You're assuming they want to sell the oil in the US markets, they don't. Corporations want to sell it to other countries but they want the US to do the heavy lifting with minimal risks.
I still find it very curious that after Russia invaded Ukraine, now Trump is using rhetoric that makes it look like the US is ready to invade some other country, too, they just have not decided on the victim yet.
And of course "start a war with another country" is an excellent example of how to control your country in case you have to, because, say, elections are coming up and you may loose.
Trump seems to have been following Russian advice throughout his political career. It started in 1987:
> Moscow at the invitation of Soviet ambassador Yuri Dubinin, in a private jet accompanied by “two Russian colonels”
and then after he ran full page ads attacking NATO. Not much has changed there really.
I'm surprised that all he has to do is say "russia russia hoax" and then the voters forget about it. I think maybe people have some similar failure modes to LLMs.
Venezuelan oil is more about US refineries that can only use very heavy oil, and US wells for such oil running out. Those refineries decided it is cheaper to bribe Trump than to invest into converting their factories. They are using US tax payer dolars (in a war with Venezuela) to avoid having to invest into their own conpanies.
That makes no sense. Any US refinery that can process heavy sour can also process any other kind of crude. It isn’t the 1950s.
The US has very advanced refinery tech that can adaptively refine everything from heavy sour to light sweet. The reconfiguration for the customer is highly customizable and largely automated. It is why so many countries send their crude to the US for refining. The US refiners make money no what kind of crude you send them.
I still thinks it's missing important details, but the US making wars to get more oil doesn't fit reality at all.