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00:00it is wednesday september 24th 2025 welcome to the myers report and today whether it's good
00:23evening or good morning depends upon where you are in the world uh the topic tonight is going to be
00:30venezuela we're going to discuss what is going on with venezuela uh its economy and also its recent
00:41activity and sparring with the u.s we have with us uh carlos legaspi who is the owner of precise
00:49investments which is an investment firm with six offices in the u.s one in mexico city and nine
00:57and offices in nine countries in south america also with us is carlos excuse me is ramiro perez
01:05who has been working with carlos for many years uh ramiro is a native venezuelan and represents
01:13precise investments in that country uh okay before we get into the really crazy stuff and we also
01:21excuse me have our military advisor rob brownsword who is a retired captain who specialized in psyops
01:29and asymmetric warfare which certainly seems to be applicable these days and who's now a military
01:35contractor operating in different parts of the world so i'll put the question first to ramiro
01:41well first off welcome nice to see you nice to meet you how is the venezuelan economy doing right now
01:49well thank you for the invitation first uh well basically the venezuelan economy is in very bad
01:58shape it's not as as bad as it was in the first trump administration right because after the first
02:09trump administration well biden took a more like a negotiating approach with maduro to try to have
02:20an election which happened last year of course maduro committed fraud i mean
02:27uh everybody was suspecting that the opposition uh won the election by election fraud yeah election fraud
02:36yeah the opposition won the election by i don't know 30 25 you know easily and well and of course
02:47maduro did not hand the power to the opposition candidate right the opposition candidate was a guy named
02:56edmundo gonzalez edmundo gonzalez is living in madrid right now he left venezuela i think in the beginning
03:02of this year but he was basically named by maria corina machado which is the real leader of the venezuelan
03:11opposition she's still in venezuela in hiding
03:13and i mean uh waiting to see how the situation develops in the meantime the economy is getting
03:23really bad because uh trump administration is taking a stronger and more aggressive
03:33uh approach against maduro they uh well basically cancel all the oil agreements the international
03:44companies had they only kept chevron's agreement but they changed the conditions
03:51uh chevron had uh with biden to a more restricted
03:57uh
03:57oil i mean oil agreement with the venezuelan government right venezuela
04:05um i mean venezuela
04:08economy and venezuela hard currency supply depends 90 percent or 95 percent from oil
04:15so the chevron uh previous agreement with maduro's government was working really well for the
04:24government because chevron was handling all the uh currency supply uh they were using uh americans
04:34financial institutions to make the payment when you say chevron do you mean chevron or you mean
04:38citco chevron chevron chevron is still operating in venezuela it's still operating in venezuela
04:45but they have a special they have a special effect license yes they are allowed to to to extract
04:53oil in venezuela it's the only one left by the way but after trump administration took power he
05:00canceled the original terms of the license and now chevron well they can keep working in venezuela
05:08but they pay maduro's government in kind what does that mean
05:13uh
05:14chevron gets i don't know one million barrels from venezuela
05:2050 percent goes to maduro 50 percent go to chevron and chevron
05:24send all those sells all those
05:27barrels in the united states
05:29so it's getting difficult for the government because they don't have any
05:34financial institution to sell those dollars and to inject that into the economy
05:41right so we are having the inflation is going up
05:45again because the black market uh the currency black market
05:50price is widening from the official market we have a currency control in venezuela
05:56and as long as that spread gets wider the economy and inflation gets worse right
06:05we have uh 250 300 percent inflation right now which is better
06:13200 one second 250 to 300 percent annual inflation
06:19annual inflation yeah and and we are better than six seven years before six six years ago we had
06:27hyperinflation a thousand percent or more so we're not as bad as it was it's not as what
06:35it's not as bad as it was in 2017 2019 but we are heading into that direction if this
06:43current condition continues and i think it will because trump now is not only taking
06:50extreme measures i mean uh economically but also well everything you have read on the news
06:58about the caribbean you know operations they he's trying to enter interdiction of drug boats
07:06drug boats yeah yeah yeah but besides a drug uh related business it's also it's also making more
07:16difficult to oil tankers to go to china because venezuela sells his production the production that
