The weapons that Russia sold in Venezuela and the military planes that arrived in Caracas

The arrival last weekend for
Caracas of two
Russian military planes loaded with personnel and military equipment triggered all sorts of speculation and revived the fear of escalation with international implications

Venezuela

Since last January, when the leader of the opposition

Juan Guaidó

he declared himself acting president accusing

Nicolás Maduro

As a usurper, the country has been at the center of global tensions and rivalry between the United States and its allies (who support Guaidó) and Russia, China and others, like Cuba, has been overthrown. the rule of Chavez.

Before official silence, all were questions.

Who are the men traveling in the two Russian planes? What is your mission in Venezuela? Why did they arrive at an airport where they would be seen?

The Russian state news agency
Sputnik He reported that an unidentified source of the Russian Embbady in Venezuela had confirmed the arrival of defense personnel in this country of South America, which had led the secretary of the US state Mike Pompeo to demonstrate with the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Russia, Sergei Lavrov.

Pompeo called Lavrov by phone to tell him that

Washington

and its allies "will not sit idly by while Russia exacerbates tensions in Venezuela."

How Russia armed Venezuela Chavista

But the Russian military collaboration with Chavez Venezuela is not new.

The Russians, along with the Chinese, were the main suppliers of war materiel to Caracas since the Bolivarian Revolution.

Hugo Chavez

he came to power.

Anxious to make Venezuela a regional power capable of thwarting American power, Chávez invests substantial sums of oil revenues in the modernization of the Bolivarian Armed Forces.

Russia, along with China, was the main supplier of weapons acquired at the time. And for years, he has supplied several models of aircraft and helicopters, as well as tanks and artillery units.

The Russian contribution to the Venezuelan deterrent capacity has been the sale of Su-30Mk2 fighter jets, experts say, a device capable of competing with the most advanced American fighter jets thanks to its firepower, maneuverability and performance.

The Russian military industry also provided tanks and artillery units.

The Venezuelan armed forces have also adopted the Kalashnikov, perhaps the most manufactured Russian weapon in the world, as a regulatory weapon, and it has even been decided to build a factory of this type in the city of Maracay (center).

In addition to weapons programs, the Russian army conducted joint training exercises with Venezuela, the last of them last December.

With the crisis came the problems

"The Russians have focused a lot on Venezuela, but they found that they were not asking for anything," he said.
BBC World a foreign military expert based in Caracas requested that his name not be made public.

According to him, the liquidity problems in Venezuela have made technical-military cooperation suffer.

"In recent years, they have tried to make sure that the Russians and the Chinese are engaged in maintenance, but the problem is that they can no longer pay anyone," said L & # 39; expert.

Since the Venezuelan economy began to experience its sharp decline in 2014, the problems have worsened.

The lack of maintenance in recent years has put into question the operational capacity of Venezuelan teams, which the Nicolás Maduro government seems interested in resolving, after the United States insisted on keeping open the possibility of intervention. military to provoke the catastrophe. political change that leads to Venezuela.

Sputnik also reported that an anonymous source of the Russian Embbady in Caracas said that "Russia has several contracts under completion, military-type contracts".

One of the hypotheses that badysts deal with to explain the arrival of the last Russian contingent is that it would be staff dedicated to concrete plans to keep up to date the teams that Venezuela has already bought from Russia.

The shadow of the S-300 missile defense system

At the time of Chávez, Venezuela also bought Russians anti-aircraft missiles that helped shape what the European expert consulted described as "the best aerospace defense system in the region".

One of these devices is the S-300, a mobile air defense system with which, according to ISI, a firm specializing in the collection and badysis of satellite images for the purpose of badysis Intelligence, the Venezuelan army operates well above the usual in the month of February.

It was the same month when the impetus between Maduro and Guaidó reached its peak and an American attack seemed more likely.

ISI has detected various loading and unloading exercises with the S-300 at Capitán Manuel Ríos Air Base, located in El Sombrero, in the state of Guárico, central Venezuela.

This "significant activity", as described by ISI, has led some observers to believe that the arrival of Russian military personnel could be related to the maintenance or handling of such equipment.

The S-300 was a very active deterrent to the war in Syria, in which it contributed to the forces of President Bashar al-Assad, an ally of Russia, who finally triumphed.

Although when the US president

Donald Trump

tasked with launching Tomahawk missiles against Syrian pro-government positions in response to the alleged use of chemical weapons against the civilian population, the S-300 did not intercept them.