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PaperclipPerfector  12d ago (text post)   24167 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of December 29, 2025

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The United States of America is now at war with the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. Dozens of Venezuelan military targets have been bombed in the last few minutes, including a major army base just outside the capital. American Chinooks have been seen flying across the Caracas skyline.

This could be the most important geopolitical happening since the Ukraine War. We do it yet know if this will be a limited run of bombing like the Kosovo strikes, or a full on Iraq style invasion and regime change. If it is the latter, it will be an important test of America’s military might, and failure could very well be America’s Suez moment. I have speculated here several times that I thought the US would have difficulty conducting a thunder run of a non-peer or near-peer adversary in its current state, and it looks as though my theory may be put to the test. On a geopolitical and moral level though, I have little sympathy for Venezuela, for the same reason I have little sympathy for Ukraine. If you repeatedly antagonize your neighboring superpower, you get what you get.

This will also no doubt further fracture the Republican base in a major way, as interventionist neocons clash with America-First isolationists.

This is also adds to an intensifying pattern of conflict in multiple theaters that could lead to global war. It also increases the likelihood of a Chinese attack on Taiwan as American asserts are entangled in multiple theaters.

I will post more information as I hear it.

source?

A true gentleman scholar post “inb4 source” and is vindicated in the light of history.

Edit:

There are now multiple airstrikes occurring within Caracas. The United States FAA has issued a NOTAM warning that civilian aircraft should avoid overflying the entire territory of Venezuela.

Reuters is now reporting that there are US ground troops active within the capital of Venezuela.

So, from reading the mainstream press this morning (allegedly with sources) the plan now is that Maduro’s deputy (a loyal chavista figure obviously) is in charge, and nothing changes except that the government becomes friendlier to the US state and oil interests? I guess that counts as a win given this was a cheap and successful operation militarily, but for the long suffering Venezuelan people it doesn’t seem to offer much in the way of hope.

Yeah, this looks like a massive flop if literally the only thing that happens is Socialist No. 2 gets put in charge after Socialist No. 1 gets removed from power. The people of the country are going to suffer just as much (maybe a little less due to oil investments) as they were doing before.

Root and branch reform giving the government to the legitimate winners of the 2024 election was the thing to do, not this half assed shit where it's now looking more like Trump took out Maduro because Maduro insulted him personally one times too many rather than there being a proper well thought out plan for regime change.

Interesting news just in, if it's anything more than gossip - the VP stabbed Maduro in the back? She and her brother were having secret talks in Saudi Arabia Qatar with the Trump administration to hand Maduro over (presumably in exchange for her getting backing to take over):

In a meeting room in Doha, 12,000km away from Caracas, officials were busy discussing the future of Venezuela without its dictator Nicolas Maduro.

A senior member of the UAE royal family was acting as a “bridge” between the regime and Donald Trump, who was building an armada to pressure the Venezuelan leader to surrender.

Except Mr Maduro had no part in the secret meetings in Doha. Instead, it was his deputy, the then vice-president Delcy Rodriguez, and her brother Jorge, who were leading the talks.

According to reports in the Miami Herald, which has strong contacts in Latin America, Ms Rodriguez, who is now running Venezuela with the approval of Mr Trump, had reached out to Washington to present a “more acceptable” alternative to the Maduro regime.

Details of the meeting are now fuelling suspicions of an inside job to remove Mr Maduro from power and leave a president in power who can manage a transition without dismantling the state completely and causing turmoil and riots. As the October reports of the meeting say, Ms Rodriguez would be offering “Madurismo without Maduro,” a kind of “Regime Lite”.

What makes this more interesting is that 32 Cubans, including military personnel, were also reportedly killed. It's unclear what they were doing where when the bombs struck, but Chavez and Maduro were reportedly relying on Cubans for presidential security all the way back in the 2000s/2010s.

32 people is a platoon's worth, or four squads. That many don't normally get taken out in a single strike. I would be willing to consider that some may have been manning the sort of air defense assets that were ambiguously targeted in the explosions in the morning, but...

...well, with the VP-coup angle, that opens the possibility that there might have been some Venezuelan-on-Cuban action going on.

If Maduro's personal guard was made up of Cubans, that might indeed make the VP more willing to break some eggs to make the omelette. So long as the eggs were Cuban not Venezuelan, well, you have to make tough decisions when you're a leader, don't you?

The question is will the new govt enact a brutal stance on local drug dealers and cartels.