07:23doesn't go to the united states it's been it's been sold in china or asian markets so all this
07:32situation it's getting it's causing maduro to you know try to find more creative solutions to get
07:42hard currency and to try to keep the economy afloat which in my opinion will be very very difficult
07:49when maduro is selling oil to china i take it since he's desperate for card currency he's not getting
07:58a good price from china is he no no of course do you know what he's getting by any chance yes uh well
08:05oil right now is uh around 62 dollars a barrel west texas yes west texas yes venezuela's uh blend oil
08:15is price is a little bit lower than west texas because the quality is not as good as the uh west texas
08:22how much lower is it i like five dollars between four five dollars but china takes advantage of that
08:30because china knows is the only buyer reliable buyer maduro has so maybe with corruption involved
08:37and using traders you know shady traders to get them the oil to china maybe venezuela gets
08:4650 and 20 dollars lower than market price so if the basic market price for the venezuelan quality oil
08:57uh would be about 58 or 55 venezuela may be getting 40 40 45 yeah which means it hurts them it hurts a lot
09:09a lot a lot yeah and they have and they and their their costs of production are not going down they're
09:15going up because of inflation yes yes but the cost of production in venezuela is low i mean i know
09:24there is inflation and and and not only inflation it's very difficult to get you know companies like
09:32schlumberger or halliburton to operate in venezuela right they still are allowed to work with chevron
09:38in venezuela but you need those companies to to get oil in from the other oils wells venezuela has and
09:49they cannot use those companies to work on those wells so they have to also rely on china chinese
09:57companies to do that work and it's not the same because venezuela i mean venezuela everybody knows
10:07venezuela is a very you know well of course it's a leftist country and it's very aggressive against
10:15the united states for the last 25 years but i don't know if you guys have been in venezuela venezuela i
10:20think is after mexico it's like a contradiction it's like the most american country in latin america
10:27because of all of the oil business yeah yeah yeah so bottom line of it in terms of uh between the tariffs
10:36and sanctions uh trump has a lot of power in mexico in venezuela yeah to inflict damage yes yes yes
10:46okay now one of the things that we've been hearing about is that maduro is trying to uh divert attention
10:54from the domestic woes by trying to take on uh trying to annex parts of its neighbor guiana uh where
11:02they're trying to annex what 74 percent of uh guiana they're just trying to take it yes
11:11how how successful is do you think he's going to be i think nothing's going to happen
11:18unless the situation with the united states gets really extreme united states army invade venezuela
11:26which i don't expect the don't expect it to happen so that will be like a desperate measure
11:33take by maduro to you know cause a bigger and regional conflict but i don't expect him to
11:42besides the rhetoric aggressive rhetoric i don't expect maduro to invade guiana basically that's been
11:50a topic uh which has been very quiet in i mean since everybody knows in venezuela that guiana is
11:59venezuelan but uh since the guiana one second guiana is venezuelan yes well let me give you a brief
12:09explanation what happened in guiana in guiana uh guiana well we have a guiana was a british colony
12:17in the 19th century we have a well uh when guiana got its independence we have an international
12:28arbitration and venezuela accused the united kingdom to you know by the judges who decided what happened
12:37guiana and guiana and guiana and uh venezuela appealed the decision and then the united nations in the
12:461940s 50 they issue uh uh like a resolution saying that only guiana and venezuela you know uh following
13:00or by a dialogue they can i mean make up their difference and try to reach an agreement regarding
13:10the territory in dispute and nothing happened right guiana is basically a jungle there's nothing there
13:16it's very beautiful but there is no population in the part you see with the red lines right
13:23what happened in but don't they don't they have oil there as well yes but they all they all was
13:31discovered 10 15 years ago it's all offshore it's all in the ocean yeah it's in the ocean yeah and it
13:39was discovered there is a which i think is the real reason of the conflict the oil was discovered
13:46by exxon mobil another u.s company and that company had a really really big uh well and it had the
13:56biggest well oil well in venezuela and chavez nationalized their operations in venezuela they
14:05asked for a you know reparation payment from the venezuelan government chavez of course never paid
14:13and there is a conflict a really big conflict between exxon mobil and venezuela and exxon mobil is the
14:23company exploring oil wells in that area that area where exxon mobil found oil part of the oil was
