In a significant escalation of Caribbean tensions, President Nicolas Maduro has ordered Venezuela’s navy to escort oil tankers departing the country’s eastern coast for the high seas. The maneuver serves as a direct challenge to the maritime blockade announced earlier this week by United States President Donald Trump, who has vowed to intercept sanctioned vessels trading with Venezuela.
The decision to deploy military escorts follows a week of rising hostilities, sparked when U.S. special forces neutralized a Venezuelan tanker in the Caribbean. Describing the seized vessel as “big, very big,” President Trump justified the measure on Wednesday, stating, “They took our rights. We had a lot of oil there. They kicked out our companies, and we want it back.”
Every nation has the right to protect its citizens at sea from piracy or acts of war.
If a Ukrainian cargo ship was attacked by the Russian navy then Ukraine could protect it and no one would question those actions.
Surely every U.S. Navy admiral and ship captains would know that if they got an order to attack Venezuelan Navy vessels.
So when the US “neutralized a Venezuelan tanker”, that wasn’t an escalation, but now when Maduro takes measures to prevent this happening again, now it’s a “significant escalation”??
I’m sure that, since a blockade is an act of war and it’s not within the president’s power to declare war, Congress will act any second now to stop this problem from escalating. Right? RIGHT?!
Like the vote that failed yesterday, where Republicans just bent over and let him do what he wants?
Haven’t heard of any vote, got a link?
Fair enough.
So full order of events. US companies invest in Venezuelan oil, they begin pumping and selling oil, Venezuelan government shoos them out to make more money, equipment fails and Venezuela makes less money per year despite owning 100% of the profits, things are fine-ish for decades between the two nations, oil talks begin again, little comes of them, US begins bombing boats that they state without verification are drug boats, trump personally chooses to begin stealing oil from a country decades removed from US involvement in their oil industry. Did I miss anything?
China.
How the U.S. is Handing Over Venezuela’s Oil Sector to China
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/How-the-US-is-Handing-Over-Venezuelas-Oil-Sector-to-China.htmlSo, where does all the oil go? In past years, Caracas was able to strike agreements with Rosneft or with Indian buyers. But as the U.S. introduced secondary sanctions, and now secondary tariffs, there was only one buyer left, the only one that does not fear Washington’s threats: China.
You forgot the bombing of civilian boats to escalate the conflict while claiming without evidence that they were transporting WMD drugs
Added
The US has been meddling in Venezuela’s affairs for decades.
Alright, toss the severely condensed events at me, along with their space on the timeline, and I’ll edit them in. “Generic animosity at some point” doesn’t make for an easy add
Maybe China can send their tankers to get their oil.
Trump administration: “YESSSS!!! We can force them to defend themselves and when they do we can cry about being attacked and say we have no choice but to go to war now!!”
If anyone here has been with a narcissist, this is very familiar behavior.
