From an industry friend: "The majority of Venezuelan crude is processed in Venezuela by PDVESA. In the U.S. Valero’s refineries in Houston, Port Arthur and Corpus are the primary processors. Valero handles about half of all Venezuelan crude in the U.S. Chevron is another, as they are the only U.S. company currently authorized to operate in Venezuela. They send a lot to their Pasadena and El Segundo refineries. I assume part of the “running” of Venezuela is taking over their refineries. On a side note, the big U.S. companies are not quite on board with Trump’s plan for them to take over, at least not yet. I guess it depends on what’s promised." Trump has now said that a condition of US companies being reimbursed for everything that was seized by VZ during nationalizaion of the industry is that US companies rebuild the decrepit infrastructure in VZ. US oil companies are saying..."whoa...let's wait and see the political/social situation before we commit billions of dollars, and we don't even know how we'd keep our employees safe."
I'm not sure what your posts is trying to say as I agree with what you posted. It's refined in Venezuela because of us sanctions. The refineries want the Venezuelan oil which is what I've been saying. Much lower transportation costs as well. They'll all get on board. They're playing games right now. Watch and see
First I hope your son makes it home safe. However I would be careful about your assessment that celebration implies consent for whatever comes next. It would be like what would happen if Trump was indicted by the Chinese government, and their special forces came and abducted him and took him to a Chinese jail while saying they also were planning to invade again and are in charge of the US. Yes… Many here in the US would be very celebratory that Trump is out of power… however very few would think it was a good thing that happened and would be nervous about what comes next with China. You also aren’t getting the full story about how Venezuelans are acting in actual Venezuela. https://bsky.app/profile/nytimes.com/post/3mbmpzztdfs2h Be careful about seeing reactions to Venezuelans in Florida and coming to conclusions. Also those Venezuelans in Florida need to be aware that Stephen Millers involvement likely means they will waste no time in deporting as many Venezuelans as they can back regardless of how ready the country is and what shape the country is in.
There are a lot of differences. In Panama, the U.S. had thousands of U.S. civilians and troops legally present under the 1977 Torrijos–Carter Treaties, which gave the U.S. a permanent right and obligation to guarantee the Panama Canal’s neutrality and security. By late 1989, Noriega had nullified election results, declared a state of hostility toward the U.S., and Panamanian Defense Forces were regularly harassing U.S. personnel. Days before the invasion, a U.S. Marine was killed at a PDF checkpoint, another Marine was wounded, and a U.S. Navy officer and his wife were detained, beaten, and threatened. The U.S. used this incident, combined with the treaty obligations and deteriorating security conditions, to justify military action. Even then, the legality was heavily disputed internationally, but there was at least a treaty-based U.S. interest and an immediate security trigger. None of that exists in Venezuela. Here, the justification has been all over the map and never clearly explained. It started as a response to alleged narco-terrorism harming Americans, shifted to claims about oil and economic recovery, and is now framed as freeing the Venezuelan people. These are not the same rationale, and they imply very different kinds of military and political commitments. It is not clear that anyone outside the administration actually knows what the plan is. It is fair to ask whether there even is a coherent plan, or whether policy is being improvised based on who has the president’s ear at the moment. So far, the action may be limited. But if the real objective is seizing oil resources or liberating the country, it cannot remain limited. Those goals require far broader military, political, and economic involvement. The shifting justifications and internal contradictions give very little confidence that the administration has seriously thought through what comes next.
The bus driver is picked and shipped out like an Amazon package. Woke shiitheads in here faint. So damn proud to be an American right now.
How much do we want to bet that the whole idea here originated from someone close to or Trump himself watching the movie Sicario and just saying hey… let do that but instead of a cartel leader, just take out Maduro, and see what happens when central, South America, the gangs, and cartels freak out and maybe do something that benefits Trumps power grab?? I see a TON of projected competence from Trump supporters today that is wildly naive. When in reality if you know anything about Trump and these stooges you know they are shooting from the hip and they even basically admit it when they speak that they have no idea what they are doing. With Trump and the military I think of the line from the great Dr. Ian Malcom…”you wield it like a kid who found his dad’s gun.”
The main objective was to capture Maduro and bring him to justice. There were a couple of things that were the same with Noriega and Maduro. They were murders and they were drug dealers, also they both had outstanding indictments out for their arrests. Let me put it this way, if this is a war then I hope all wars we enter into end up with no casualties and the mission accomplished as quickly as this mission was accomplished.
Lets hope this never comes to this. I've seen pictures in the streets of Caracus (SP?) Also my son told me they're very happy in Carousel. We will see about the last paragraph. Hopefully all of the gang members and other assorted criminals Biden let in will be removed.
Trump wants Venezuela to be a US Vassal State, where they do what we want or else. Trump will make sure Big Oil gets re-entrenched in Venezuela. (Hard to be US First when the real beneficiaries are multi-national corporations, right?) Trump is going to recreate the political and economic dynamics in Venezuela that lead to Hugo Chávez. Trump is too dumb to understand this. BTW, if there was a next election, Trump would count the votes and declare the winner. This is the United Fruit Company all over again, just 100 years later, with oil being substituted for bananas.
I do not know how you know what the main objective was. Trump has given several reasons to date and likely will give more in the future. In the end, this is something that Trump wanted to do (think tariffs) and he just did it. Trump will find a way to sell this, after the fact. At least with tariffs, Trump demonstrated a complete lack of understanding of international economics and the US Constitution before jumping in head first.
