cross-posted from: https://sh.itjust.works/post/52511055
The escalation of threats to Venezuela by United States President Donald Trump may be easy to dismiss as one of his random whims, but it is too closely linked to major confrontations to be seen as a regional affair with limited impact on the rest of the world.
Venezuela is turning into a bargaining chip in the game of global superpowers, along with Ukraine.
Not a major power at all, Venezuela still matters globally – not only as a country with the world’s largest proven oil reserves, but also as a political ally of China, Iran and Russia – countries the US-led West sees as its archrivals. Of these three, Russia is the one which finds itself in the most delicate position when it comes to Venezuela. The US-driven escalation poses risks for the Kremlin, but there are also potential gains to be made.
The main factor is the unexpected thaw which happened in relations between the US and Russia during Trump’s second term as president.
Since Putin’s ascent to power in 2000, the Kremlin has seen the US first as an unreliable partner, then as a full-fledged adversary with an ambition to divide and rule in the ex-Soviet neighbourhood.
But it all suddenly went back to a partnership of sorts when Trump returned to the White House at the beginning of 2025. The US all but terminated its financial aid to Ukraine and adopted the posture of near-neutrality, though it still supplies crucial intelligence to the Ukrainian army. In the latest iteration of its National Security Strategy, the US even dropped Russia from the list of “direct threats”.
There is also the aspect of cynical political calculation. The geopolitical gains from the US launching a military attack on Venezuela potentially exceed the losses.
That is because it would put Russia and the US on an equal moral footing with regard to the war in Ukraine. If the US can dictate its will by means of military aggression in what Americans call “their backyard”, then why can Russia not do the same in its own? The US aggression in Venezuela would justify Russian aggression in Ukraine in the eyes of many, especially in the Global South. Handily for the Kremlin, it would also sow further divisions between the US and Europe as well as feed polarisation within the US itself.
If, in addition to Venezuela, the Trump administration presses forward with its irrational desire to occupy Greenland, the situation would be ideal for the Kremlin. It may even open avenues for post-Ukraine rapprochement with the EU-led part of Europe, currently its main global nemesis.
Generally, the Russians see themselves as the keepers of the old order, ultimate foreign policy conservatives. They see the US-led West as a revisionist force responsible for undoing the post-World War II order and see the war in Ukraine as a way of countering that revision.
But, as their thinking goes, if there is no return to the old order, for which the West is to blame, let us negotiate a new one: an order in which the US does as it pleases in its Western hemisphere, and Russia retains influence over the ex-Soviet neighbourhood.
LOL. You're so cooked.
No, our school age propaganda taught us that Russia is our mortal enemy and the enemy of democracy. Fuck, it was the entire premise of Command and Conquer Red Alert (what if the Russians were the real fascists?)
Russia had been appeasing and then matching US escalation in Eastern Europe and particularly Ukraine for a long time. No need for this dissident novelist to warn everyone through "fiction". Russian military build was open and obvious. You're living in a fantasy world of spy games between the good democratic guys and the evil fascists, never asking once why the US saved thousands of Nazis, with the help of the Vatican, to not only flee the country but integrate them throughout the Western hemisphere while the Soviets did nothing of the sort. Never once stopped to ask why West Germany had openly Nazi political leaders take over under the Allies watch while East Germany was accused of totalitarianism because it kept purging Nazis and their sympathizers.
Look, Russia today is not Soviet Union. They're a liberal capitalist hellscape in the same philosophical category as the US. But the US is clearly the enemy of democracy everywhere, having overturned a dozen or more democratic governments all over the world.
This article is the topic though. And this article is total fucking trash.
jfc Oh ok 👌
You don't say... Speaking of what you're taught in schools about Russia and the Soviet Union, I'll just leave this here
I'm sure you won't need it though since you clearly hold all the information to back your beliefs.
Again, you might want to look into the documented history of who was involved in the collapse of the Soviet Union. Who happens to be in control of the U.S. right now and has been plotting this shit for decades?
Oligarchy in modern day Russia is a feature, not a bug. You seem to be missing the point intentionally to help spread more disinformation, but regardless, if you're allowed to take Putin's piece out of your mouth for a second, you might realize there are no good guys in this scenario.
So your argument is that this article is fine because journalism is when you moralize and make false equivalencies and just generally write your own opinion without actually doing any journalism because Russia bad. That's your whole argument. Someone tried to warn us about the pending invasion of Ukraine that we all knew was coming, because Russia is so evil that no one could possibly know what they're up to and need fiction writers that are "dissidents" to tell us what's happening behind the iron curtain.
This article is trash and there's no way to defend it so you have to resort to arguing that trash articles that fit the narrative are fine because Russia bad.
And if you think I've spread any disinformation here, go ahead and call it out. I'll be happy to back it up with sources instead of vague literary allusions to YA murder fantasies.