I get the impression that nothing is going to change since all of the concessions Trump wants apparently have to do with oil. And he's supposedly told the oil companies that if they want their assets back they will have to commit to billions of dollars in additional investment. That's going to be a tough sell, especially since the political situation hasn't changed much in terms of stability. Venezuelan oil is expensive to drill and doesn't sell for much, and with prices low, that kind of investment doesn't make sense. Even if the oil companies want to appease Trump, the banks and insurance companies also have to be on board, and I don't see it happening. Maduro was a bogeyman but he didn't really do much (and he was supposedly offering oil concessions anyway), so it's hard for me to see what taking him out accomplishes. As I said earlier, I don't think this is going to have much salience two months from now.

I live in Miami. I was thinking about putting together a longer posts where I take a small scale example but extrapolate to how geopolitics work. But the summary of it would have been white guy does shit and it fixes a group issue.

I live in Miami. My gut is America has status here. Trump can just say he’s in charge and the new administration has that backing. Which gives them legitimacy. All we really need to do is let Exxon do what they do. Boost oil production to 4m barrels a day. Let the current admin steal 100-500k barrels a day. And that’s a huge win for Venezuelans.

I guess I’ve lived in Miami. And there was like obvious situations that you could fix. And I did 30s conversation and fixed it. Then did some racists shit and said white guy fixed it. And no one cared. White guy fixed it and everyone was just happy the issue was solved. I think Venezuela is there.

So when people question whether VP will have respect I would counter that Trump says Venezuela is ours.

I’m going to be honest I don’t understand any of this. Like what does any of this mean, I’m having trouble even parsing it.

I guess I’ve lived in Miami. And there was like obvious situations that you could fix. And I did 30s conversation and fixed it. Then did some racists shit and said white guy fixed it. And no one cared. White guy fixed it and everyone was just happy the issue was solved. I think Venezuela is there.

Where did you say you lived again?

Miami's likely in my top 5 cities to which to fatFIRE (or at least chubbyFIRE if I get all-so-tiresome'd out before getting there). Warm weather, party city, airport with many one-stop destinations. One thing that gives me pause is the frequency by which rachet internet videos come from Miami, that perhaps my impression of Miami is rose-tinted and outdated.

Nah, fatFIREing in the US is a bad idea given the ultra high cost of living. And Miami especially has no pedigree, one might as well go to Dubai instead. Much better to go to the South of France or Italy or somewhere with real history and taste. "Retiring to Miami" doesn't have the same ring to it as "Retired to Florence", never mind the latter is probably cheaper to fatFIRE to.

I would rather live in a van down by the river than live in dubai.

Fair, but many many people (like myself) would say the same about Miami. And Dubai is better connected anyways if one is forced to choose between the two.

to which to fatFIRE (or at least chubbyFIRE if I get all-so-tiresome'd out before getting there).

To what?

Link

for the record, I dislike you as well.

</3

If I extrapolate. I play basketball behind the mall in Brickell. It’s a very mixed group. Probably about 30% English speaking, 40% bilingual, 30% Spanish only. 3 Venezualians. 1 Bilingual. 2 Spanish only. My Spanish is bad.

We have twice in the last year had city issues. The first was they were not turning the lights on until 7:15 which meant 6:50 to 7:15 it was dark. We have a group chat on WhatsApp so it was an issue for about 3-4 weeks on talking about how to mitigate. I had the brilliant idea of why don’t we just call the city to turn the lights on earlier instead of talking about how to mitigate the issue and play around it. Turns out a 30s phone call solved the issue.

A half year later I was traveling around Argentina. The WhatsApp group was blowing up every day about whether the court was open. The city repainted the court and had locked it. It was locked for like three weeks. People just bitching the court is locked everyday. I get back in town and I reply on WhatsApp has anyone tried calling the city. I call next day and it’s open in a day.

I guess what I am getting at is Maduro could have just called Exxon and a 30 second phone call they would have been like ya we can just start drilling. But for whatever reason Latam sometimes just doesn’t make that phone call.

So for geopolitics if the white guy just says he’s in charge now the Latin Americans kind of just accept it. And sometimes it’s literally really easy.

My gut says Trump is in that situation. Only has to make a short phone call to Exxon and everyone is happy.

I may be wrong. But my gut is that the no casualty coup means it was just accepted US is in charge.

Your examples aren't "white guy fixed it" - they are either "Local government is responsive to the kind of thing a basically functioning local government is responsive to if the requestor is a white English-speaker, but not if it is a brown Spanish-speaker" (unlikely in my view) or "Local government is basically functioning for everyone but recent immigrants from dysfunctional countries aren't aware that responsive local government is a thing" (seems like a racing certainty).

I don't see how expecting local government to be basically functional is a superpower that works in Venezuela. It wouldn't work in California either.

