On Wednesday, December 10, Donald Trump announced that the United States had seized a tanker in the Caribbean carrying more than 1.6 million barrels of Venezuelan crude oil. “Large tanker, very large, largest one ever, actually, and other things are happening,” Trump told the press. The seizure is only the latest move in a long build-up of U.S. military action in the Caribbean and…
Source
troops seized an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela on Wednesday, a major escalation that the Venezuelan government called “international piracy.” We speak with New York University professor Alejandro Velasco about the Trump administration’s intentions in the country, which has the world’s largest known oil reserves. Though the Pentagon has claimed the conflict is aimed at combating…
Source
With thousands of US troops patrolling the Caribbean, at least eight warships deployed in the region, and the BBC reporting that it tracked four US military planes that flew near Venezuela Thursday night, lawmakers and other leaders from across Europe on Friday issued a unified demand for the Trump administration to deescalate the tensions it has ratcheted up in recent weeks.
Source
On Tuesday, a group of House Democrats introduced legislation seeking to block the Trump administration from continuing its boat strike operations, in Congress’s latest attempt to wrest back authority over military operations. The lawmakers, including top Democrats on foreign and military affairs committees within the House, said that the administration is seemingly preparing for war while…
Source
As fears mount that U.S. strikes against so-called “narco-terrorists” in the Caribbean could escalate into full-scale war with Venezuela, weapons makers are well positioned to benefit from the unprecedented U.S. military build-up in the region, not seen on such a scale in decades, and continues unabated. Currently, key naval vessels such as guided-missile destroyers equipped with the Aegis…
Source
White House officials have sought to walk back President Donald Trump’s repeated threats against Venezuela in recent days — even as the Department of Defense has continue to strike boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific — but officials in the South American country on Tuesday took the arrival of a US aircraft carrier in the region seriously despite the administration’s claims that it won’t…
Source