Rumsfeld hears concerns about Chavez

MANAGUA, Nicaragua -- The recent military build-up in Venezuela by U.S. nemesis President Hugo Chavez has other countries in the region worried that the weapons could end up in the hands of terrorists, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Monday.\n"I can understand neighbors being concerned," said Rumsfeld, who is attending a meeting of Western hemisphere military leaders here this week.\nAsked whether he believes Venezuelan officials' contention that the weapon buys are strictly for defense and not a threat to the region, Rumsfeld said, "I don't know of anyone threatening Venezuela -- anyone in this hemisphere."\nVenezuela's defense minister Gen. Raul Isaias Baduel, who is also attending the meeting, said Monday that his country's recent military spending spree wasn't "an arms race," despite Washington's protests.\nChavez, however, has repeatedly charged that United States is planning to invade his country, a claim American officials dismiss as preposterous. And he said Sunday that he's heard the Bush administration is plotting to assassinate him or topple his regime.\nU.S. Army Gen. Bantz J. Craddock, chief of U.S. Southern Command, called the accusation "mindless" and "way over the top." But he also agreed that Venezuela's recent deal to buy roughly $3 billion worth of arms from Russia -- including rifles, jet fighters and helicopters -- is triggering "more concern from more countries."\nRumsfeld did not meet privately with Baduel but did briefly exchanged pleasantries with him.\n"I have spoken to Mr. Rumsfeld to convince him that he should try smoking Venezuela's good tobacco," Baduel told The Associated Press. "He said he doesn't smoke, that his wife wouldn't let him."\nMeanwhile, Craddock and other officials said Monday that they don't see a credible threat in Venezuela's call for the creation of an anti-U.S. military coalition with other leftist countries in the region. Craddock said Brazil's defense minister told the gathering he doesn't see a need for a regional military organization.\nGen. Moises Omar Hallesleven, the commander of the Nicaraguan military, told U.S. reporters he is not concerned about the Chavez effort.\nVenezuela, he said through an interpreter, has very weak influence in the region. Hallesleven also vowed that as long as he is its leader, the Nicaraguan military will remain apolitical and professional -- even if Sandinista leader Daniel Ortega wins the upcoming presidential election.\nChavez grabbed headlines recently when he called Bush "the devil" and slammed U.S. leaders for trying to block his country from taking a seat on the U.N. Security Council.\nU.S. officials have long considered Chavez a destabilizing force. And they have suggested that Venezuela would make the Security Council unworkable if the nation were to win its bid against U.S.-backed Guatemala for a rotating council seat.\nRumsfeld, in his formal remarks to the gathering, also made a reference to the other main U.S. antagonist in the region: Cuba.\nHe said he hoped that one day soon "the final holdout in our hemisphere against the democratic sweep of history will give its citizens the right to choose their own destiny and will participate in our conference."\nRumsfeld also called for more regional cooperation in the fight against terrorism.\n"These new challenges can be solved only if we work together to protect our free democratic institutions and to provide economic opportunities for our people," Rumsfeld said.\nThe military conference, along with a NATO defense ministers meeting and other military visits in the Balkans last week, have largely kept Rumsfeld out of Washington for the past week, where there is renewed debate on his stewardship of the Iraq war.\nHe said he will not resign and openly questioned why reporters were so focused on a new book, "State of Denial" by Washington Post assistant managing editor Bob Woodward, that is critical of the defense chief.\nClearly frustrated with repeated questions about his job security, Rumsfeld told reporters he has not read Woodward's book and is not likely to.\nAP writer Julie Watson contributed to this report.