How the US attacks on Venezuela Impact Trinidad and Tobago with Andrew

Summary

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It Could Happen Here – Episode Summary

Episode Title:

How the US attacks on Venezuela Impact Trinidad and Tobago with Andrew
Date: September 25, 2025
Hosts: Andrew Sage (aka andrewism), James Stout

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Overview

This episode explores the cascading impacts of recent US military actions against Venezuela, specifically focusing on how these moves are shaping the politics, security, and daily lives of neighboring Trinidad and Tobago. Drawing on history and first-hand context, co-host Andrew Sage, who is Trinidadian, delves into:

• The recent US bombings of alleged “drug boats” in the Caribbean,
• Trinidad’s shifting diplomatic stance under its new Prime Minister, Kamala Persad-Bissessar,
• The regional dynamics between the US, Venezuela, Guyana, China, and Trinidad,
• The risks posed by these geopolitical maneuvers to ordinary citizens,
• The historical entanglement of US-Trinidad relations.

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Main Discussion Points and Insights

1. Background: Trinidad’s Political Turmoil and US Actions

(03:13–06:00)

• US Strike on “Drug Vessel” (03:13):
  The spark for current tensions: US military bombed an alleged Venezuela-linked drug boat in the Caribbean; no evidence provided for its criminality.
• Prime Minister’s Aggressive Stance:
  New PM Kamla Persad-Bissessar publicly championed the strike, saying she had “no sympathy for traffickers and that the US should kill them all violently.”

  "She has no sympathy for traffickers and that the US should kill them all violently." – Andrew Sage (03:55)

• Domestic Fallout:
  Kamla’s administration is marred by mass layoffs, canceled celebrations, and a pattern of reckless, antagonistic diplomacy, particularly towards Venezuela—Trinidad’s closest geographic neighbor.

2. Historical Context: Trinidad’s Foreign Relations and Regional Precedents

(06:00–12:35)

• Trinidad and US – Long Ties, Mixed Legacy:
  US military bases from WWII through the 1960s, shaping both infrastructure and social structure (e.g., economy of prostitution referenced in Calypso song Jean and Dinah) (09:00).
• Caricom Formation and Weaknesses:
  The regional bloc meant to empower Caribbean nations, Caricom, is undercut by cost barriers and lack of real integration:

  "Caricom is kind of like if the EU was entirely toothless and didn't really do much of anything." – Andrew Sage (11:00)

• Pattern of US Intervention (16:25):
  Reference to US invasion of Grenada in the 1980s, American disregard for international law, and Trinidad’s wary relationship with superpower politics.

3. Economic and Social Impacts: Oil, Migration, and Broken Neutrality

(15:34–21:12)

• Oil Windfalls and Industrialization:
  Trinidad is less tourism-dependent than its neighbors due to oil booms, but both boons and busts have been at the mercy of international forces.
• Borderland Dynamics with Venezuela:
  Deeply intertwined histories, shared migration, and trade. Recent crisis in Venezuela has led to migration surges toward Trinidad (17:30).
• Increasing Violence & Trafficking:
  Trinidad is a transshipment point for drugs, guns, and trafficked people, fueling domestic violence, while the US flexes military power ostensibly to fight crime.

4. The Guyana Factor and Venezuela’s Assertiveness

(19:19–21:00)

• Venezuela–Guyana Tensions:
  Venezuela’s renewed claim to much of Guyana's territory, sparked by Guyana’s oil discoveries, creates a dangerous flashpoint.
• Regional Militarization:
  Small countries like Trinidad and Guyana are falling into security dilemmas, seeking US partnership but risking entrapment in great-power games.

5. Kamla Persad-Bissessar’s Foreign Policy and Its Dangers

(21:55–24:56)

• Alignment with US, Recklessness toward Venezuela:
  Kamla's government abandoned diplomatic tightropes maintained by predecessors, openly antagonizing Venezuela and snubbing Caricom.
• Domestic Racial/Ethnic Tensions:
  Discussion of Trinidad and Guyana’s substantial Indo-Caribbean (East Indian) populations and their relationship to Caribbean unity efforts.
• Influence Operations and Cambridge Analytica:
  Kamla supposedly benefited from Cambridge Analytica’s first major experiment in electoral manipulation, highlighting foreign meddling at Trinidad’s expense.

