[sasportas]

Wouldn't this depend on how much of an air force Chavez has? Your scenario sounds like it would be a head to head contest between our Naval carrier aviators and their air force. I think they are supposed to have a fairly large air force.

[Virginia Ridgerunner]

Not particularly. One can have a large air force in terms of numbers, but if one does not know how to use it, or if your pilots are not adequately trained in combat tactics, then it is pretty much useless. Venezuela does have an Air Force http://www.scramble.nl/ve.htm that includes twenty-one vintage F-16s and some French Mirages. But Chavez's mouth has caused him some supply and maintenance problems http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1556187/posts. Therefore, I suspect that Venezuela's Air Force would not last very long against an American carrier battle group (or two).

Also, do not forget that the U.S. Navy can launch several hundred Tomahawks with various types of warheads to hit Venezuelan airfields well before Chavez could even get his Air Force into the air. This is all theoretical, of course, but a likely scenario I think if we ever had to put Venezuela's military down without invading the country.

Fortunately, it may not ever come to that since Venezuela's military does have close ties to the U.S. military, and many Venezuelan officers apparently are sympathetic to the U.S, as suggested in this piece http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1565908/posts.

Also, Chavez is apparently going to drive Venezuela's oil economy into the ground by grossly overspending on his military http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1561885/posts, and so I suspect that his days are numbered from within, one way or the other, and he doesn't even know it.