The next proxy war - Venezuela invades Guyana?

[LimaDelta]

Couldn't see a thread on this. What's the general feeling, sabre rattling by a Russian ally, or a genuine prelude to more fighting? How will we respond if a commonwealth nation is invaded. Time to test out one of those new carriers? While we are under no legal obligation, surely if we allow this to happen the Commonwealth becomes meaningless? What's the point of belonging to a club which allows this to happen to it's members? Defence is not mentioned in the charter, but must be in some way implied one would think.

I wonder how the far-left will try to frame Guyana as the bad guys in this one. Probably being formerly British Guyana is enough, Imperial guilt by association.

[DeejRC]

It’s a touch more complicated than all that though. The boundaries have been in dispute for a fairly long time and in many ways Venez did get stitched up when they were drawn. Equally, nobody was giving that much of a damn until the oil discoveries kicked off in the last cpl of yrs. What isn’t in doubt is the almighty fk up of the situation that Venez will cause if it gets it’s incompetent hands on the place and industry.

[LimaDelta]

DeejRC said:

It’s a touch more complicated than all that though

Isn't it always?

[Plymo]

DeejRC said:

It’s a touch more complicated than all that though. The boundaries have been in dispute for a fairly long time and in many ways Venez did get stitched up when they were drawn. Equally, nobody was giving that much of a damn until the oil discoveries kicked off in the last cpl of yrs. What isn’t in doubt is the almighty fk up of the situation that Venez will cause if it gets it’s incompetent hands on the place and industry.

Venezuela does have stloads of oil already though - it's more the issue of being unable to sell it easily that's crippling them. Plus the usual terrible government, corruption, and general chaos that goes with the territory.
Lake Maracaibo definitely has plenty of oil, I've seen the stuff pouring from little platforms and floating around the water (not a slick, but great globs of it).
US sanctions get blamed for it, and it does look to be mostly the case, though I'm not convinced that if they did manage to export their oil easily that the money raised wouldn't just disappear.
In the past though they were very good at introducing public services, modernising infrastructure and various industries, so not your usual tin pot South American dictatorship.
It's sad to see most of it falling apart and the crazy amount of crime that the Venezuelans I sailed with seemed to take as normal...

The place really should be a paradise, it has everything, it's just politics have screwed it up

[Iamnotkloot]

I’d be all for putting a UK army battalion in Guyana as a deterrent.
We can’t let crummy Maduro get his corrupt hands on the area scot-free. Plus, Guyana is small enough and Venezuela large enough already.

[ralphrj]

LimaDelta said:

Couldn't see a thread on this. What's the general feeling, sabre rattling by a Russian ally?

I seem to recall that the US has always justified its expenditure on its military on the grounds that it may need to fight in 2 different theatres of war at the same time (as they did in WW2). Therefore, it would not surprise me at all if this, along with the current fighting in Gaza, is based on Russian attempts to try and dilute US support for Ukraine by creating other conflicts that they know will result in US intervention of some sort.

[nikaiyo2]

Plymo said:

Venezuela does have stloads of oil already though - it's more the issue of being unable to sell it easily that's crippling them. Plus the usual terrible government, corruption, and general chaos that goes with the territory.
Lake Maracaibo definitely has plenty of oil, I've seen the stuff pouring from little platforms and floating around the water (not a slick, but great globs of it).
US sanctions get blamed for it, and it does look to be mostly the case, though I'm not convinced that if they did manage to export their oil easily that the money raised wouldn't just disappear.
In the past though they were very good at introducing public services, modernising infrastructure and various industries, so not your usual tin pot South American dictatorship.
It's sad to see most of it falling apart and the crazy amount of crime that the Venezuelans I sailed with seemed to take as normal...

The place really should be a paradise, it has everything, it's just politics have screwed it up

???? they always have been a classic South American tin pot dictatorship. Just more like Cuba than Chile, so beloved by students and the Labour party, so the extrajudicial killings in the hundreds of thousands are not something we need to worry about. The arrest, imprisonment and torture of people with differing views is pretty much like any other tin pot dictatorship lefty or righty.
Like most socialist governments it was a paradise until the money ran out and they started to interfere with food production, so in addition to being murdered or tortured by the state for not being a believer you could also starve to death, in the usual marxist manner.

