A Change in Chávez?

By Mary Anastasia O'Grady
Sunday, August 10, 2008

Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez has tried make himself a global powerbroker and the leader of a socialist resurgence, but his methods have been less than statesman-like. Calling the president of the United States an unflattering part of the human anatomy is one example. Hanging with Colombian terrorists is another.

Yet, according to the State Department's Assistant Secretary for Western Hemisphere Tom Shannon, blowback may be starting to force the Venezuelan leader to rethink his antisocial ways. "Countries around the region have seen the political space open to Venezuela shrinking," the Bush Administration's top diplomat for Latin America told a House subcommittee last month. "The re-emergence of countries that have traditionally been regional leaders has constricted Venezuela's diplomatic movements."

This is a polite way of saying Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Peru and Mexico, thanks to their economic achievements and the evolution of their institutions, have been elevated to the realm of serious countries -- while Venezuela has sunk to banana-republic status.

Venezuela has been further damaged, Mr. Shannon added, by Mr. Chávez's failed campaign for a U.N. Security Council seat and his country's growing "internal problems" -- of which the most visible are skyrocketing crime, inflation, food shortages and unemployment.

Where Mr. Shannon ventured into questionable territory, however, was a suggestion that the loose cannon in Caracas may be seeing the error of his ways. "For the first time in many years," he said, Venezuela has "expressed a willingness to explore improved relations with the U.S. President Chávez recently told our Ambassador that he wanted to improve our counterdrug cooperation. . . . "

How wonderful. Venezuela under Mr. Chávez has become a key transshipment agent for cocaine destined for the U.S., Europe and -- lately -- West Africa, where (as even Mr. Shannon noted) "the drug trade is exploding and causing instability to the region."

Mr. Chávez may well be softening his tone since he can only conduct so many fights at one time. At home, he's trying to brace up his troubled rule with new decrees seizing control of the economy and setting up a personal militia. But to mistake his tactical maneuvers as a sign of new maturity would be wishful thinking. Let's hope the Bush Administration -- and whoever comes next -- is not so unwise.