6. Escalating Military Risks and Civilian Fears

(28:21–34:01)

• US Bombings in September 2025:
  Multiple strikes on boats, insufficient evidence, summary executions cited.

  "Even if they did have proof that it was a drug boat, summary execution on the high seas is not exactly in line with international law." – Andrew Sage (28:45)

• Potential for Venezuela to Retaliate Against Trinidad:
  Venezuela issues explicit warnings that US military actions from Trinidadian soil could provoke a direct response (30:19).
• Undercurrent of Foreign Meddling and “Manufactured Consent”:
  Large US and Chinese embassies, social media bots faking grassroots support for Kamla, and heightened diplomatic maneuvering.

7. Human Costs: Fishermen, Migrants, and Ordinary People

(35:02–37:41)

• Fishermen at Risk:
  Trinidadian fishermen are scared to go to sea, fearing mistaken-identity attacks (31:52).
• Venezuelan Migrants Demonized and Vulnerable:
  Venezuelans in Trinidad face xenophobia and risk being caught up in geopolitical violence, despite fleeing hardship and not supporting the Maduro regime.

  "These people are victims of a system that has left them with very few opportunities. And the way we're responding is by killing them and by destabilizing a whole part of the world that no one asked for this." – James Stout (37:20)

• “Little Fish” Pay the Price:
  Enforcement targets low-level traffickers or innocent people, while organized crime and political leaders remain largely unaffected.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Prime Minister Kamla's Approach:
  "She said the US could base whatever they want in here... I don't know where she got this we from, but she's saying, oh yeah, they could come and they could, you know, launch stuff from here."
  — Andrew Sage (30:33)

• On US Justification:
  "All the smoke and mirrors about drugs and fighting drugs... it really is that smoke and mirrors, because if it was about that, they would be trying to get information to target the heart of the operation. What the US is doing right now is flexing."
  — Andrew Sage (29:01)

• On Propaganda and Manipulation:
  "There was recently an expose that determined a lot of the pro-UNC, pro Kamla buzz that occurs on social media – it's bot driven. Like you go onto these profiles and they're bots. Just fake names, fake profile pictures, AI posts."
  — Andrew Sage (32:37)

• On Human Impact:
  "Their economy is so bad that they are not able to put fuel in their boats... This is a country which sits on a massive oil reserve, but yet people can't afford to put fuel in their fishing boats."
  — James Stout (37:20)

• Closing Rallying Call:
  "Please do what you can to stand to speak out against this American intervention, to educate yourself on what's going on... probably hunker down and have a crisis bag or emergency bag set up if worse comes to worse and everyone else really just get the knowledge and do what you can in your area to disrupt this machine."
  — Andrew Sage (37:41)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• [03:13] — Inciting incident: US strike, Trinidad PM’s reaction
• [05:00] — History of political leadership and corruption in Trinidad
• [09:00] — US military history and cultural impact on Trinidad
• [11:00] — CARICOM’s founding and ineffectiveness
• [16:25] — US invasion of Grenada and global law hypocrisy
• [17:30] — Migration between Venezuela and Trinidad
• [21:00] — Venezuela-Guyana border tensions, oil discoveries
• [24:19] — Cambridge Analytica’s manipulation of Trinidad’s elections
• [28:21] — Details of US bombings in September 2025
• [30:19] — Venezuela’s warning of retaliation
• [32:37] — Astroturfed political support, social media bots
• [35:02] — The real human cost: migrants, fishermen, and the "little guys"
• [37:41] — Andrew’s closing message and call to action

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Tone and Style

Conversational, urgent, and deeply personal, as Andrew Sage weaves history with present-day realities to highlight the precarity facing Trinidad and Tobago. There's an undercurrent of dismay at government recklessness, US imperialism, and the everyday suffering of marginalized populations.

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Conclusion

This episode illuminates the domino effect of American military intervention in Venezuela, laying bare how it reverberates in smaller neighboring states like Trinidad and Tobago—entangling them in great-power confrontation, fueling internal strife, and putting civilians at risk. Through grounded historical context, the hosts urge listeners to educate themselves, resist manufactured consent for escalation, and remember the ordinary people most affected by policies made far beyond their control.

