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President Donald Trump confirmed the startling attacks in Venezuela and the arrest of leader Nicol\u00e1s Maduro were largely about its vast oil reserves\u2014not just drugs and immigration\u2014arguing that American oil companies will rebuild the Venezuelan crude industry to compensate the U.S. financially and enrich the Venezuelan people.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re going to have our very large United States oil companies\u2014the biggest anywhere in the world\u2014go in, spend billions of dollars, fix the badly broken infrastructure, the oil infrastructure, and start making money for the country,\u201d Trump said during a press conference on Saturday.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re going to have a presence in Venezuela as it pertains to oil,\u201d Trump said. \u201cWe\u2019re going to be taking a tremendous amount of wealth out of the ground.\u201d<\/p>\n
Although smaller gains could come more quickly, energy analysts emphasize it will take years\u2014likely close to a decade\u2014to truly rebuild the Venezuelan oil sector and dramatically boost exports, ensuring U.S. ensnarement in Venezuela for a long time.<\/p>\n
While scant on details, Trump said Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodriguez is in charge for now, but that \u201cshe really doesn\u2019t have a choice\u201d and must follow the White House\u2019s orders until fair elections or a transition of power is implemented. \u201cWe\u2019re not afraid of boots on the ground.\u201d<\/p>\n
Home to the world\u2019s largest proven oil reserves but less than 1% of global oil production, Venezuela is arguably the planet\u2019s biggest underachiever from a petroleum extraction perspective. Once a major player churning out nearly 4 million barrels of oil daily, Venezuela\u2019s volumes have plunged from 3.2 million barrels daily in 2000 down to about 960,000 barrels today under the authoritarian socialist regimes of Maduro and his predecessor, Hugo Ch\u00e1vez, from a combination of mismanagement, underinvestment, and escalating U.S. sanctions.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re going to get the oil flowing the way it should be,\u201d Trump said. \u201cIt\u2019s actually a minor flow now for what they have.\u201d<\/p>\n
Trump has repeatedly said he wanted the Venezuelan oil back that was expropriated from American operators during George W. Bush\u2019s second term. During his press conference, he called it the \u201clargest theft of property in the history of our country.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cMassive oil infrastructure was taken like we were babies, and we didn\u2019t do anything about it,\u201d Trump said.<\/p>\n
Trump said the U.S. has now \u201csuperseded\u201d the Monroe Doctrine, noting that some now call it the \u201cDonroe\u201d doctrine. \u201cAmerican dominance in the Western Hemisphere will never be questioned again.\u201d<\/p>\n
Citing national security concerns over drug trafficking, since the fall, the U.S. has bombed many boats from Venezuela\u2014under questionable legal authority\u2014killing more than 100 people thus far, according to the U.S. military. In December, the U.S. escalated the conflict by seizing sanctioned oil tankers and implementing a partial oil embargo around Venezuela.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe embargo on all Venezuelan oil remains in full effect. The American armada remains poised and in position,\u201d Trump said.<\/p>\n
While more than 80% of Venezuela\u2019s exported oil goes to China\u2014Trump said the U.S. will allow the legal sale of Venezuelan oil to China and others\u2014almost 15% does go to the U.S. through a special license Chevron holds to operate in Venezuela.<\/p>\n
\u201cChevron remains focused on the safety and wellbeing of our employees, as well as the integrity of our assets. We continue to operate in full compliance with all relevant laws and regulations,\u201d a Chevron spokesperson said Saturday, declining further comment for now.<\/p>\n
In a Washington, D.C. conference in November, Chevron Chairman and CEO Mike Wirth said the geopolitical circumstances are difficult, but Venezuela\u2019s potential is worth the effort. \u201cThe kinds of swings that you see in places like Venezuela are challenging. But we play a long game. Venezuela is blessed with a lot of geologic resource and bounty. And\u00a0we are committed to the people of the country and would like to be there as part of rebuilding Venezuela\u2019s economy in time when circumstances change.\u201d<\/p>\n
Many Democratic members of Congress sharply criticized Trump for making an illegal attack on Venezuela and lying about it.<\/p>\n
U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton, D-Mass., said Trump acted Illegally, outside of U.S. interests, and seemingly with no plan going forward. He told CNN that the White House lied to Congress about forcing regime change, putting boots on the ground, and about drugs coming to the U.S. from Venezuela\u2014or the lack thereof.<\/p>\n
\u201cMaybe this is all about oil and he\u2019s trying to steal their oil,\u201d Moulton said, but that he doesn\u2019t know for sure because Trump lies about everything.<\/p>\n
When asked how the attacks in Venezuela mesh with \u201cAmerica First\u201d policies, Trump said: \u201cWe want to surround ourselves with good neighbors. We want to surround ourselves with stability. We want to surround ourselves with energy, We have tremendous energy in that country. It\u2019s very important that we protect it. We need that for ourselves; we need it for the world.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
#Trump #Venezuelan #regime #change #largely #oil #stole #oil<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
President Donald Trump confirm… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9079,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[544,486,809,364,3792,7077,599,3512,7076],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9078"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9078"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9078\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/9079"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9078"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9078"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9078"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}