https://www.lewrockwell.com/2026/01/no_author/how-trumps-oily-dreams-may-collapse-in-a-venezuelan-dark-pit/

How Trump’s Oily Dreams May Collapse in a Venezuelan Dark Pit
By Pepe Escobar
Strategic Culture

So the Big Oil Picture in Venezuela is way more complex than the Trump 2.0 gang suspects.

Let’s start with neo-Caligula’s new edicts on the imperial satrapy he says he now owns; not exactly edicts but outright threats directed to interim President Delcy Rodriguez:

Crack down on “drug trafficking flows”. Well, this should actually be directed to Colombian and Mexican smugglers in cahoots with big American buyers.
Expel Iranian, Cuban, and other “operatives hostile to Washington” – before Caracas is allowed to increase oil production. Not happening.
Halt oil sales to “US adversaries”. Not happening.
Hence it becomes a near certainty that neo-Caligula may bomb Venezuela again.

Neo-Caligula, in a separate motormouth offensive, also clarified that he wants to somewhat overhaul the oil business in Venezuela via subsidies. It “could take less than 18 months”; then it morphed to “we can do it in less time than that, but it’ll be a lot of money”; and finally morphed to “a tremendous amount of money will have to be spent and the oil companies will spend it.”

No, they won’t, as several proverbial “industry insiders” have advanced. US energy majors balk at the sight of investing fortunes in a nation that may be engulfed by total chaos if neo-Caligula forces a traitorous government over 28 million people. ......