with his supporters". By early 2002, Chávez's approval rating dropped to around 30%. This action, according to The Los Angeles Times, "united all the anti-Chávez forces", bringing together union leader Carlos Ortega, head of the Confederation of Workers of Venezuela (Confederación de Trabajadores de Venezuela, CTV for short in Spanish), with Pedro Carmona Estanga, head of Venezuela's main business federation, Fedecámaras, in a call for an "indefinite general strike" in support of oil workers. Military The existing military grew wary of Chávez due to his relationship with Fidel Castro and the Colombian guerrilla group FARC that they were previously taught "were the greatest threat to their country". The military felt that after fighting against Castro's influence, guerilla groups and attempts to overthrow previous Venezuelan governments to expand his revolutionary presence since the 1960s, that they had finally lost when Chávez came to power. Chávez promoted guerilla fighters into the Venezuelan military and forced the wary existing military servicemen to assist them. One of the more controversial actions that created discontent within the military was when Chávez forced them to assist the FARC with setting up camps in Venezuelan territories, providing ammunition to fight the Colombian government, supplying ID cards so they could move freely through Venezuela and sending members of Bolivarian Circles to their camps to receive guerilla training. The most controversial steps taken by Chávez was ordering the existing military to work with the Cuban military, with the Venezuelan military and intelligence agencies forced to open their bases, files and hard drives for their Cuban counterparts creating a sense of being betrayed by Chávez. The "long-simmering resentment in the military" was articulated publicly by four high-level officers, including Air Force Gen. Roman Gomez Ruiz, who called on Chávez to "resign peacefully and take responsibility for your failure". Chávez responded by declaring these officers traitors, ordering their arrest, and forcing their resignations. The Chicago Tribune later reported that although the Venezuelan general public was unaware of it, the country's oil industry was approaching the end of a six-week work slowdown and Chávez's government and oil executives had agreed that members of an oil board picked by Chávez would resign. "But labor and business leaders, who had joined in secret with dissident military officers in an effort to oust Chávez, decided that the moment had come to press on", the newspaper maintained. "The middle-class intellectuals and professionals who had at first