What is the US invasion / regime change / taking control of Venezuela all about? This is from The Telegraph this morning, in an email news alert:
Venezuela push
British investment firms are preparing to pile into Venezuela, betting that Donald Trump's toppling of Nicolás Maduro will trigger a resounding economic revival.
Hedge funds and asset managers in London are among those preparing to snap up debt, stocks and invest in property and companies across the country.
Investors are betting that Venezuela's socialist “Chavismo” system will soon be dismantled and replaced with American-style capitalism, triggering an economic boom that could define the decade.
So, now we know. It is all about providing an opportunity for hedge funds.
The trouble is, quite a lot of me believes that might well be true.
In the battle between financial capitalism and the people, financial capitalism is winning.
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Trump has linked Venezuela and Greenland (and indeed Canada) to US national security.
We have to take very seriously the possibility that the intimidation fleet off the coast of Venezuela could move further north to sit somewhere between Canada and Greenland. But actually the population of Greenland is so tiny (around 60,000) that the US could easily post a few thousand or a few tens of thousand of soldiers on the ground there.
Naomi Klein’s Shock Doctrine written 20 years ago comes to mind. She nailed it.
[…] gambled on an event like this, has risen by around 30% since Saturday. They are celebrating, and, as I have noted this morning, their plans for the exploitation of Venezuela are developing rapidly. The suggestion that this is […]
The value of a leader (Sir Kier) is judged, not when times are easy, but when difficult and demand bravery against bullies. Starmer fails, even though he could have codified a legal blah blah answer – he was once described as a prominent international human rights lawyer.
Leadership is a test of character.
Most of us have encountered such a choice of siding with a ‘bullying boss’ or a decent person, from time to time, and perhaps in circumstances where you could lose your job, reputation and livelihood.
And I don’t think Trump’s actions have changed Venezuela much. It is still run by Chavinistas, a guerilla war could ensue and further impoverish the poor. Maduro et al seemed open to funnelling oil through US oil giants to boost their national income and accepted a deal – maybe it’s being played out now in part?
And Trump will move on to Iran, so control of Venezuelan oil is a tidy backup plan if the Gulf becomes a full blown war zone.
As to your question – Trump’s plan is simple – create a greater Pax America from the Arctic to Antarctic.
“Investors are betting that Venezuela’s socialist “Chavismo” system will soon be dismantled and replaced with American-style capitalism, triggering an economic boom that could define the decade”. – whilst assuming that the losers (there will be losers) will sit idly by and do nothing. FARQ used to be just across the border, if social conditions significantly worsen due to the vultures then weapons will do the talking. It has almost always been thus in South & Central America – the greed of the few leading to violence.
Nils Pratley in today’s Guardian has doubts that American big oil (with the exception of Exxon which already has a presence in Venezuela) will be very wary of rushing in. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2026/jan/05/donald-trump-big-oil-venezuela
I hope he is right, mostly because I am very much in need of hope at present.
I can see no reason why they need to take the commercial risk of this.
1. It’s actually Chevron that has been in Venezuela for quite some time, not Exxon. Chevron CEO Mike Wirth was recently on Bloomberg News mentioning this. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/audio/2025-12-10/bloomberg-talks-chevron-s-mike-wirth-talks-oil-prices-podcast
2. The Trump administration is not in charge of Venezuela. It has not taken over Venezuela. Following a directive issued in advance by Maduro, in case he was captured, the Chavista army has mobilized and now controls Venezuela. The new Venezuelan president, Delcy Rodriguez, isn’t playing ball with the US either. Today she announced publicly that Venezuela is not going to be anybody’s colony, ever again. While it’s not clear whether the army listens to her, Trump is definitely not in command down there. And the CIA recommended her.
La CIA recomendó dar el poder de Venezuela a Delcy Rodríguez ante el riesgo de que María Corina Machado no controlara el ejército
3. Russia’s foreign minister Sergey Lavrov has made noise about Russia’s firm support for Maduro and against the US. He phoned Rodríguez on Saturday to express “strong solidarity” with the government, and the Russian foreign ministry publicly demanded that the United States release Maduro. (I don’t see Russia sending military power to Venezuela.)
4. Venezuelan oil – pfft. I don’t think so.
All I see is more of the same U.S. hegemony there always has been except that this time Trump and his administration are so contemptuous of everyone that they just cannot be bothered to dress it up or lie about it. This is the iron fist minus the velvet glove.
This is doing business the American way and the rest of us are nothing but red Indians to them.
The choice is between a system in which the country sitting on the world’s largest oil reserves runs out of toilet paper and financial capitalism.
I have read analysis, which seems credible, that suggests that this is all about petro-dollar hegemony.
Venezuela was apparently trading with China for oil in the yuan which of course the US will not tolerate. In 2018, Venezuela announced it would “free itself from the dollar.”
They started accepting yuan, euros, rubles, anything BUT dollars for oil.
There’s a pattern of what happens to leaders who challenge dollar hegemony:
2000: Saddam Hussein announces Iraq will sell oil in euros instead of dollars.
2009: Gaddafi proposes a gold-backed African currency called the “gold dinar” for oil trade. We of course know the fate of those two individuals and their countries.
Russia sells oil in rubles and yuan since Ukraine.
Saudi Arabia is openly discussing yuan settlements.
Iran has been trading in non-dollar currencies for years.
BRICS countries are actively building payment systems that bypass the dollar entirely.
The US’s justification for its actions in Venezuela can be dismantled by a six year-old…..the petro-dollar seems altogether more feasible.
Maybe…
It’s a plausible hypothesis but Venezuela only exports $4bn of oil so that is unlikely to have much impact on the US$ if it was paid for in yuan rather than $.
Is it perhaps connected to the long-standing rivalry if not feud between 1) ‘Wall Street’ and 2) ‘City of London and satellites’? The value of the financial services provided by area 2) comfortably exceeds 1). The stringency of financial regulation in area 1) is markedly tougher than in area 2).
For one view of this, see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQ7UrtDjNao
As the past six years should have shown people with enquiring and open minds, a lot of things which they believed in 2019 probably aren’t true.
I doubt this, very much. That stretches correlation beyond the bounds of reasonableness.
Some analysis I’ve read indicates that this whole thing is all about sending a message to China to cease operations in South and Central America and about China’s and the BRICS attack on the dollar trading currency hegemony!
I th9ink there is a lot being said without a lot of substance to it.
So that’s why Badenough says it’s morally right, whatever the legality of it.