Luongo: Trump Betrays MAGA Over Venezuela
The U.S. backed a coup in Venezuela that has failed. And President Trump was the architect of it. This is a farce surrounding an intrigue contained within a tragedy.
What has happened in Venezuela is tragic. Nicolas Maduro is a comical figure straight out of central casting for a South American leader of a junta. But it has been the U.S.’s designs on Venezuela’s oil and gas reserves (the largest proven in the world as of 2017) that is the real story behind this week’s events.
For anyone still harboring doubts as to who Trump truly is Venezuela should end them. Trump’s Energy Dominance policy is at the core of his foreign policy. And he will do whatever it takes to secure that policy and deliver a long-standing order to the U.S. and European oligarchy to gain control over Venezuela.
Energy Dominance
As Alistair Crooke succinctly put it last year at Strategic Culture:
The US – were energy dominance to succeed – simply would control the tap to the economic development – or its lack thereof – for rivals China, and Asia. And the US could squeeze Russia’s revenues in this way, too. In short, the US could put a tourniquet on China’s and Russia’s economic development plans. Is this why JCPOA was revoked by President Trump?
Here then, is the squaring of that circle (more US power, yet less empire): Trump’s US aims for ‘domination’, not through the globalists’ permanent infrastructure of the US defence umbrella, but through the smart leveraging of the US dollar and financial clearing monopoly, by ring-fencing, and holding tight, US technology, and by dominating the energy market, which in turn represents the on/off valve to economic growth for US rivals. In this way, Trump can ‘bring the troops home’, and yet America keeps its hegemony. Military conflict becomes a last resort.
Most of Trump’s supporters refuse to admit this is the plan. They still want to believe that National Security Advisor John Bolton and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo were thrust upon him by the nefarious Deep State.
And that Trump is a trapped hero in a cage yearning to breathe free and MAGA, if we just support him a little more. Nonsense.
Trump has been very clear about this policy for years. We take over these places, kill the bad people and pay for it all by stealing their natural resources, in this case oil.
It is Trump’s 17th century view on trade writ large. Since this is a 17th century colonial mindset.
An independent Venezuela, even if it is run by an incompetent bus driver, is something that cannot be allowed to stand. Anyone that refuses to trade that oil on U.S. controlled exchanges, exchanges controlled by Goldman-Sachs, or in U.S. dollars is to be taken over and a puppet government installed, c.f. Iraq, Libya.
But only after your production is removed from the market. So that we can sell ours.
This is geopolitics 101 folks. Nothing new under the sun. Does everyone not remember Trump’s cutting Venezuela from the global monetary system through sanctions last year?
https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-01-25/luongo-trump-betrays-maga-over-venezuela