But given the demographics of blue-collar workers in metro Miami, I suspect the guy who actually fixed it on behalf of the relevant local government was Hispanic.

I guess what I am getting at is Maduro could have just called Exxon and a 30 second phone call they would have been like ya we can just start drilling.

Venezuela was being sanctioned by America six ways from Sunday, so Exxon would have to say "no can do".

Latino-tilted WhatsApp groups tend to have a high noise-to-signal ratio.

Perhaps we'll hoop together one day, or perhaps we may have mutual hoopers by acquaintance.

Hablo Espanol?

If you need to ask you probably don't.

I am skeptical this will work out. The VP will be in a much less stable position than Maduro.

For starters, she will not command the same loyalty of the various power holders -- this is just coup-proofing 101.

Becoming a puppet of the US (at least as far as oil is concerned) will not play well with the population, and in particular not play well with the people in the party.

Apparently, crude oil is 90% of Venezuela's exports. My guess is that Trump will take most of that revenue for the US. While parts of that revenue previously ended in slush funds, part of it also stabilized the regime, paying for stuff the population needs or likes.

Then you have an opposition that will almost certainly try to seize the day.

Given that Trump has already threatened other neighboring countries, some people have a vested interest in making sure that his gamble will not pay off. While the US can certainly occupy and defend the oil rigs, pipelines are much harder to defend without the cooperation of local security forces. Even if the VP gives out the order that the security of the oil infrastructure is priority one (because her life depends on it), I doubt that she will have the clot to actually enforce that priority. Local security forces might decide that taking a bribe to let a vehicle carrying a drone and some explosives through a checkpoint is a better deal for them than arresting the suspects.

Of course, putting Maduro into the tender cares of the US court system is a rookie mistake which GWB would not have made. (Albeit he needed that because officially, the DoD was just aiding the DoJ in apprehending a criminal, which would be even less plausible if the accused ended in gitmo outside of the DoJ's jurisdiction.) Perhaps he really has strong evidence tying Maduro to drug smuggling which will force the court system to lock him up until a president pardons him (as US presidents are wont to do, lately). Otherwise, the judiciary is certainly the part of the government Trump has the least control over, and they might not deliver the verdict he wants.

From all the Venezuela experts I know, it's incorrect to think of the previous regime as Maduro commanding the loyalty of various power-holders as if he was some Arab dictator. He was an increasingly ineffectual figurehead "in charge" while the real power-holders, mostly in the military, made decisions - the man was a bus driver, not a colonel. These military power-holders don't need to become a puppet of the US to get what they want, just to stop being an enemy of the US. There are many things that could go wrong still but, assuming nobody on either side chimps too hard, realistically the political stuff on the VZ side is a smaller issue than the bond restructuring on the US side.

These military power-holders don't need to become a puppet of the US to get what they want, just to stop being an enemy of the US.

What exactly has VZ done to be called an enemy of the US? The nationalization of their oil industry (in 1973)? Having a socialist dictator in the Americas? Or are you referring to Trump's claims that Maduro is using fentanyl as a 'weapon of mass destruction' in the US?

Also, it seems to me that Trump's understanding of agreements is that there is always one party which gets fucked over by them, and therefore he only agrees to deals which fuck over the other party. I seriously doubt that he is going back to the 50-50 sharing of profits from before the nationalization.

And while I have no doubt that the military leaders in charge are corrupt as fuck and will do whatever benefits them personally, in my experience militaries also generally foster thoughts of nationalism and independence. If VZ bends over backwards the moment Trump sends in a few helicopters, their citizens might start to ask questions about the purpose of having a military.

Well, as far as "enemy of the US" goes, much of it (e.g. subsidizing Cuba) is standard small-potatoes third-worldoid stuff, but what really grinds Washington's gears (under Biden as well as Trump) is VZ cozying up to China. Maybe they were worried about their military relationship with Russia too, except that we've now seen exactly how effective S-300s are in Bolivarian hands. The Southern Caribbean is seen as a critical security interest for the US and they want China out of there yesterday, see also the Panama stuff.

Also, it seems to me that Trump's understanding of agreements is that there is always one party which gets fucked over by them, and therefore he only agrees to deals which fuck over the other party. I seriously doubt that he is going back to the 50-50 sharing of profits from before the nationalization.