We should rejoice that peaceful socialism is being spread to another country, if only more of the people of Guyana could be peacefully beaten and murdered into accepting Marxism into their hearts. Or as an alternative give over

Its very sad for the people who will die through this, I cant help but feel Pube-tin has a hand in this.

[LimaDelta]

nikaiyo2 said:

I cant help but feel Pube-tin has a hand in this.

Of course he has, hence the 'proxy' thread title.

[LimaDelta]

Looks like Guyana may have lost a helicopter in the disputed area now. They didn't have many to start with.

https://twitter.com/AlbertoRodNews/status/17325001...

[LimaDelta]

Apparently SouthCom to conduct 'flight operations' tomorrow.

[Taffer]

Should be easy to take care of the Venezualan Navy - just charter a few cruise ships to sink their ships:

https://twitter.com/TheDreadShips/status/124636431...

[TTmonkey]

Britain to deploy its elite JSO insurgency brigade.

[BrettMRC]

Taffer said:

Should be easy to take care of the Venezualan Navy - just charter a few cruise ships to sink their ships:

https://twitter.com/TheDreadShips/status/124636431...

[hidetheelephants]

LimaDelta said:

Couldn't see a thread on this. What's the general feeling, sabre rattling by a Russian ally, or a genuine prelude to more fighting? How will we respond if a commonwealth nation is invaded. Time to test out one of those new carriers? While we are under no legal obligation, surely if we allow this to happen the Commonwealth becomes meaningless? What's the point of belonging to a club which allows this to happen to it's members? Defence is not mentioned in the charter, but must be in some way implied one would think.

I wonder how the far-left will try to frame Guyana as the bad guys in this one. Probably being formerly British Guyana is enough, Imperial guilt by association.

I can't see any sign of a bilateral UK defence treaty, so not likely to be the Loamshires being voluntold they're getting a all-expense spared crabby ian holiday to catch something chronic in the jungle. The US probably wouldn't need much encouragement to get involved in an opportunity to use venezuelan forces for target practice.

[biggbn]

LimaDelta said:

Couldn't see a thread on this. What's the general feeling, sabre rattling by a Russian ally, or a genuine prelude to more fighting? How will we respond if a commonwealth nation is invaded. Time to test out one of those new carriers? While we are under no legal obligation, surely if we allow this to happen the Commonwealth becomes meaningless? What's the point of belonging to a club which allows this to happen to it's members? Defence is not mentioned in the charter, but must be in some way implied one would think.

I wonder how the far-left will try to frame Guyana as the bad guys in this one. Probably being formerly British Guyana is enough, Imperial guilt by association.

Most people who I know on the 'far left' are pacifist by nature, naive dreamers with idealistic goals. I count myself amongst them. Three main causes of conflict are greed, pride and ideologies, whether religious or political. Kinda sad. Kumbyah motherfker, Kumbyah x

[CoolHands]

And how does pacifism fare when having to deal with these scumbags in the real world.

[biggbn]

CoolHands said:

And how does pacifism fare when having to deal with these scumbags in the real world.

Define pacifism? For me, I'm OK with legitimate force, not illegitimate violence. I've led a violent life and I'm heartily sick of it all. Man never tires of showing his inhumanity to his fellow man, and we all go round again and again having never learnt that violence simply creates violence. Soon as the people of the world realise we are a collective living a fortuitous life on a random throw of a cosmic dice and that division ultimately ends in a very small number, the sooner we can start to teach our children love not hate. But hey, hating is easy. We're good at it. We've been doing it for years. Why change these arguments about land, gods, resources? Of course we must defend ourselves but rather ironically those with the most sin tend to throw the first rock...they've nothing to lose ya see

[Hill92]

An instant goodwill visit from the Americans:

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/u-s-conducts...

[hidetheelephants]

Hill92 said:

An instant goodwill visit from the Americans:

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/u-s-conducts...

They have more goodwill to give and the flight is shorter.

[Flooble]

Reminds me a little of the incident in Rowland White's Phoenix Squadron - a little bit further North but a similar squabble.

Hopefully this one can be calmed down fairly quickly in a similar fashion; all it took to defuse the Belize situation was flying a couple of Buccaneers overhead.