STOP SAYING “THEY’RE THERE FOR THE OIL.” IT’S A LIE.

The U.S. never meaningfully extracted oil from Iraq, Libya, or Syria. No cheaper gas. No increased supply. No public benefit. That fantasy collapses once you understand financialized capitalism.

Modern empire is not extractive — it is anti-productive. Profit does not come from producing resources, but from preventing production, enforcing scarcity, and monetizing future claims through debt.

The real mechanism is simple and repeatable:

Sanctions cut a country off from dollar clearing, refinancing, insurance, parts, and logistics.

Production collapses — by design.

The collapse is blamed on “mismanagement.”

Debt defaults follow.

Creditors activate international arbitration.

External assets are seized.

Financial firms “stabilize” the wreckage through debt restructuring, asset stripping, and collateralized future barrels.

Production stays constrained — because abundance would destroy price leverage.

The oil is most valuable when it stays in the ground, backing debt, derivatives, and geopolitical control.

This is why Venezuela is not about rebuilding capacity or supplying oil to anyone. It’s about debt peonage, asset seizure, suppressed production, and externally controlled cash flows.

Arguing “it’s wrong to take their resources” is a losing move. It concedes the false premise that resources could be taken and shared. They can’t. They never were.

Trump didn’t expose a failed system. He exposed a system working exactly as intended.

Imperial power today is not theft.

It is financial strangulation disguised as economics.

Anyone still saying “they just want the oil” is protecting the machine.