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Transcript

[Andrew Sage]

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[James Stout]

I'm here with James Stout. For those of you wondering what my last name is.

[Andrew Sage]

Hello. Hello. And for those who couldn't tell by my accent or maybe don't recognize it, I'm from Trinidad and Tobago, born and based. And you may or may not have seen Trinidad's name being called up in JD Van's and Marco Rubio's mouths lately, particularly with the moves that the US has been making in the Caribbean Sea as of late. So to provide a little context on the inciting incident of this episode, the current Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago, Kamala Passad Bocesa expressed very passionate support for the US's recent move on an alleged Venezuela based drug vessel. Yeah, I say alleged because no proof has been provided that it was a drug vessel or anything of that nature that the United States struck. The Prime Minister said, and I quote, that she has no sympathy for traffickers and that the US should kill them all violently.

[James Stout]

Jesus Christ.

[Andrew Sage]

For those. I mean, most people not know much about Trinidadian politics. I don't expect them to. Our current prime minister, she won this year actually and she kind of carried on that trend of incumbents losing their elections that took place, you know, post COVID lockdown 2020 era.

[James Stout]

Yeah.

[Andrew Sage]

So the previous Prime Minister was Prime Minister Dr. Keith Rowley. He was Prime Minister for like 10 years. He became Prime Minister after she lost her last stint as prime minister because she's kind of a mess in a couple different ways. I mean both parties are pretty corrupt, but they're corrupt and incompetent in some very critical ways. Corrupt and racist and a couple other issues. That trend continues with her new candidacy. You know, she is not only failing the country in some crucial ways. You know, she canceled our Independence Day celebrations. She fired like thousands of workers from local agency that's responsible for landscaping around the country, basically, you know, cutting grass and clearing drains, that sort of thing. Fired like thousands of them. Right. So now the entire country is overgrown and all those people have like right before their Children have to go to school. You know, they had no income to support them. So there's like a lot of cruelty, a lot of corruption, a lot of incompetence and, yeah, in this particular case, diplomatic carelessness, recklessness. Because she goes and she says this despite the fact that not only did the US violate a law, international law, but also we are small. You may not be able to see Trinidad in a lot of maps because we are small. You know, we may be one of the more populated Caribbean countries, but we are still small. Venezuela is our closest neighbor. And she has been exceedingly irresponsible in the ways that she's approached Venezuela, because the previous administration actually had an agreement with Venezuela regarding the extraction of their fossil fuels in the waters that are between Trinidad and Venezuela. We had to get permission from the United States to get into that agreement with Venezuela because Venezuela is currently under sanction. And for the longest time, Trinidad has had to walk this sort of tightrope of playing nice with both the US and Venezuela. She's basically coming, guns blazing, to make statements that appear to be openly aggressive towards Venezuela, towards Venezuelan sovereignty and so on. Now, her reasoning is that Trinidad has been ravaged by a lot of violence and addiction that have been caused by these drug cartels coming from South America, including Venezuela. This is a very real issue. The illegal gun and drug and human trafficking that takes place between South America and Trinidad. We are transshipment point for that sort of activity, and that kind of thing brings violence. The issue is that while she may be able to say things like, may God bless and protect the members of the U.S. military, the U.S. and the U.S. military are in part responsible for the violence that has ravaged Latin America. But is also not even particularly interested, regardless of what their words may say, they're not particularly interested in dealing with the drug issue. At the end of the day, it really comes down to regime change and a desire to control Venezuela's resources. But let me take it back for a moment and provide a longer history of what's going on. Right. United States became independent in 1776. You know, Trinidad became a colony of the UK in 1797, not long after that. Because prior to being under the uk, Trinidad was under the Spanish. And while being under the Spanish was settled by French settlers. So it was like Spanish laws, French settlers, and then later on, UK governance. And so the War of 1812, which is, you know, the war took place between the US and the uk, led to some African Americans siding with the UK in exchange for emancipation and in exchange for their services in that war. That group of people which became known as Americans were resettled in South Trinidad. And I'm actually descended from some of them, allegedly. So there is this history of exchange taking place between us and Trinidad. You know, During World War II, America had military bases established in Trinidad. We had Waller Field, which was commissioned in 1941, and the Chagramas Naval Base, which was fully operational in 1943. And that provided strategic naval and air facilities in the Caribbean, thanks to the Destroyers for Bases agreement with the British. The British got destroyers and the US got bases in the British colonies. Now, thankfully, the base was scaled back and eventually decommissioned and returned to Trinidad and Tobago's control by 1963. But that took a lot of protest and marching to accomplish. It was the whole thing of trying to get Yankee out of Trinidad. Yankee did provide some benefits to Trinidad in terms of establishing infrastructure for highways and that sort of thing. But there was also a not so positive social impact of the American presence. You know, one Calypsonian known as the Mighty Sparrow sang in a song called Jean and Dinah, that's basically the American presence funded a lot of households due to prostitution.

