Colombia V's Venezuela - Capabilities/Who Would Win?

Hi,

with the tensions growing between these two South American Countries, it would be good to look at who has the military capability to defeat the other.

Not knowing too much about these 2, I was kind of surprised to see its not a one sided fight at all.

COLOMBIA

Colombia has been battling left-wing insurgents for more than four decades and enjoys close U.S. logistical and intelligence support. Venezuela’s military lacks combat experience but its air force has superior technology

Regular Troops - 254,300
Reserves - 61,900
National Police - 136,000 (many combat trained and prepared)

Hardware -
115 combat capable aircraft, including 22 ground attack fighters, among them Mirages and KFirs.

4 surface combat ships

Defense Budget in 2007 - $5.1 billion


Venezuela

Regular Troops - 115,000
Reserves - 280,000

Hardware -
94 combat capable aircraft including 68 fighter jets including - Sukhois, F16's amd Mirages.
Recent Military purchases include 53 helicopters, 24 SU-30 Sukhoi Fighter Jets and 100,000 Kalashnikov Assault Rifles.
6 surface combat ships

Defense Budget in 2007 - $2.56 billion.

Source: International Institute for Strategic Studies, AP

eldib.wordpress.com...



Also found this article from June 2009 -

www.military.com...

But the purchase of the SA-24 man-portable missiles - the most sophisticated version manufactured in Russia - spiked U.S. anxiety.The missile and launcher weigh just 42 pounds, can hit targets flying at up to 19,500 feet, employ a "fire and forget" system that is highly resistant to countermeasures, has night-vision capability and is easy to maintain, U.S. military experts said. Previously, Venezuela only had pedestal-mounted Swedish RBS-70 and French Mistral surface-to-air missiles.

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(may not be indentical model to what mentioned above)


It seems that both these countries have some decent capability against a neighbouring country. Colombia without a doubt would have US intel which would be a big help. Venezuela on the other hand boasts more trrops and a more impressive air force, not to mention some impressive imported goods from Russia!!.

Maybe the situation here will simmer down, who knows, but it seems this has been brewing up for a long time and with the US using Colombian Airspace, I can only see this heating up in the meantime. As for who would win. It certainly makes for a long bloody guerilla type battle in which the US would surely be helping Colombia as much as it can from behind the curtain.

Feel free to add more Military info, opinions etc.

Cheers, G.



[edit on 8-11-2009 by grantbeed]

Interesting comparison. I think if a war did erupt between them, a lot will depend on who supplies which country in the fight. There's a lot of money that can be made by selling weapons to them. It wouldn't surprise me if US, European, Russian and Chinese weapons were sold to both countries if they went to war. That could make a big difference in who would win.

Venezuela would dominate the air war which would be irrlevant due to the limited size of each countries air arm, the naval conflict would be irrelevant but fairly equally matched for similar reasons, and the ground war would take on the appearence of a large guerilla action with few set piece battles because of the harsh terrain and unsuitability for heavy artillery or tanks.

If ever there was a popcorn war this would be it, i.e. just sit back and watch the utter futility of it.