The Venezuelan castro-communist counterinsurgency (1960-1968) and the fight for emergent democratic governments

Daniel Levinson Harris

Small Wars and Insurgencies, 2021, vol. 32, issue 1, 152-162

Abstract: Democracies, handicapped by constitutional conventions and structural mechanisms which enforce the practice of humanitarian ethics, are less well-equipped to address counterinsurgencies (COIN) than popularly-unaccountable authoritarian regimes. Although commonly asserted in academic and popular channels, this statement belies a greater truth: that democracies actually outperform authoritarian governments as it relates to COIN conflict outcome. This paper makes the argument for the waging of effective COIN by emergent democracies through the analysis of the successful Venezuelan anti-Castro-Communist counterinsurgency of the 1960s. The Rómulo Betancourt (1958–1964) and Raúl Leoni (1964–1969) administrations’ tempered and humane response to urban and rural Castro-Communist violence decisively won the backing of the Venezuelan people and mortally wounded the insurgent support base. Once military operational and tactical missteps that prolonged the conflict are accounted for, the Venezuelan COIN of the 1960s can serve as an exportable model for newly emergent democracies seeking to wage war within constitutional conventions.

Date: 2021
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DOI: 10.1080/09592318.2020.1826837

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