Venezuela and Iran are strategic targets to control China's supply of crude oil. That's pretty much it.
USA can produce all the oil/energy it needs for itself. Everything else is about controlling the energy supply to adversaries.
Venezuela and Iran are strategic targets to control China's supply of crude oil. That's pretty much it.
USA can produce all the oil/energy it needs for itself. Everything else is about controlling the energy supply to adversaries.
This is frequently stated as a goal of the 5D chess but it is ridiculous if you think about it. China is not buying oil and gas from Russia at discount rates (and had been for quite a while). They haven't performed blood rites with Venezuela that force them to only get oil from Venezuela. They can buy it from anybody who is willing to sell. Even if you sink the Middle East into the ocean they will still be able to buy oil from others, albeit at much higher prices. So no, this is not a strategic target, unless you actually want to attrition them to bankruptcy with oil prices. But this path is and should be very unpopular with regular citizens.
As the parent comment explains, the US can't produce all the oil it needs, because it's refinery capacity isn't aligned with the type of oil it pumps from the ground.
It can be if necessary. It’s just the US refineries can deal with the crappy oil produced by places like the tar sands in Canada, where few other countries currently can
The Venezuelan oil is essentially the same, and Canadian bitumen is much cheaper on the world market to account for this.
I have seen a few slightly different figures but it is something like 40% of oil still needs to be imported to get the right mix for the current economic setup.
But it is a free market. If prices in the international market are at 2x the prices in the domestic market, nobody would sell oil in the domestic markets. The US would have to introduce export controls.
But can the US do it? No, because it lacks refining capability for a lot of the kind of oil it produces and retrofitting existing refineries is a multi-year, very expensive project.