14:32in proper guiana territory but the other one which is a very very big well is in all those offshore waters
14:42which are in dispute between venezuela and guiana and maduro of course took advantage of all that
14:49problem to you know make a political noise and saying the united state is helping guiana
14:55they are attacking the country and you know
14:59try to take the situation for his benefits basically okay of late uh president trump has been
15:10interdicting uh some drug boats coming out of venezuela uh and he's deployed a significant
15:19u.s naval presence there uh how is that impacting how well venezuelan politics and the country well
15:29uh i i think that will be in the long run bad for the venezuelan opposition because i don't expect the
15:43united states to invade venezuela the venezuelan opposition the only tool or the only hope they have
15:51to be honest to get rid of maduro and the chavista government is that the united state invade venezuela and
16:00you know basically handed out the power to the opposition so this is giving part of venezuelan
16:08population some hope maybe which i what i hear you saying is the venezuelan population would welcome
16:19an invasion by the united states part of not all of not all of it part of the really extreme opposition
16:27and it's causing i mean it's it's in my opinion that is giving false false hope to to that part of
16:35the opposition and maduro will end up taking advantage of that well the united state reduced its
16:44operation on the caribbean which i i i i think is going to happen i mean maybe in six years in six
16:52months next year when we approach the midterms in november next year i i don't think how the united
17:00state can you know maintain or keep that big military operation on the car uh first off would the u.s
17:09have any difficulty maintaining its current naval presence there uh i'm an army guy not a navy guy
17:16but the that fleet has to sail anyway um i think it's i think and they have to train
17:25with and they train anyway yeah and they and they have to expend fuel because that's how our our budget
17:31system works um there is an expense to it yes absolutely and what i don't know is how much in
17:38addition to our normal fleet is this uh but we do have three i'm aware of three missile frigates and
17:47one missile cruiser uh down there we've got a an amphib and i think don't we have an amphibious
17:53aircraft carrier we've got an amphib down there right now that's uh i think it's the iwo jima
17:59uh so that's going to have a portion if not an entire marine expeditionary unit on board i'd need a
18:08marine to speak specifically to that um also uh there's another interesting potential um indicator
18:18uh there's a special operations low profile civilian converted um vessel called the mv ocean trader
18:32that is fitted out to be a um it's a it's a custom built uh special operations undercover support vessel
18:43uh and it was recently uh spotted off of bahrain uh in the persian gulf and last couple days has been
18:55off of saint kitts at anchor so that could be an indicator of an impending action what about the
19:04french deploying uh naval elements there i don't know if they're there for their own self-interest or if
19:10this is a coordinated effort with uh with the united states navy um that seems to be an interesting
19:18question because macron on one hand uh deployed these ships and it seems like they are there to
19:26interdict drug runners but on the other hand at the same day he did that uh he came out against the
19:34united states israel policy yeah so as a military guy would you want to invade venezuela what would
19:42be the problems oh geez so it would i would not want to be part of that planning operation um what
19:52what i see what we're doing right now uh besides attacking a very real threat you know the the drug
20:00the drugs going into the united states is also a weapon system for our adversaries and it's a unique
20:08weapon system in that it's makes money um it is linked with their military they they deny it even
20:16columbia denies that the cartel of the sons doesn't exist there are people that seem to be uh suggesting
20:22that the cartel of the sons is a fiction written by the trump administration but i learned of it through
20:29military intelligence um uh publications years ago not from the maga movement so uh this operation moves
20:41um cocaine across borders from colombia into venezuela using um venezuelan rebel forces working
20:53in conjunction with with venezuelan military so our colombian rebel forces with venezuelan uh military
21:02forces so that is that is a real thing and and so uh engaging the uh the drug traffickers
21:14is a necessity now whether you blow them up or you interdict them and and uh and arrest them that's
21:21that's two different things uh isn't it easier and less expensive and better for military training
21:27for us to blow them up and not have to deal with them personally i like it but uh other people that
21:33you know your your law and order types may maybe not so much um so we'll we'll see how that that falls
