It is time for the United States to "take some decisive steps" because of the chaos in Venezuela and Russia's involvement there, former CIA director James Woolsey told Newsmax TV.
During an appearance on Tuesday's "Newsmax Now," Woolsey discussed the chaotic day in the South American nation because of a military uprising.
"I'm most worried about Russia right now for all sorts of reasons," Woolsey told host John Bachman. "You've got something like 20,000 Russian troops masquerading in their uniform color as being from somewhere other than where they're from.
"I think we have to take some decisive steps. I would hasten to say I'm not suggesting that at this point we use military force. But economic steps, ways of cracking down on those three or four countries that are helping preserve the dictatorship, and an illegal one, in Venezuela, I think we have not been moving hard enough and we need to pick up our speed and game."
Opposition leader Juan Guaidó is recognized as Venezuela's legitimate interim president by 54 countries, including the United States, but President Nicolás Maduro is still clinging to power.
Russia and Cuba are on Maduró's side, and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo even said Maduro was about to flee to Cuba on Tuesday morning before Russia talked him out of doing so.
Woolsey thinks it is time for the CIA to drop in some operatives and do what they do best.
"We need to use some of the tricks of the trade that we've used in past decades to help countries become free like those in eastern Europe, and to do so sometimes in the shadows," he said.
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