Maneuvers With Venezuela Over, Russian Navy Sets Sail For Former US Base In Panama

Peter the Great came, he swept around, he hung out with the guys for a while, and then he sailed away. The Russian navy's giant nuclear-powered missile cruiser, the largest afloat on the planet, didn't stay long in Venezuelan waters.

Officials in Caracas had made much of the visit to Venezuela of the Russian fleet for joint maneuvers in the Carribean. It was pointed out that this would be taking place right under the nose of Washington, not to mention in its backyard.

State television channel VTV went to town on the story, depicting stern-faced soldiers with jutting jaws gazing towards the horizon as they sailed the decidedly less than stormy seas. As it turned out the joint maneuvers appeared to be not much more than a day at the office on water. An exercise grandly entitled Combined Venrus Operation 2008 got under way at eight o'clock on Monday morning.

And then, it's said, at five o'clock that afternoon, it was over and done with. Peter and his friend, an anti-submarine vessel named Admiral Chabanenko sailed away, accompanied by three Venezuelan frigates to the 50-mile mark. The next step, or so it's said, is for Venezuelan ships to set sail for the North Sea for more maneuvers with the Russians. The timetable for this hasn't been disclosed.

The maneuvers just ended were the latest step in President Hugo Chávez' efforts to forge ever closer relations with Russia, and by no means least in the military sphere. This in turn is part and parcel of his long-running campaign against what he sees as undue United States influence in the region.

Inviting Russian warships and ostentatiously holding joint exercises with them was yet another way of cocking a snook at the Bush Administration, even if its days in power are numbered and attention focuses on incoming President-Elect Barack Obama.

As for the home front, the new friendship with Russia is seen as a good way to rub it in with people who think Chávez is wrong to pursue a quarrel with Washington. The US is Venezuela's best customer for its main product, oil -- and lately, it seems, the only one who pays retail, if at all. Time was when Venezuela had close military ties with the United States as well, to whom it looked for most of its military supplies.

Chávez put a stop to that a couple of years back. He ended long-running military cooperation with the United States and told its soldiers to go home. Then he turned to Moscow for arms deals, and the orders have been piling up ever since.