[James Stout]

Oh, wow.

[Andrew Sage]

And the song was basically about how Jean and Diana had to go and find other work now that the Americans were leaving. So after the failure of the West Indies Federation and the independence of countries like Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago from the uk, the location of the former military base Chaguamas also ended up becoming the temporary location of the capital of the short lived West Indies Federation. After the West Indies Federation broke apart, Chaguamas became the place where the Treaty of Chagramas was signed between the newly independent countries of Trinidad and Tobago and Jamaica and so forth, which established Caricom, the Caribbean Community and Common Market in 1973. Caricom will come up later. Caricom is kind of like if the EU was entirely toothless and didn't really do much of anything. It's a nice idea of trying to get a bit of regional collaboration and integration and trade and movement, but it's still more expensive to go between islands than it is to go from an island to the us. So Caricom hasn't exactly succeeded in facilitating island movement thus far, but Caricom will come up later on. Right.

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[James Stout]

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[Andrew Sage]

Follow and listen on Apple Podcasts. Trinidad and Tobago got its independence in 1962. We became a republic in 1976, and we were under the prime ministership of Dr. Eric Williams from 1962 to 1981. Now Dr. Eric Williams was our first Prime Minister and so he's respected in that regard. He also wrote Capitalism and Slavery, which was a really impactful piece of literature on the role of capitalism in the abolition of slavery, or rather the economic motivations for the abolition of slavery, as opposed to the claimed moral virtue of the British Empire in abolishing slavery when it did.

[James Stout]

Right, right.

[Andrew Sage]

So he did some good academic work and you know, he was instrumental in the establishment of Trinidad and Tobago as an independent country, but he also suppressed the black power movements that took place a little while after we became independent because of his failures. He also banned the Trinidadian born American immigrant, Kwame Ture, otherwise known as Tohtika Michael, which is like a world renowned socialist and Pan Africanist.

[James Stout]

Yeah.

[Andrew Sage]

Right. So through the 70s, we had an oil boom and we became really, really industrialized. We had another boom in 2000, and unlike other Caribbean countries, we didn't have to be dependent on tourism. And so we ended up going in a different developmental direction. The thing about the oil booms is that really had more to do with certain happenings in the Middle east than really anything that we did. You know, the oil boom just kind of fell in our laps in that way.

[James Stout]

Right.

[Andrew Sage]

1983, there was an invasion of Grenada by the United States after Maurice Bishop's coup. And the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States Dominica, Barbados and Jamaica called for the US to come and assist in dealing with this Marxist Leninist gaining power in Grenada. While Trinidad Tobago, the UK and Canada criticized the invasion. It was a violation of international law, according to the UN General Assembly. But as usual, the law doesn't really apply to the US So nothing really came out of that. Otherwise. The relation between the US and Trinidad and Tobago has been, you know, we have a lot of trade, you know, we have a large diaspora in the us There's a lot of travel between the countries. Most of our tourism comes from the us we have A lot of American based oil and gas companies established in Trinidad and our whole consumerist culture is basically a copy in many ways of what the US does when they sneeze. We catch a cold, as the saying goes. Yeah, I know I'm establishing a lot of context, but it's to give an idea of how we are where we are right now. Right, yeah. So next door to Trinidad, we have Venezuela. And we really had this sort of diplomatic relationship going on with Maduro and USA at the same time under the former Prime Minister, Dr. Keith Rowley, who was of the same party as our First Prime Minister, Dr. Eric Williams. Right. With the issues taking place in Venezuela right now, there's been a large influx of migrants from Venezuela living in Trinidad and Tobago right now. Well, mainly Trinidad, yeah. Right. I have a lot of Venezuelans now living in Trinidad, some of them legally, some of them illegally prior to that recent wave. And by recent, I'm talking like 2016, 2017. Prior to that wave, we had Venezuelans in Trinidad and we had Trinidians in Venezuela because, you know, we're neighbors.

