The Read
Caracas keeps the building but lost the keys. The Chavista security and oil apparatus still runs the state, but Washington now sets its perimeter.
Delcy Rodríguez governs a recognizable Chavista machine without the founding strongman who gave it meaning, and the bolívar's slide is exposing how little legitimacy the apparatus carried on its own.
Venezuela's pivot from sanctioned holdout to US extraction venue follows the Caribbean client-state pattern of Panama under Noriega's removal in 1989 and Haiti repeatedly: a friendly government governing on terms set in Washington with independent reach capped for the duration.
Caracas's two remaining client relationships have inverted: Cuba is collapsing as Venezuelan oil cuts off, and the Ejército de Liberación Nacional (ELN) sanctuary across the Colombian border is now Venezuela's main piece of regional leverage rather than a service it provides.
LAST 30 DAYS
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APR 24Fri
United States Removes Sanctions on Delcy Rodríguez
MAY 10Sun
Venezuelan Diaspora Non-Return Following Maduro Capture
Maduro was physically removed by US forces on April 8 and sits in a Brooklyn detention cell. Rodríguez consolidated under Washington's protection, sanctions came off her personally, and a Marriott in Caracas now functions as the operational nerve center of US policy inside Venezuela.
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