The US regime change or coup d’etat in Venezuela last January made little sense initially.  Though the left-leaning, President Maduro had long been a thorn in the side of the US administration and its narrative of how ‘things should be done’,  he was no Fidel Castro and Venezuela was no 1960s Cuba. 

Why then would the US got to the trouble of launching a military strike against a country it hadn’t even declared war on and kidnap its President and his immediate family? 

The  rationale given—that  ‘the Venezuelan people wanted it and had been groaning under the tyrannical yoke of its dictatorial President’  seemed a little thin!

Pretending that ‘the people wanted it’ has long been a catch call of US administrations unilaterally bringing about forced regime changes in countries whose leaders it did not like, e.g.   Mossadeq in Iran,   Saddam in Iraq, Gaddafi in Libya.  

And of course this rationale is never applied to the US itself or to its own allies—as Iranian President Ahmadinejad noted with some smug satisfaction when he called on “the British Government to engage with protestors against the regime”—during the London riots of 2011. 

He was using language more normally reserved for Middle Eastern and Latin American countries when the Anglo–sphere is grooming public opinion for regime change!

Certainly it was hard to see why President Trump ought suddenly take a keen interest in the welfare of the ordinary Venezuelan working stiffs when successive US administrations routinely ignore their own indigent populations, chronically unemployed and decaying inner cities. 

One might think ‘get your own house in order first’ or that ‘charity begins at home’. 

But, when the US invaded Iran in an unprovoked and literally pointless War—the objective of this War has never been made clear—the reason for the Venezuelan intervention became all too clear. 

Knowing that 20% of the world’s crude oil flows through the narrow Straits of Hormuz, and that Iran has been able to effectively close these off and expose the vulnerability of the world economy for all to see— the US was ensuring its own access to crude oil (even if Venezuela’s is of rather inferior quality) or at least denying access to Venezuelan oil to other actors —such as China, Russia or even Europe. 

European leaders ought take note at this latest piece of self-serving foreign policy on the part of the US.  

While Trump pursues a risky and globally destructive war in Iran, and the US continues to insist the EU sanction Russia and not buy its gas or oil, the European economy risks stagnating to no visible benefit on its own part. 

Who Does This war benefit? 

Not the EU certainly.  It might benefit oil-producing countries like Saudi Arabia, which can now charge premium for their product, and which have a long standing emnity with their Sunni Islam neighbours. 

It benefits the Israelis who have long- standing grudges against Iran for its support of Hezbollah. 

The Israelis have been patiently waiting for 40 years to find a US President foolish enough to start a war with Iran and choke off the life blood of the western global economy—and they finally found one! 

Given that the Iraq War of 2003 had a defined objective—to topple President Saddam Hussein—that was achieved within months, and yet the Americans remained bogged down there for over decade!

It remains to be seen how long this current, apparently objective-less War will last and where it will lead us! 

If China continues to obtain oil from Iran, it may well start to object in stronger terms than mere diplomatic ones if its supply gets interrupted or destroyed by the US and its allies.  

Is this a war the West can really afford in the long run?

Nick Folley