What's U.S. Oil Doing in the Ground in Venezuela?

[MrWowWow]

Seems like a rerun of some past reichwingNut illogic to justify a pre-emptive attack on Iraq.
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As of 2023, Venezuela holds approximately 303 billion barrels of proven crude oil reserves, making it the country with the largest proven reserves in the world.

These reserves account for about 17 % of global proven oil reserves.

Much of Venezuela’s oil is extra-heavy crude (very dense, high viscosity, often with high sulfur content), which makes extraction, upgrading, and transport more technically challenging and costly.

The Orinoco Oil Belt (Faja Petrolífera del Orinoco) is central: it contains a large share of the country’s heavy oil reserves.

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) estimates that, besides the proven reserves, the Orinoco belt may have 900–1,400 billion barrels of heavy crude in place, of which 380–652 billion barrels could be technically recoverable (i.e. with existing technology, irrespective of economics).