[James Stout]

Right.

[Andrew Sage]

It's close, you know, so you had Trinidadians involved in the mining sector in Venezuela. You had Venezuelans involved in the cocoa plantations in Trinidad. So we've always been a very mixed up group. Right. And this idea of strict border control between the countries is a very recent, politically motivated situation. Now with everything going on in Latin America thanks to US intervention and the US is constantly feeling war on drugs, we have a lot of violence passing between our territories. You know, guns, drugs, human trafficking, as I mentioned.

[James Stout]

Yeah.

[Andrew Sage]

And then Venezuela now is. I mean, their hands are not clean. I'm not saying any country's hands are clean in this. I'm not trying to pee into good guy, a bad guy dichotomy.

[James Stout]

Yeah.

[Andrew Sage]

Venezuela is still holding strong to this claim that they have from since before their independence that like more than half of Guyana actually belongs to them. Guyana, by the way, is an English speaking Caribbean culture country bordering Venezuela, Suriname and Brazil. So Guyana recently explored and discovered a bunch of offshore reserves.

[James Stout]

Yeah.

[Andrew Sage]

Which, you know, they're really excited to capitalize upon. And you know, they have a lot of deals and agreements taking place where that is concerned. All of a sudden Venezuela's like, you know, that piece of land that we've long been seeing is ours. Yeah. That, that really is ours. And they started, you know, they're putting out maps claiming that, yeah, most of Guyana is actually Venezuela and all these different things. So it's a very, is a very Threatening situation because Venezuela is a military power in its own right.

[James Stout]

Yeah, right.

[Andrew Sage]

Guyana, Trinidad, we don't have much military prowess. So in a sense, I understand why both Trinidad and Guyana are cozying up with the US right now. But at the same time, this recent administration's cozying up has not been the most tactful, you know, because we do have a diplomatic approach that has worked well for us for a very long time. Now. The argument could be made that maybe that diplomatic response at diplomatic balance cannot be maintained forever. Our neutrality cannot persist as things are heating up in the region. But we had an opportunity to respond carefully, to respond in a measured fashion to the US's recent move with bombing the alleged drug boat, and we did not do that.

[James Stout]

Yeah, that's a pretty squandered chance to just, like, say, you know, we should respect international law here. And, you know, like, the easiest thing to say would be, like, there's a set of procedures for doing this. We could follow them.

[Andrew Sage]

Yeah.

[James Stout]

It's not hard to say that.

[Andrew Sage]

That. That. That deal we had with Venezuela, that was a deal that we were able to negotiate under Biden. That was the deal that when Trump came into power, he just took back. He was like, nah, y' all can't do that anymore. So with Trump going in this either you're with us or against us kind of direction that calls for extra, you know, care, and, you know, you're kind of dealing with a bomb that you're trying to work around. Right?

[James Stout]

Yeah.

[Andrew Sage]

But in the same year that Trump got elected, Kamala Passad Betessa, our current prime minister, got elected. You know, she's known for being reckless. She's known for being a bit of a drunkard. She's passionately pro Trump. She was a Covid conspiracist in the vein of one of her famous quotes is sunlight will kill Covid. She's passionately pro us, passionately anti Maduro, passionately racist, and very much anti Caricom. Right. Now, there's a bit of a history there because Trinidad and Guyana are two Caribbean countries with very large East Indian populations. As in Indians from India.

[James Stout]

Yeah.

