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Venezuela's Authoritarian Allies Woodrow WilsonWoodrow Center Reports on the Americas • #43 Venezuela’s Authoritarian Allies: THE TIES THAT BIND? Cynthia J. Arnson, Editor Latin American Program The Wilson Center’s Latin American Program provides non-partisan ex- pertise to a broad community of decision makers in the United States and Latin America on critical policy issues facing the Hemisphere. The Program provides insightful and actionable research for policymakers, private sector leaders, journalists, and public intellectuals in the United States and Latin America. To bridge the gap between scholarship and policy action, it fos- ters new inquiry, sponsors high-level public and private meetings among multiple stakeholders, and explores policy options to improve outcomes for citizens throughout the Americas. Drawing on the Wilson Center’s strength as the nation’s key non-partisan forum, the Program serves as a trusted source of analysis and a vital point of contact between the worlds of scholarship and action. The Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars was chartered by the US Congress in 1968 as the living memorial to the nation’s twen- ty-eighth president. It serves as the country’s key nonpartisan policy fo- rum, tackling global challenges through independent research and open dialogue. Bridging the worlds of academia and public policy, the Center’s diverse programmatic activity informs actionable ideas for Congress, the administration, and the broader policy community. Please visit us online at www.wilsoncenter.org. © 2021, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars ISBN: 978-1-7359401-4-4 Contents Acknowledgments ............................................................................................ 3 1 Introduction Cynthia J. Arnson ..................................................................................................................... 4 2 Venezuela: Russia’s Gordian Knot in Latin America Vladimir Rouvinski ................................................................................................20 3 China–Venezuela Economic Relations: Hedging Venezuelan Bets with Chinese Characteristics Stephen B. Kaplan and Michael Penfold ....................................................................54 4 Two Nations, One Revolution: The Evolution of Contemporary Cuba–Venezuela Relations Brian Fonseca and John Polga-Hecimovich ............................................................102 5 The Geopolitics of Cuba–Venezuela–US Relations: An Informal Note Richard E. Feinberg ........................................................................................................ 122 6 India–Venezuela Relations: A Case Study in Oil Diplomacy Hari Seshasayee ............................................................................................................. 136 7 Turkey and Venezuela: An Alliance of Convenience Imdat Oner ....................................................................................................................... 166 8 Venezuela’s Relations with Iran James Bosworth ............................................................................................................ 192 About the Authors .......................................................................................214 Latin American Program Acknowledgments I am grateful to many colleagues who supported this project since its origin in 2018. The book is a product of collaboration between the Wilson Center’s Latin American Program, Kennan Institute, Kissinger Institute on China and the United States, Asia Program, and Middle East Program, the kind of cross-regional partnership that the Wil- son Center excels at facilitating. I owe special thanks to many talented and generous colleagues: Rob Litwak, Matt Rojansky, Joe Dresen, Will Pomeranz, Robert Daly, Mi- chael Kugelman, Abe Denmark, Merissa Khurma, Sue Howard, and Stephanie Deane, for multiple forms of advice, assistance, and feedback. I am also grateful to current and former colleagues in the Latin American Program—Benjamin Gedan, Anders Beal, Be- atriz García Nice, Oscar Cruz, Anya Prusa, Ricardo Zúñiga, Jacquelyn Dolezal-Morales, and Catalina Casas—for believing in this work and for the example of their own high standards and dedication. Abraham F. Lowenthal Fellow Michael Penfold enriched this work in innumerable ways, offering his keen insights, steadfast encouragement, and friendship. And one could not ask for kinder or more skilled professionals than editor Alfred Imhoff and designer Kathy Butterfield. The authors of these chapters tolerated multiple rounds of updating and editing of their chapters, many of which appeared earlier as bulletins published by the Wilson Cen- ter. I am ever grateful to