The Venezuelan saga now has enough twists to resemble a hard-boiled detective novel
The Venezuelan saga now has enough twists to resemble a hard-boiled detective novel.
On the side of the alleged good guys, the United States seized a vessel off Venezuela’s coast, claiming it was carrying “sanctioned oil” of Venezuelan and Iranian origin. Donald Trump, never one to understate a threat, floated the possibility of a ground incursion against what he memorably labeled the “narco-government” of dictator Nicolás Maduro.
On the side of the alleged bad guys, Vladimir Putin rang up his “pana” Maduro to reaffirm his support — and, rumor has it, to offer him a comfortable asylum in a kind of post-Soviet viceroyalty known as Belarus. China, for its part, would not take kindly to the world’s largest proven oil reserves falling into the hands of “American imperialism.”
Of course, “good” and “bad” are mostly rhetorical conveniences. No one ignores Washington’s longstanding appetite for Venezuelan crude, just as no one can overlook the suffering Venezuelans have endured under Maduro’s iron fist. In short, stay tuned.
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