Arms Shopping in South America

Venezula only has 62,000 people in their army and national guard combined. But the country's buying 100,000 AK-47 assault weapons -- and the Pentagon says the order could rise to 300,000.

Hard to figure out what Venezuela would do with all those rifles -- and not enough men to man them all. But the Bush administration says the move could start a South American arms race and destabalize the continent for decades.

The Los Angeles Times also reports that Venezula's spending billions to buy new warships, as many as 50 Russian attack helicopters, and 30 MIG-29 fighter jets. (LAT)