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Summary of current situation by a Venezuelan analyst: goal is for elections in near future
Posted on 1/3/26 at 9:10 pm
Posted on 1/3/26 at 9:10 pm
quote:
Delcy Rodríguez and the core of the regime’s leadership are negotiating with the United States as we speak. This is not a sudden pivot. It is the result of a conclusion reached in Washington over months: the U.S. does not believe that María Corina Machado and the opposition have the operational capacity to seize power in Venezuela because they do not control, or meaningfully fracture, the military. If they did, power would have shifted immediately after the 2024 presidential election. It did not.
For a long period, U.S. officials, including Marco Rubio, were in constant communication with Machado and her team. They were asked repeatedly for proof of a concrete plan, not just to win power symbolically, but to retain it in practice: chain of command, military alignment, institutional control, day-after governance. The answers were consistently evasive, justified by security concerns, but never substantiated. At that point, from the U.S. government’s perspective, the opposition ceased to look like a viable transition mechanism and began to look like a political wager with no enforcement arm.
The plan now on the table is for Delcy Rodríguez to stabilize the country with U.S. backing and then call for general elections. This is not framed as an endorsement of the regime, but as a containment and transition strategy. Washington is explicit about one thing: this is not a partnership of equals. The United States is running the process, the lines are being managed through Rubio, and the leverage is entirely asymmetric. Delcy is the instrument, not the center of gravity.
U.S. officials also assess that Delcy’s harsh public rhetoric today was aimed inward, at the chavista base, not outward. That messaging is understood as domestic signaling. Nevertheless, as of now, negotiations with the United States are ongoing as we speak.
LINK
This post was edited on 1/3/26 at 9:11 pm
Posted on 1/3/26 at 9:12 pm to HailHailtoMichigan!
Should have had that strategy during Iraq...
Posted on 1/3/26 at 9:12 pm to HailHailtoMichigan!
Not to be confused with our resident analist, Roger.
Posted on 1/3/26 at 9:22 pm to HailHailtoMichigan!
quote:
U.S. officials also assess that Delcy’s harsh public rhetoric today was aimed inward, at the chavista base, not outward. That messaging is understood as domestic signaling. Nevertheless, as of now, negotiations with the United States are ongoing as we speak.
Demanding that the US release Maduro and his wife sure doesn't seem like messaging consistent with someone who is cooperating with the US on this regime change.
Or maybe I just didn't read my cracker jack box decoder ring correctly.
Posted on 1/3/26 at 9:26 pm to HailHailtoMichigan!
Why not just install Edmundo González, the guy who actually won the most recent election?
Posted on 1/3/26 at 9:31 pm to HailHailtoMichigan!
Thanks. That makes more sense than what the President said at the press conference about us "running things" without any plan to do so.
Do you think they negotiated a stand down order for the Venezuelan military to let Maduro be taken without any American deaths?
Do you think they negotiated a stand down order for the Venezuelan military to let Maduro be taken without any American deaths?
This post was edited on 1/3/26 at 9:37 pm
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