[Andrew Sage]

When the West Indies Federation was getting its start, both Guyana and Trinidad's Indian populations had the concern that considering the rest of the Caribbean as black majority, that they would not be adequately represented in a West Indies federation. And so that sort of opposition to that level of regional unity seems to have persisted within some circles of East Indian or Indo Caribbean politics.

[James Stout]

Okay, interesting.

[Andrew Sage]

Not. All right. But some seem to have an opposition to too much CARICOM involvement because they feel that their voices will be drowned out by black people. And I mean, there's a lot of anti blackness in that community. But that is not the subject of this particular episode. So that sort of opposition to the West Indies Federation seems to have carried over into opposition towards Caricom. And when there was low turnout among PNM supporters, which is the party of Dr. Rowley and Dr. Williams, as well as some third party momentum taking place, Kamala ended up coming into power. Right? And when she came into power, she's making these moves, making these statements and disregarding CARICOM and disregarding caricom's opinion, disregarding CARICOM involvement in Trinidad's moves and decisions. As a small country, CARICOM is supposed to be our way of beefing up our voice on the international stage. And she's basically saying, bun, that, you know, we will do our own thing. Right?

[James Stout]

Yeah.

[Andrew Sage]

Oh, I forgot to mention another thing about Kamala. Just for a bit of context, Cambridge Analytica came into Trinidad and basically ran an experiment using our elections to test out some new strategies. They ended up taking into the US Right. They practiced their electoral manipulation in Trinidad, which is how Kamala won in the first, the first time she was elected back in 2010, 2015, it was through collaboration with Cambridge Analytica. So again, yet another connection between the US and Trinidad, for better and for worse.

[James Stout]

Yeah.

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[Danielle Fishel]

This is Danielle Fishel from Pod Meats World. Parents, let's talk snacks. If your mornings look anything like mine, one kid's trying to pile drive a pillow and the other is trying to zip themselves into a backpack. Meanwhile, I'm trying to sign a permission slip with an eyeliner pencil because that's all I could find. That's why Mott's no Sugar Added applesauce pouches are perfect to have nearby. These things are clutch and are perfect for moments of stress. Made with real apples, no sugar added and the pouch? Genius. It's mess free and perfect for the car, the lunchbox or after school activities. This is a snack you can feel good about and a good source of vitamin C too. Just tasty applesauce your kids will actually want to eat. The other day I handed one to my son mid meltdown. He took a deep breath squeeze the pouch and suddenly he was calm. He had a tiny apple powered moment of Zen. Trust me, your future self will thank you. Mott's Real apples make real good applesauce. Learn [e-mail] High Key Listen to High.

[Andrew Sage]

Key, a new weekly podcast. You better listen. That's literally the definition of being an Aries moon. Just one little spicy off comment, that's all it does. Everyone loves me at the Cancer and then the Aries comes out and they say who the is that? No you're gonna come for me being an Aries and you have a Sag moon? Get out of here. But I'm a Capricorn rising so that honestly balances it out and makes me more likable. Okay, that is your Capricorn talking. Listen to High key on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast.

[James Stout]

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[Andrew Sage]

So what's happening now is that, you know, on the 2nd of September, the US bombed a pirogue and claimed to kill 11 people and claimed that it was a drug boat, despite the fact that they haven't provided any proof that the footage was extremely grainy. And even if they did have proof that it was a drug boat, summary execution on the high seas is not exactly in line with international law.

[James Stout]

Right?

[Andrew Sage]

Right. If these are quote unquote violent drug traffickers who are killing people and doing all these ridiculous things you're supposed to Bring them in. You're supposed to interrogate them. You're supposed to go through a certain procedure, right?

[James Stout]

Yeah.

[Andrew Sage]

All the smoke and mirrors about drugs and fighting drugs and all these different things, it really is that smoke and mirrors, because if it was about that, they would be trying to get information to target the heart of the operation. What the US Is doing right now is flexing, right?

[James Stout]

Yeah.

[Andrew Sage]

It's flexing their muscles in the region to show what it is willing to do. It's trying to poke and prod Venezuela to respond in kind so that it has the excuse it needs or the further excuse to intervene. There was another strike, another boat bombing on 15 September, and there was another strike on 19 September against another boat. And it's a very, very worrying place to be and time to be alive.

[James Stout]

Right.

