Venezuela - Not Just Oil But A Treasure of Minerals, Gold, and Diamonds That America Captured

However, during 1999 to the first decade in the new millennium, due to wrong policies and mismanagement, the nation’s oil industry witnessed a downfall.

According to several prominent international organisations including OPEC (Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries), not just in South America, Venezuela has the largest proven oil reserves in the world with an estimated 303 billion barrels as of 2023. This figure is 5 times what the United States has in terms of crude oil.

After Venezuela, Saudi Arabia has the second-largest proven oil reserves at 267.2 billion barrels, followed by Iran, Canada, Iraq, UAE, Kuwait, Russia, the United States, Libya, and then the rest of the world.

But despite having the largest oil reserves, Venezuela hasn’t come out in the world as prosperous as that of the UAE.

One possible reason behind this could be wrong policies, an incapable leadership, corruption, involvement in drugs and narco-terrorism, as what the United States claims, and for that, it launched one of its most daring operations of regime change by capturing its incumbent leader, Nicolas Maduro.

But Venezuela is not just rich in oil reserves. It has other very valuable natural reserves that it makes a 'nation of interest', especially for the United States, which is in its backyard.

In a recent statement by US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, he said, "You have steel, you have minerals, all the minerals, they have great mining history that’s gone rusty... and Donald Trump is going to fix it."

According to the International Energy Agency, Venezuela as of 2023 has a total of 5.5 trillion cubic meters -- 195 trillion cubic feet -- of natural gas which in total accounts for 73 per cent of Southern America’s total reserves.

Gold

Venezuela also holds the largest gold reserves from any other nation in Latin America, that makes it a 'nation of special interest' for the United States.

The World Gold Council says Venezuela has approximately 161.2 metric tonnes of gold reserves that are worth $23 billion in today’s market value.

Considering all these factors, Venezuela is an oil, natural gas, gold, diamond, bauxite, and nickel-rich country in true sense - this makes a perfect case for the United States to gain control of the nation to boost and utilise or either exploit its resources, boost its economy, and also counter China, which is the largest importer of Venezuelan crude.

Given the fact that Venezuela is a mineral-resource-rich country, it also suggests that Trump's action to dethrone Maduro from power was not just a counter narco-terrorism or a pro-democracy operation but a very well calculated and greedy move to take control of its natural resources.

United States in a specialised military operation at the dawn of January 3, captured Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores in Caracas.

Codenamed ‘Operation Absolute’, the US launched a well-coordinated air and ground assault and captured Maduro and his wife from their bedroom.

For the time the operation was being executed, US forces using its high-tech military to switch off the region’s power through specialised techniques, held Maduro, his wife, and transferred them to New York to face criminal charges.

It was a 150-minute operation to be precise, during which 150 aircraft from 20 different bases conducted strikes and dismantled Venezuela’s Chinese-built air defence systems, including the ‘Fuerte Tiuna’ complex and ‘La Carlota’ airfield, to dominate the airspace and control power in Caracas.

Around 2 AM on Saturday, US’ Delta Force units barged into Maduro’s residence by helicopter. Though the Venezuelan president did attempt to hide in a steel safe room, he failed to succeed.

Maduro is currently lodged in New York’s Metropolitan Detention Centre in Brooklyn.