Has Putin Reached the Exit-Strategy Point for Maduro?

Has the endgame arrived for South America’s most villainous socialist tyrant? And really, the only one of note still around, after the exhaustion of Chavista-ism?

Read all of Duane’s post from earlier this morning, if you haven’t yet, to get the full picture of Donald Trump’s squeeze play on Nicolas Maduro. The squeeze will get tighter in upcoming days, the Wall Street Journal reported late last night, as the US intends to fully enforce sanctions on Venezuela’s illegal oil trade on its false-flagged tankers. That aims a dagger at the heart of Maduro’s control over his country:

While the U.S. has accused Maduro of leading a drug-trafficking cartel—a charge he denies—oil money is far more important to the Venezuelan leader, his inner circle and the country itself. Crude sales have long represented more than 90% of Venezuela’s export income, and close Maduro allies have faced accusations of skimming from billions in annual oil revenues.

More tanker seizures—or even just the threat—creates an escalating series of crises, forcing Venezuela to deeply discount its oil to its handful of buyers, including China, and spend more of its dwindling foreign reserves to stop spiraling inflation.

Underscoring the danger: the tanker seized on Wednesday was carrying roughly $80 million of oil, equivalent to about 5% of what Venezuela spends monthly on imported goods, raising the prospect of shortages.

U.S. officials said Wednesday there would be more ship seizures in a new effort to force Maduro from power, an effort that has involved a massive military buildup in the Caribbean, deadly strikes on alleged drug boats and threats of bombing Venezuela. President Trump has said Maduro’s “days are numbered,” though he hasn’t publicly committed to a next course of action.

The drug boat strikes were just to get Maduro’s attention. Seizing the tankers will strip Maduro of his ability to maintain power through corruption, cutting off the cash distribution that keeps people loyal to the dictator. The oil on the one tanker seized by the US Navy would have brought $80 million in revenues to Maduro’s regime, and one economist tells the WSJ that Trump could force an economic collapse by seizing one tanker a month. 

Even without another seizure, the message has been sent:

Even if the U.S. doesn’t regularly seize more tankers, the threat has already paralyzed tanker traffic in and out of Venezuela. On Thursday, there were about a dozen such ships outside Venezuela’s main oil port waiting to dock, but none had moved in to load crude. Normally, the port would be buzzing, with at least 10 tankers moving in to load or conducting ship-to-ship transfers.

A Venezuelan port official said employees around the country are calling in sick or skipping work as tensions with the U.S. escalate.

A few more seizures, or maybe just one more, and those tankers will stop showing up altogether. And that will crash the only commodity that socialist-gripped Venezuela has to fund its economy, other than the illegal drug trade run by the cartels, who have had worse luck at sea than Maduro. Without a reliable flow of hard currency into the country, Maduro will have to hire food tasters and bodyguards who watch his bodyguards. The first impulse of the power elites there would be to see if the US would lighten up with Maduro out but the same players behind him taking power.

In other words, we are approaching an endgame in Venezuela. And Reuters reports that even Vladimir Putin sees the writing on the wall:

Russia and its close ally Belarus reached out to Venezuela’s embattled leader, Nicolas Maduro, on Thursday as U.S. President Donald Trump ramps up pressure for his removal, raising the possibility he could seek refuge abroad. …

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko on Thursday held his second meeting in 17 days with Jesus Rafael Salazar Velazquez, the Venezuelan ambassador to Moscow.

According to Belarusian state news agency Belta, Lukashenko told the envoy on November 25 that Maduro was always welcome in Belarus and it was time for him to pay a visit.

On Thursday, Belta quoted Lukashenko as reminding Velazquez they had agreed at the first meeting to “coordinate certain matters” with Maduro.

“We agreed that, after resolving certain issues, you would find time to come to me and meet again so we could make the appropriate decision, which is within our competence. And if necessary, we will then involve the president of Venezuela.”

Don’t let’s be coy about this. If Maduro leaves the country now, it will be on a one-way ticket. Lukashenko is Putin’s toady, and he himself knows full well what a “visit” to Belarus would mean at this point. It would offer Maduro the same opportunity in Minsk that Bashar al-Assad took for himself in Moscow. Lukashenko wouldn’t be making these arrangements without approval from Putin, and Putin wouldn’t approve them unless the situation in Venezuela becomes entirely untenable for Maduro. 

If oil exportation has ceased already, Maduro may not have too much time left at all. If he doesn’t get out soon, he might find himself attempting to sneak out of Venezuela like his political enemy did to get to her Nobel Peace Prize ceremony – chased not by the regime per se, but elements of his own base who might see his neck as a convenient path out of the trap Trump has set for the regime. Assad may have ended up humiliated in Moscow, but better than than to end up like Moammar Qaddafi or Saddam Hussein. 

Editor’s Note: Thanks to President Trump and his administration’s bold leadership, we are respected on the world stage, and our enemies are being put on notice.

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