Anne Applebaum

We're just there for the oil kind of enterprise.

That's right.

I mean, it's not even the Victorian British Empire, which did have an ideology and manifest destiny.

But it's very, very brutal.

And Venezuelans want change.

And one person said to me, I don't care who runs the oil industry.

I just want the country to move again.

So they keep looking for the bright side, but he almost never talks about Venezuelans.

He doesn't talk about them at all and what they would want.

And he's never used the word democracy when he talks about them.

I guess it's important for him to meet Machado, and I don't envy her having to go through that.

And I am afraid there will be some horrific scene where she hands him the, I think it's a gold medal you get when you win the Nobel Prize.

I mean, there might be some ugly thing that happens, which I don't wanna watch,

So there are armed groups inside Venezuela.

There are some terrorist groups, I mean, mostly on the border coming from Colombia and elsewhere, but there are also armed paramilitaries inside Venezuela who may or may not be happy with the new system, whatever that system turns out to be.

There are Russian and Chinese and Iranian links in Venezuela.

I mean, I know that the Trump administration said they would have to leave, but that's not how it works.

I mean, they don't necessarily leave.

And there's plenty of opportunity for

People who don't like the new system, whatever that turns out to be, to push back against it.