http://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/opinion-venezuela-takes-americans-hostage/ar-AA1r0qKj?ocid=msedgntp&;pc=DCTS&cvid=eec563660dcf4c548042e60114bb141a&ei=71
By Mary Anastasia O'Grady
The Wall Street Journal
September 22, 2024
That didn’t take long. Nine months ago the U.S. returned alleged money launderer Alex Saab to Venezuela in exchange for 10 detained Americans, a fugitive from U.S. justice, and a virtual pinky-swear from Nicolás Maduro not to take any more American hostages. Last week the Venezuelan dictator went back on his word.
Venezuela’s arrest of three Americans—including an active-duty U.S. serviceman—is a sobering development for the Biden administration. U.S. officials expressed hope in December that the exchange of Mr. Saab for the American hostages was a step toward restoring Venezuelan normalcy. But the Maduro regime has picked a new fight, alleging without evidence that the three Americans were part of a U.S. plot to overthrow it. Venezuela also nabbed two Spaniards and a Czech and claims to have discovered a cache of rifles.
The latest detentions come on the heels of the July 28 presidential election that Mr. Maduro lost badly (67% to 30%) to opposition candidate Edmundo González Urrutia. The regime refuses to accept defeat. It has unleashed a crackdown that even a U.N. human-rights fact-finding mission has condemned. The police state exiled Mr. González to Spain last week with the help of the Socialist Spanish government. The Venezuelan nongovernmental organization Foro Penal says Caracas holds 1,834 political prisoners.
This is predictable in a military dictatorship allied with Russia, Cuba, China and Iran. It’s also humiliating for the Biden administration, which has repeatedly trusted the criminal government on the delusional premise that Mr. Maduro and his friends are interested in a return to democratic capitalism.
It’s not too late for the administration to recover its dignity. Mr. Maduro benefits from the fact that the U.S. president is checked out and his underlings prefer to lay low during his final months in office. But Vice President Kamala Harris has skin in the game. More than 40% of Venezuelans polled in August reported their intentions to flee the country if Mr. Maduro isn’t removed from power, and those migration flows are destabilizing the entire region. Failure to combat the “roots” of the crisis is part of her legacy.
One big Biden mistake has been failing to deny the regime the hard currency it needs for the military by applying U.S. oil sanctions where they could make a difference. Instead, by the end of this year, Chevron is expected to be exporting from Venezuela some 200,000 barrels a day, or some 25% of Venezuelan output. That’s a drop in the global oil-supply bucket of 103 million barrels a day, so it won’t affect fuel prices in the U.S. But according to Luis Pacheco, a nonresident fellow at the Baker Institute in Houston, over the next 15 months, at present prices, Chevron’s exports could provide some $1.7 billion to the dictatorship.
Other big American players like Conoco and ExxonMobil left Venezuela around 2006 after the government raised royalties and later forced foreign companies to become minority owners in joint ventures with the state-owned oil company, PdVSA. Chevron stayed and has become an important partner of the regime.
When oil prices collapsed in 2014, PdVSA had trouble keeping up its majority-partner obligations for operations in the joint ventures. It turned to Chevron for help and the American company accepted the request, eventually lending PdVSA billions of dollars.
This wasn’t a gift. Chevron intends to recover the money by producing and exporting Venezuelan oil. President Trump put the kibosh on that with sanctions prohibiting American investment in Venezuela and the U.S. import of Venezuelan oil.
Chevron’s lobbyists have done better with Team Biden. In 2022 the Treasury issued General License 41 to allow Chevron to ramp up operations in the South American country and sell to the U.S. Treasury also issued General License 8, allowing several oil-service companies to operate in Venezuela. The administration said it was rewarding the regime for its part in negotiations—held in Mexico—aimed at restoring Venezuelan democracy.
In October 2023, after Venezuela signed an agreement with members of the opposition to hold a presidential election in 2024, Treasury rushed to issue General License 44, available to any oil company, to do business with PdVSA.
Mr. Biden got burned again within months, when Mr. Maduro banned the presidential candidacy of the popular Maria Corina Machado, who had won the opposition primary. Washington allowed General License 44 to expire in April. But General Licenses 41 and 8 remain in place.
Mr. Maduro says Russia or China can replace Chevron. He’s blowing smoke. For Russia, an oil producer, the less global supply the better. China is focused on getting repaid billions in loans it made to Caracas, not investing more.
Chevron makes no bones about its priorities: Money is above the suffering Venezuelans. The Biden administration’s motives are difficult to divine.
The essential American soul is hard, isolate, stoic, and a killer. It has never yet melted. ~ D.H. Lawrence
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