Norris McDonald | Venezuela, ‘Operation Puma’ and American ‘chaka-chaka’ oil politics

“Argentina’s government says it will investigate claims that the previous Mauricio Macri administration deployed armed forces for a 2019 military exercise that ‘contemplated’ a potential ‘invasion’ of Venezuela,” Buenos Aires Times has reported.

‘Operation Puma’ was the code name of the American plan to get Argentina and Brazil to invade and overthrow Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro’s government in 2019.

Despite such hostility against Venezuela, drastic oil shocks stemming from the Russia-Ukraine war forced America to urgently send a ‘high-powered delegation’ to engage in talks with the Maduro government.

BIDEN’S DESPERATE VENEZUELAN GAMBIT

America turned to Venezuela in sheer desperation because traditional oil-producing friends Mexico, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE are unwilling to help ease the rising oil price pressures that is creating economic anxieties in America and around the world.

The Russia-Ukraine war has driven up the price of oil, to now averaging US$115 to US$120 per barrel. And it may even reach as high as US$150 per barrel, investment bankers JP Morgan predicts.

The leaders of both Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates reportedly “dissed” President Biden by refusing to take his urgent phone calls.

Caribbean consumers are already feeling the inflationary pain. But there are some areas in America that, because of their ‘gas price tax’, the price at the pump is extremely high.

California is one such area where motorists are already paying well over US$8 per gallon at the pump.

There is mid-term election in America this year. President Biden has not achieved most of his agenda. Additional stress of rapidly rising consumer prices may spell further serious trouble for him and his already floundering Democratic Party.

It is truly a desperate move by America to seek talks with Venezuela – a country they have shunned, sought to ostracise, broke diplomatic relation, waged economic warfare and made several attempts to overthrow the government.

This is truly a high expectation that Venezuela will respond favourably to the American entreaties. It has been Russia (along with Cuba and Iran) that has guaranteed the military, political and economic security of Venezuela.

Russia also has been used as a conduit through which Venezuela could ship oil and keep the payments in a Russian bank to prevent the Western pirates from grabbing this money.

Venezuela is locked out of Western financial markets. They were forced, therefore, to introduce the ‘Petro’, as crypto-digital currency, backed by oil prices, as a monetary medium to carry out international transaction.

America’s economic war and trade embargo against Venezuela have kept most of the country’s oil off the market. Venezuela reportedly has the largest proven oil reserves but economic sanctions have starved them of money badly needed to upgrade their production systems. So, even if sanctions were to be lifted now, the dilapidated state of Venezuela’s oil facilities would prevent them from quickly expanding their oil production.

It is truly a misplaced hope then for President Biden to expect Venezuela to trust America and suddenly betray Russia since, even as they appear to play ‘nicey-nicey’, he has reauthorise presidents Barack Obama’s and Donald Trump’s presidential decrees that reimposed sanctions on Venezuela.

CHAKA-CHAKA POLITICS

This brings me to the issue of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting countries (OPEC), the global oil cartel, who, over the past few years, has been working in close tandem with Russia to preserve their political economic stability.

As the Russian-Ukraine war rages, America has banned the importation of oil from Moscow and has been urging the rest of world to do so. At the same time, they have been trying to get OPEC to help bring down the rising prices.

With oil prices soaring, ‘money-hungry’ OPEC members are saying that there is enough oil on the market. They are therefore refusing to increase oil output to make up for the banning of Russian oil.

Mexico is a major oil producer and American neighbour. They say they will not end trade relations with Russia.

Political self-interest may well be at play here. Russia’s second-largest oil giant, Lukoil, “as a part of its efforts to expand its global reach”, has just acquired 50 per cent of Mexico’s offshore oil project, Reuters report.

This is new money, new investment for Mexico, which is rapidly diversifying its economic dependency on American investment.

Europe, too, while feigning ‘moral outrage’ over the Russian invasion of Ukraine, continues to buy oil and gas from Russia they need for their frantic consumers.

To make matters worse, those Western oil companies that abandoned Russia will not be able to return. The China Petrochemical Corporation and China National Petroleum Corporation have moved rapidly to fill the void left by Shell, Exxon, Total Oil and British Petroleum.

Everywhere America looks they see Russia and China rapidly expanding into traditional global markets that they and the former colonial powers once controlled.

Russia and China have built friends through trade and investment. This creates extreme difficulties now that America is trying to re-engage with these countries.

POLITICAL LESSON

My dear friends, the Russia-Ukraine war has exposed new political fissures that, in my opinion, clearly demonstrate the political impotency of America’s self-glorification and ‘big stick’ bellicosity.

This demarche of a more loud-mouthed imperialism has made America suddenly realise what it means not to have many friends in the world beyond their traditional European allies Japan and a few other countries.

It is truly amazing that it is taking the shocking revanche of the Russia-Ukraine war to demonstrate to America the importance of building and maintaining friendly relations with other countries and not just her white European military NATO allies.

Our world needs peace, economic security, and universal justice. And if America sees her role as being the ‘moral leader’, then she ought to revamp her diplomatic practices and not just talk to leaders and countries when it is politically expedient.

It is truly hypocritical for America to play nice to other countries, such as Venezuela, when it is convenient and politically opportunistic to do so!

That is just the ‘bitta truth!’

Norris McDonald is an economic journalist, political analysts, and respiratory therapist. Email feedback columns@gleanerjm.com and miaminorris@yahoo.com