If you really believe in the “economic war”, attack your enemies

This piece published yesterday by Aporrea is useful to understand the consequences of really believing that Venezuela is the victim of an “economic war” waged by its enemies.

The author argues that if the government is serious about the war, then it should act as if it is really fighting a war. The logic of war is not the logic of pluralist politics: in a war the enemies (the opposition) are to be destroyed.

“When there is a situation of conflict, one of the parts declares war on the other, at that moment they cease to be adversaries and become enemies, the rules of the game change. In the Venezuelan case, one of the parts has declared war on the other, [but] each part does not dare to recognize that the other is its enemy that must be destroyed. This is a very atypical war because the enemies (government and opposition) are not suffering casualties, instead it is the poor people who are dying,” explains the author.

What should the government be doing in this war scenario?

“I believe that time has come to put things in black and white and to recognize that we are really at war, with victims of battles fought by two antagonistic enemies that will not stop [until] the other is defeated.”

“The government cannot go around accusing its enemies of the existence of and ‘economic war’ against it and not take the measures to face them and defeat them in the battle field of the national economy. The first thing to do is to suspend the legal and economic guarantees that allow the enemy to keep on fighting the war.”