None of this kremlinology is all that relevant to the actual state of the VZ oil industry. As you say, it was nationalized back in the 70s, and basically chugged along until Maduro. Under Chavez, the locals decided that a) they should give a bunch of their oil away for free for political purposes and b) lol who cares about maintenance bro just steal the money for new parts, then Chavez got lucky in dying before the consequences really hit Maduro. It's more Eskom than Mohammad Mosaddegh. So what you have now to make a deal over is a basically defunct industry with $150bn in sovereign debt to deal with before Western experts can get the oil pumping again.

their citizens might start to ask questions about the purpose of having a military.

It's a military kleptocracy, bro, if their citizens were allowed to ask questions Maduro would already be in Nicaragua.

As it is the case for many weak monarchs, Maduro may have been the compromise between rivalrous factions who - although ambitious in their own right - don't have the will or the prowess to step into Chavez's shoes. The bumbling fool could play president on TV while the real power brokers run the country.

But what happens when your puppet ruler is kidnapped by a foreign hegemon?

Fictions are durable. If you've been pretending for years he's actually in charge, then people believe that. You can't go 'we're the actual rulers' overnight. And suppose you actually do that. Trump could send Maduro back! Then what happens?

So as long as America has Maduro in hand, Venezuela cannot appoint his replacement without great internal effort. There'd have to be an election. I have no doubt that his vice president is a Kamala and was picked because she would never even sniff power. Any deep state figure wanting to control the Chavista party will do so without a scrap of democratic legitimacy.

So as long as America has Maduro in hand, Venezuela cannot appoint his replacement without great internal effort. There'd have to be an election.

Even if Epstein's guard shows up and Maduro accidentally suicides, Venezuela by its own Constitution has to hold an election. Apparently the VP has gotten the nod from the Supreme Court to rule for 90 days, which is probably acceptable to all parties who matter (i.e. the US), but after that they're going to have to do something. Probably they're working hard on how to rig an election more subtly than Maduro.

Apparently, crude oil is 90% of Venezuela's exports. My guess is that Trump will take most of that revenue for the US. While parts of that revenue previously ended in slush funds, part of it also stabilized the regime, paying for stuff the population needs or likes.

Are they even making money on oil at all right now? Their cost of production is much higher than what it sells for, since all they have is heavy crude. In theory they could get some financing based on hypothetical future profits if the price of oil rises... but that's kind of hard when they're a tinpot dictatorship that nationalized a bunch of foreign oil property not that long ago. Nobody wants to loan them money.

I'm worried that this will lead to an even further destruction of their economy as their cocaine money goes away and anyone with any sort of means runs away to the US.

Are they even making money on oil at all right now? Their cost of production is much higher than what it sells for, since all they have is heavy crude.

Well, Trump was seizing a Venezuelan oil tanker recently. Presumably you are wrong and they can extract crude oil for less than what they can get for it on the international market

Also, there are plenty of nations which could provide the machinery to extract oil in exchange for crude. It would not have to be a big investment in refining capabilities (which could then be nationalized), but just enough support to keep their oil rigs running for another six month or so.

No, that's not how the oil business works. First, while they do have a small amount of easily drilled conventional oil, that's not what gets people excited. When you hear people talk about Venezuela's "world's largest oil reserves," it's almost all unconventional oil (extra-heavy or oil sands). For that, just the basic costs of drilling it are very high. It's not uncommon for oil companies in Alberta, Canada to operate at a loss because it's difficult to restart production after shutting it down. But that doesn't mean they want to expand production or can make money that way. Even if Trump wants to gift them a ton of free equipment and expert petroleum engineers, that doesn't magically make it profitable.

Tough predicament right. The way this works with a clean slate is the US oil industry could offer to take risks to modernize Venezuela's oil infrastructure in exchange for a mutually agreeable revenue share contract. If they have trouble coming up with financing we could perhaps find generous terms through some kind of global multi-lateral stabilization facility.

This is an obvious playbook towards success if they could credibly promise not to put socialist retards in power and steal and squander everything again.

Even if he is aquitted, by that time enough will have changed that he can't just walk back into power

The Venezuelan constitution requires new elections within 30 days of the removal of the President, if the National Assembly does indeed remove him (presumably for abandonment even if involuntary). I suppose they could leave Maduro as titular head of state and let Rodriguez run things until her term runs out (in 5 years).

My guess is Rodriguez and the assembly play ball and they get elections at some point in 2026.

If the US is fine with Rodriguez why would anyone expect new elections to be free or fair? If she’s amenable to Trump’s demands then he has no interest in making a big deal of another questionable election result.

If the US is fine with Rodriguez why would anyone expect new elections to be free or fair? If she’s amenable to Trump’s demands then he has no interest in making a big deal of another questionable election result.

Because obviously fraudulent elections would make Trump look bad. She may cheat (and probably will) but she'll have to be better at hiding it than Maduro.

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