Comment by xg15
3 days ago
Yeah, I was mostly surprised about the brazenness of it all. So the plan is to take over the government, take over the oil industry, sell the oil and in infinite grace give the Venezuelans some part of it back (minus of course the "compensation" for the years in which US companies were kept out of the country)
And all that as official doctrine, not even some secret strategy paper or covert ops campaign.
Edit: I had to chuckle at his "reviewing" of the Monroe doctrine as DONroe doctrine. There is "on the nose" and there is "punching someone in the face"...
> minus of course the "compensation" for the years in which US companies were kept out of the country
I don’t want to sound like I’m running coverage for the Americans, but wasn’t a lot of that infrastructure built by foreign multinationals and then expropriated by Chávez in 2007?
> built by foreign multinationals and then expropriated by Chávez in 2007?
If you follow this reasoning - after what happened today - you will get Iran 2.0: Venezuelan boogaloo
I have zero optimism that after this - ordinary Venezuelans will have better outcomes in 10 years time.
Current USA government is some weird klepto-oligrachy. Hates brown people. It’s not doing it out of benevolence to Venezuelans. Venezuelans will get either colonialist resource extraction treatment or some power vacuum will bring just another despot.
Ask the Guyanese next door if they think they are getting a good deal from oil exploitation: https://ieefa.org/articles/guyana-paying-oil-costs-20-years-...
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We have already seen this plot in Iraq!
> Hates brown people
You're reading tealeaves to support your own hate-fueled nonsense belief. Correlation doesn't equal causation and all that.
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Venezuela is the new Africa [or India [or Philipins]]
Your comment triggers so many thoughts, but the first one is I'm so friggin' naive, which is embarrassing. In my fantasy world corporations make investment decisions based on risk. They invest in a country like Venezuela and part of the due diligence is evaluating whether things may go sideways, like in any investment, and what plan b is if they do. And if plan b is getting the government to backstop you with money, guns and/or regulations then that would not be a viable strategy.
But, at every level in the US, that plan b is viable. And it's used over and over and over again, from small local businesses with local politicians to the US Federal Government and military for the likes of the oil industry.
At what point do you just accept the truth: that you (me!) are the dumb one because you hold onto this fantasy of how you think things ought to be as opposed to how they are?
Why is plan (b) bad? From my perspective it is certainly how things ought to be. If my property is nationalized in another country by force, I am fully in favor of my country swinging its dick around to get it back.
And what is to say that plan (b) isn't taken into account when doing the risk assessment in plan (a)?
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And Venezuela was well aware of plan b when accepting the investment.
That’s the story in every oil producing third world country. Without western countries, and these days China, they would just have oil in the ground because they lack the technology and capital to explore for it and extract it. They want the colonizers to come just long enough to install the oil spigots then leave.
I admittedly don’t know much about the industry, but didn’t most other countries not elect to expropriate the infrastructure? My understanding was that a lot of the problems the Venezuelans are having now arose from alienating themselves from the international supply chains and expertise necessary to maintain the equipment used to extract and refine petroleum.
They just do not want colonizers to steal their country and interfere in their internal decisions. Unfortunately, this is the story with every First World colonizer: they do not agree with that.
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As someone living in a country where all of our oil wealth is being extracted by American corporations - America has a very special talent for "convincing" government officials to sign away their citizen's oil wealth. Not repairing that theft by nationalizing the oil seems more criminal than allowing the corporations to continue
At least you are paid fair share of taxes instead of being sent to gulag for questioning your dictator.
If it was done in a legal process then it should be litigated in that country.
What happens to the infrastructure built or businesses run or labor contributed by “illegal” immigrants who are now deported? Does the USA somehow reverse it and make it disappear?
Such a line of reasoning used to justify this kind of extrajudicial and warlike activity is somewhat similar to France’s nonsensical demand for long term reparations from Haiti for colonial infrastructure.
> What happens to the infrastructure built or businesses run or labor contributed by “illegal” immigrants who are now deported?
I believe “built” here refers to the financiers. Like when someone says “I’m building a house” they mean they’re paying to have a house built, unless they’re actually in the construction business, etc.
> "And all that as official doctrine"
The Donroe Doctrine.
https://bsky.app/profile/atrupar.com/post/3mbjv2l5otf25
I think a lot of people don't understand the difference between geopolitical control and economic control.
Being explicit, I'm saying that having access to a resource doesn't mean you get to sell it to whoever you like.
Nobody from Latin America is surprised, the US has been a bully state since the cold war.
American interventionism in Latin America goes back hundreds of years
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filibuster_(military)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_Wars
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roosevelt_Corollary
There has never not been a bully in anarchic systems.
The official doctrine yesterday was they were killing Americans with drug trafficking. That didn't even get mentioned today.
> the plan is
There is no plan. Again.
Machado is standing by. But she’s a woman so Trump has ruled her out.
You mean the lady that basically called for this invasion, praised Trump and MAGA, promised she would let western companies extract whatever they want in exchange for personal power? Yeah, surely this will end well for Venezuelans.
It’s reasonable for her to say such things in order to get support of the nation most capable of removing Maduro and allowing her to rule. It doesn’t make her a bad person or speak negatively on how effective a ruler she will be.
> the lady that basically called for this invasion
Like Jefferson lobbied France to help us out with Britain.
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She could had gotten everything she wanted if she only understood that blowing smoke up Trump's ass isn't good enough anymore. He demands bribes as well.
If $1-6 million buys a pardon, how much buys a country?
He's just said she's not being considered.
Which makes total sense, the military has been Chavismo's strongest asset for as long as it's been a thing
That won't change just because Maduro isn't there, whomever does take control, will need external protection, or the US acting as an unspoken enforcer (Unspoken because "No boots on the ground right now" but "prepared for a second wave")
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Correct. I spoke unclearly. I meant that we have a good option, our Endara to Noriega, but instead Trump is hard pivoting to the Baghdad model.
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This particular quote isn't dementia, he's making a joke, it's the "Donroe Doctrine" because DONald Trump is now expanding it or whatever.
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Did we watch the same debate? He was diminished, at the end of his term, during a tough campaign. But not crazy. And certainly not a puppet.
Two wrongs don't make a right.
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You’re right. And it was bad.
This is bad too.
Prepare Canada and Greenland, you can see the standard American right wing response to unchecked war mongering right here.
On a technology note, anyone got any bets on which company gets all the free loot? Did Erik Prince rebrand for the fiftieth time? Seems like he’d be a safe bet.
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> Your turn
I genuinely don’t get this argument. You’re saying Trump is a vegetable like Biden and counting that as a win?