “his guy” and prevented the West from putting its preferred leader to take power.$Moscow also has something to gain economically from its presence in Venezuela, as it seeks to take advantage of a self-inflicted withdrawal of US energy companies from Venezuela. The US decision to temporarily extend General License 8, which allows US companies a temporary stay of presence in Venezuela, may not be extended again in October. If not, US companies’ withdrawal from Venezuela would be a boon to Russian and Chinese, energy companies. Both could acquire turnkey operations on US invested production facilities.$Yet Moscow’s Venezuelan position is not without risk and cost. Over the past fifteen years, Moscow has bought itself close relations with an increasingly authoritarian, incompetent, and illegitimate regime. The money that Russian firms put into the Venezuelan economy—which has paid no dividends—simply helped the Maduro regime get past the 2015 elections. Russian companies are losing money in Venezuela, and many have chosen to close up shop and head back to Moscow.$Most importantly, the country’s already dismal economic plight is only getting worse. Maduro clings to office only thanks to the counterintelligence support of Cuba and the loyalty of Venezuela’s military, which is not assured as the country’s deep suffering grows. And supporting Maduro will only become more costly for the Kremlin. Polls by the independent Levada Center, for example, show that a growing majority of Russians believe the country is spending too much on foreign adventures and not enough at home. What’s more, the Venezuela strategy undermines one of Russia’s major foreign policy goals; to create a multipolar world in part by encouraging unity and common cause among the BRICS countries, the association of five major emerging national economies (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa). Moscow’s support for Maduro has driven a wedge between Russia and Brazil, the South American member of BRICS, which considers the Maduro regime a regional disaster. $Putin faces one more danger from his Venezuelan adventure that dwarfs
all the others. The Venezuelan deployments are difficult to support
logistically, and Moscow’s ability to deploy conventional forces in the Western
Hemisphere cannot compare to US capabilities. If the United States were to send
its military to oust Maduro, there is little Putin could do about it. In that
case, Putin would face the worst of all worlds: the loss of an ally whom he had
vowed to protect, at the hands of his geopolitical foe. $Putin surely understands his military’s conventional inferiority to US forces, but he has repeatedly risked confrontation, expecting Washington to blink. For more than five years, Russian warplanes and ships have harassed American ships and planes, approaching too close and at times with their transponders turned off. More critically, Russian Wagner mercenaries repeatedly challenged US-supported opposition groups, accompanied by US forces, in Syria in 2017 and 2018. The last incident, in February 2018, provoked a US strike that killed hundreds of Russian fighters. Instead of protesting or retaliating, the Kremlin simply disavowed the mercenaries. Moscow could face a similar situation in Venezuela, especially given reports earlier this year that it had sent mercenaries to Caracas.$$Although the situation in Venezuela is at an impasse, it remains highly fluid, with Maduro feeling emboldened on the one hand, but the interim government striving to sustain its momentum on the other. Guaidó is recognized as president by democracies around the world, and his government has legitimate representation at the Inter-American Development Bank. The Lima Group—which includes Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, and Venezuela—has condemned the Maduro regime and sought international pressure to force Caracas to hold new elections. Meanwhile, the European Union (EU), on the heels of a scathing report following the July 2019 visit to Venezuela by United Nations (UN) High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet, |