[Andrew Sage]

I would say, you know, we have Guyana as a player. You know, they're still working with U.S. oil companies, they're collaborating with the U.S. they have this territorial anxiety with regard to Venezuela, and they are part of caricom, Guyana's part of Caricom, trying to, you know, work it out through that channel and through other channels. Venezuela, in response to Kama's energy, has basically put out statements talking about, hey, this Kamala kind of crazy or sure about that? Because if any US Missile comes out of Trinidad, we are responding to Trinidad.

[James Stout]

Right. And Trinidad is, like, not the same as the U.S. right? Like. Like that. It's not like a mutually assured destruction.

[Andrew Sage]

Exactly. So she is, you know, speaking very recklessly. And in the meantime, the Venezuela is saying response, you know, if any sort of US Incursion is launched out of Trinidad, which she invited, by the way, she said the US could base whatever they want in here if they want. We are standing ready. We. Right. I don't know where she got this we from, but she's saying, oh, yeah, they could come and they could, you know, launch stuff from here. And I'm like. And Venezuela is like, y' all are talking kind of crazy right now. You should care about your citizens, because we know your citizens don't like what you're doing. So why are you doing this kind of thing? Yeah, and it's bigger than just Venezuela, the US And Trinidad, because Venezuela is also aligned with Russia. Right. It's, I believe, Russia's only ally in the Western Hemisphere. Yeah, Right. And while the drug issue and the crime issue is a significant concern, most of the drugs are coming from Colombia in the first place, which the US Is not currently targeting. Right. And at the end of the day, as I mentioned earlier, it seems to be coming down to regime change and resources and the control of Venezuela's resources. You know, we are now in a situation where our fishermen are having to stay home out of fear.

[James Stout]

Oh, geez.

[Andrew Sage]

That their fishing boats could be struck out of the water.

[James Stout]

Yeah, yeah.

[Andrew Sage]

You know, we are in a situation where Kama's fan base is just as Trumpian and cultish as the marker base. Seemingly seems to be perfectly fine with what's going on. Although in some ways I think that that might even be astroturfed or inflated artificially, because there was recently an expose that determined a lot of the pro unc, which is Kamala's party, the pro unc, pro Kamla buzz that occurs on social media. It's bot driven. Like you go onto these profiles and they're bots. Just fake names, fake profile pictures, AI posts.

[James Stout]

Oh, geez. Yeah, it's just entirely fabricated.

[Andrew Sage]

This is also at a time when the US Is building a massive embassy in our country, when Kamala seemingly opening the floodgates to military collaboration with the US where we are dealing with our own economic woes and crime woes and so on. And, you know, we also have the largest Chinese embassy in the region. We have a lot of collab with China. We recently made moves to recognize Palestine with a Palestinian diplomat. Now reside in the country. It feels like we are putting ourselves in a very risky position. And whether or not we could have done more or less to get out of this position, considering the US has its backyard policy with regard to the rest of the Americas, with regard to the fact that Trump has created this Department of War, that the US Seems to be flailing around as a dying empire. Does the fact that the Caribbean has been called out so frequently with violence in an effort to manufacture consent for what seems to be coming next. With the fact that there was a failed intervention to overthrow Maduro in the past, known as Operation Gideon. Right. Back in 2020, all this has me a bit stressed.

[James Stout]

I mean, there was a particularly insane attempt to overthrow Maduro in 2020. Right. The silver core thing.

[Andrew Sage]

Yeah, yeah. They had this. This American security firm and some Venezuelan dissidents just. They tried to infiltrate Venezuela by sea and basically as soon as they landed, they got arrested.

[James Stout]

Yeah, yeah. I think some of them got detained, like by Venezuelan fishermen who realized they only had BB guns. It sucks that, like having spent time in Venezuela and with Venezuelan people a lot, you know, for. For years now, it's Venezuelan people who are going to pay the price for all of this. Right. Like it's not. And potentially people in Trinidad and Tobago as well, like, they very clearly do not want Maduro to be running their country. Right. Like, it's. Yeah, saw that in the election. We saw that in the protests after election. They have every reason to, to want to leave their country and go somewhere safe, but that's not possible for many of them.

