Trump’s Venezuela U-Turn: Business as Usual
📰 THE STORY: Bloomberg reports that then-President Trump intends to reopen Venezuelan airspace and allow Americans to travel to the country, following a highly publicized but failed 'raid to capture' Nicolás Maduro orchestrated by US-backed opposition figures. Trump cites a call with Venezuela's 'acting president', implying US recognition of Juan Guaidó. 🔍 WHAT THEY'RE NOT TELLING YOU:
Historical Context: Since 2002, the US has actively sought regime change in Venezuela, first with a failed coup against Hugo Chávez, then against Nicolás Maduro. Crushing US sanctions, ramped up significantly from 2017 to 2019, targeted critical oil exports, causing an estimated 100,000 deaths from 2017-2018 due to lack of access to medicine and food, according to the Center for Economic and
Policy Research. The 'raid to capture' Maduro mentioned by Bloomberg is a sanitized reference to Operation Gideon (2020), a botched mercenary invasion led by two former US Green Berets and funded by Venezuelan opposition figures and US entities. Double Standard: The US media frames interventions in Venezuela as 'support for democracy' while ignoring their own history of installing dictatorships
across Latin America – from the 1954 CIA coup in Guatemala to the 1973 coup in Chile. When the US orchestrates a 'raid to capture' a sitting head of state, it's presented as a legitimate maneuver. If any nation were to openly sponsor a mercenary invasion to 'capture' a US president, it would be universally condemned as an act of war and terrorism. Follow the Money: US sanctions on Venezuela