Vladimir, Stephen, Michael, Brian, John, Richard, Hari, Imdat, and Boz for their excellent research, enthusiasm, and patience over the life of this project. I am reminded to add the disclaimer that, despite our collective best efforts, I bear responsibility for any errors that might remain. Finally, I hope that this work contributes to the efforts of those inside and outside Venezuela seeking to bring about a democratic, inclusive, and peaceful resolution of the country’s deep and overlapping governance, economic, and humanitarian crises. Cynthia J. Arnson Director, Latin American Program June 2021 THE TIES THAT BIND? 3 INTRODUCTION Cynthia J. Arnson 1 Latin American Program 1 This is a book about the international dimensions of regime survival in Venezuela. Spe- cifically, it explores the ways that international allies of Nicolás Maduro’s authoritarian government have assisted it in surviving a calamitous period of economic decline, punishing economic sanctions imposed by the United States, and internal pressures for political change.1 This book aims to fill an important gap in the understanding of the international dimensions of the Venezuelan crisis. It details how a range of international allies— Russia, China, Cuba, India, Turkey, and Iran—have aligned with Caracas for diverse economic, political, ideological, and geostrategic reasons. With the exception of Turkey, the relationships between Venezuela and its foreign allies predate Maduro, who came to power in 2013. They were established, deepened, or transformed by President Hugo Chávez, a populist authoritarian who ruled Venezuela from 1999 until his death in 2013. The Chávez period was marked by windfall rents and unprecedented wealth from Venezuela’s principal export—oil—on which the economy depended for over 90 per- cent of export earnings. (By 2021, export dependency on oil had risen to 99 percent.)2 THE TIES THAT BIND? 5 Latin American Program Venezuela was like other South American producers of raw materials that benefited from the commodity price boom during the first decade of the 2000s. With oil bringing in over $100 per barrel, Chávez spent lavishly on missions (misiones) aimed at improv- ing social welfare in poor neighborhoods. He also embarked on a period of foreign pol- icy activism directed explicitly at countering US influence in the region and spreading largesse to multiple countries in the region in the name of Bolivarian socialist solidarity.3 In furtherance of these foreign policy goals, Chávez and Fidel Castro of Cuba es- tablished the Bolivarian Alliance of the Peoples of Our America (ALBA) in 2004.4 ALBA aimed to challenge not only US leadership but also the development and trade integra- tion strategies promoted by “neoliberal” international financial institutions such as the World Bank. To deliver an alternative form of international assistance, Chávez launched Petrocaribe in 2005, providing oil at deeply discounted prices to energy-starved Carib- bean and Central America countries, including Cuba. These same years saw Chávez build strong relationships with China, Russia, and Iran, explicitly embracing regimes that were at odds with Washington even though each had its own reasons for allying with Venezuela. Not surprisingly, US policymakers viewed Venezuela’s economic, polit- ical, and military cooperation with these extra-hemispheric powers as antagonistic, if not threatening, to US interests. Nicolás Maduro sought to continue, deepen, and diversify the international ties that Venezuela established during the Chávez era. He was not always successful; for example, for a variety of reasons elaborated in chapter 2, the Russian oil giant Rosneft withdrew from the country in 2020. Nonetheless, the existence of these relationships helps explain Maduro’s resilience in the face of a “maximum pressure” campaign by the Trump administration aimed at overturning his regime and opening a path to free elections. Sanctions were the centerpiece of this pressure campaign; they were ap- plied not only against current and former government officials and military leaders but also on entire sectors of the economy.5 While terrorism- and drug trafficking–related sanctions had been leveled against Venezuelan officials going back to the administra- tion of George W. Bush, the pace of sanctions accelerated during the Obama admin- istration. This followed congressional enactment of the Venezuela Defense of Human Rights and Civil Society Act of 2014,6 after which Obama sanctioned an array of prom- inent officials responsible for repression or corruption. Under President Trump, the US 6 VENEZUELA’S AUTHORITARIAN ALLIES Latin American Program Treasury Department vastly expanded the targets, sanctioning scores of political and military leaders, including President Maduro himself, his wife, the vice president, Su-
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