It usually takes archival digging, the golden gaffe, an ill-considered remark and occasional spells of candour by those in power, to admit that the United States has, in common with other imperial powers, brutal ambitions.  An example of the latter was General Smedley Butler who, at his death in 1940, had become the most decorated Marine in US history.  After retiring from active service, he was frank about what his role had been.  Professing to being a “racketeer” and “gangster for capitalism”, he went on to explain how: “I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil interests in 1914.  I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Boys to collect revenues in.  I helped the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street.”  That was just a selection.

With President Donald Trump in power, we do not need a Butler to give the game away or expose any frightful cabal.  The empire is out of the closet, bolshie, bright and more thieving than ever.  While the Donroe Doctrine is intended to reprise the Monroe Doctrine, it offers nothing more than imperial rapacity, seizure under pretext.  The January 9 meeting with two dozen oil executives at the White House to discuss the fate of the Venezuelan oil market showed Trump to be in full flight as cocky pip and proud procurer of corporate thieving under the cover of government protection.

Representatives from such veteran behemoths as ExxonMobil and Chevron were present to listen to calls from the president that they invest handsomely in modernising and tidying up Venezuela’s tattered oil infrastructure.  Problems with the oil itself – heavy, hard to refine and packed with sulphur, not to mention the questionable number of proven reserves – did not blight the conversation.  “American companies will have the........

© Middle East Monitor