[Andrew Sage]

Yeah. I mean, like I said, there's a Venezuelans in Trinidad right now.

[James Stout]

Yeah.

[Andrew Sage]

So any moves that Venezuela is making, they're obviously going to make with consideration to the fact they have their own people in Trinidad as well.

[James Stout]

Yeah, exactly. And like they're being demonized even though they've done everything they can to separate themselves from Maduro. And like they are being.

[Andrew Sage]

Yeah, there's unfortunately a lot of xenophobia in Trinidad.

[James Stout]

Yeah, it's really sad. Like, and we see it here too, right, this allegation that they're all gang members, which is like, if we think that gang violence is bad in Venezuela and in parts of Venezuela it is bad, then surely it would make sense to people who don't want any part in that might leave and go somewhere else.

[Andrew Sage]

Yeah.

[James Stout]

And rather than supporting them, we're just killing like the lowest tier people. Right. Like, even if we entertain the idea that the boat could have been carrying drugs and we put aside the fact that that hasn't been proven, or the boats, plural, the people driving the boats and other people, like making the calls here. But yeah, they're the people being killed.

[Andrew Sage]

Exactly, exactly. It's the same principle with all these, these, these drug busts and gang busts that take place in Trinidad. You know, they go and they roll in and they, they arrest these small fries. But the big boss is calling the shots unharmed.

[James Stout]

Yeah.

[Andrew Sage]

You know, the multinational criminal empires that are moving the people, moving the drugs, moving the guns in the region, they're untouched.

[James Stout]

Yeah. And like even the Maduro's two nephews, like, they were released after they were detained for trying to run drugs via Haiti. Right. Like, like you say the people making the real decisions are largely insulated from all this. It's, it's working people in Venezuela who like, they don't have other opportunities. Right. Like, I have heard the most disheartening stories, especially from Venezuelan fishermen. Right. Like, like their economy is so bad that they are not able to put fuel in their boats. It wouldn't be economical to put fuel in their fishing boats. Even if they caught a full load of fish, they wouldn't be able. No one has any money. To buy the fish at a high price so they can't pay for the fuel. And this is a country which sits on a massive oil reserve.

[Andrew Sage]

Yeah.

[James Stout]

But yet people can't afford to put fuel in their fishing boats. Like, you know, these people are victims of a system that has left them with very few opportunities. And the way we're responding is by killing them and by destabilizing a whole part of the world that no one, no one asked for this there, you know, apart from apparently your prime minister.

[Andrew Sage]

Yeah. So, I mean, this was a very rambly episode, more rambly than my usual. But I just wanted to get the word out on what's going on in my corner of the globe to let the Americans in the audience know to, you know, please do what you can to stand to speak out against this American intervention, to educate yourself on what's going on for the Trinis who may be in the audience. You know, probably hunker down and have a crisis bag or emergency bag set up. If worse comes to worse and everyone else really just get the knowledge and do what you can in your area to disrupt this machine. Yeah, yeah, that's it for me. All power to all the people. Peace. It could happen. Here is a production of Cool Zone Media. For more podcasts from Cool Zone Media.

[Danielle Fishel]

Visit our website Cools or check us out on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts.

[Andrew Sage]

Or wherever you listen to podcasts.

[Danielle Fishel]

You can now find sources for it could Happen here listed directly in Episode Descriptions.

[Andrew Sage]

Thanks for listening.

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[Danielle Fishel]

This is Danielle Fishel from Pod Meets World. Parents, quick question. When is the last time you won snack time? The Other day I handed my son a perfectly portioned Pinterest level snack and he traded it for a Mott's Applesauce pouch. I'm not mad, just impressed. And that's why Mott's no Sugar added Applesauce pouches are perfect to keep on hand. They're made with real apples packed in a super easy pouch. Perfect for tossing in a lunchbox, keeping in the car, or grabbing as you're running out the door. Plus, they're a good source of vitamin C and kids love them. Win Win. Make sure your kid wins snack time with Mottz. Real apples make real good applesauce. Learn [e-mail] Ah come on. Why is this taking so long? This thing is ancient.

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[Andrew Sage]

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[James Stout]

Use as directed.

[Andrew Sage]

This is an I Heart podcast.