21:40out carl carlos yeah you're an expert on latin america and you are an american
21:48so and you've got your feet in in both of these cultures and your fingers everywhere how do you see
21:57the u.s interdiction of the drug vessels playing out good bad or indifferent i think what it is is um
22:06uh it's it's i think it's overkill for interdiction and underwhelming for an invasion
22:14because it's it's it's not big enough force to invade venezuela but it's kind of like a little
22:19bit too much you know you could do it with much less you know though blowing up those those ships i
22:24think the strategy here is to see if they could create some um uh space between maduro and the venezuelan
22:34military because they upped the bounties right now you have the bounty on maduro got moved up 50 million
22:43and that's twice what they had for osama bin laden so right now if you add up the bounties of the
22:49top officials of the maduro administration it's 100 million dollars so i think what they're doing is
22:56saying hey if you're an ambitious military officer and all that you could you know we'll back you up
23:03up and you could make yourself a nice hundred million and so try to shake uh who buy a little
23:12bit of force a little bit of money but i don't think it's going to work i think the military and
23:18maduro really really really tight no and to add something that uh sorry carlos the venezuelan military
23:25is of control by maduro's cuban advisors yeah and they do a really really good job
23:34to spy on them and to try to stop whatever possibility of uh you know of a military coup
23:45they have been very very successful since i don't know since since chavez years i i i i agree with
23:53you i don't think that strategy would work but that's the only strategy that i think is being trying
23:58to be implemented by the timing of the bounties and and that military force in the caribbean yes yeah of
24:05course they are trying to break maduro's coalition and you know and of course is that that that's the
24:11the the main uh objective of all these operations rob you want to say something yeah i think the uh the
24:20fact that the that the bounty was raised from what was it 15 to 50 million yeah i suppose that the
24:27department of defense recognizes that it's going to take a lot to cause people to break from
24:35from maduro and i don't think 50 million will do it either no i don't think so and i don't think
24:40it means that the united states thinks that maduro is that much more of a bad man than osama bin laden
24:45i think what it indicates is how strong maduro's presence is i agree yeah and i do think that that
24:54is is going to fail um and and carlos you're right that the force that we see off the coast
25:01is not an invasion force um the amphib could potentially take an airfield or a port
25:11and it would need more help to do so um i think that amphib is there as a contingency
25:19not an invasion force um in order to invade i mean just the terrain alone in venezuela makes
25:26it an extremely difficult country to invade from any direction um especially from the sea with all
25:33the mountain ranges um with all the wetlands and you know the bottom line of it is rob we don't want to
25:41do it yeah i and yeah it's not so i think i think what we're doing now is a mix of trying to force
25:52compliance with deterrence you know don't go into guyana stop trafficking drugs stop working stop
26:01actively working against us with the myriad of ways that you work against the united states you bring up
26:06an interesting point while that force is not significant enough to invade is it significant
26:13enough to stop a venezuelan invasion into guyana i would suppose it could definitely foil uh an invasion
26:23or it could just move into guyana and set up defense and i think uh a marine expeditionary unit in
26:30the defense with all of the aviation assets and missile assets that come with it and artillery would
26:36definitely shut down anybody's uh hopes and dreams of invading a country so so that might be one of the
26:45reasons the fleet is there it could be a contingency yeah uh to invade venezuela you'd probably be forced
26:5410 times or more uh to be great we don't want to do that can we so the question is do we have enough
27:01economic leverage to if not get rid of maduro to at least negate his ability to hurt us
27:12yes yes of course of course of course you you have and and i think well like like carlos said in about
27:20mexico you have to see what they're doing and not only what they're saying right you have uh in venezuela
27:30they welcome a daily flight from the united states with uh deportations basically that's something that
27:38people are no noticing but that is so we're deporting people from the united states to venezuela
27:46yes yes maduro is accepting the flights with no problem at all also uh even though they didn't
27:56kept the friendly conditions uh that they had with biden really uh regarding chevron's deal they
28:05still are allowing chevron's to to work with the venezuelan government so they they they did not
28:13shut uh shut the chevron's down so you see they are trying to you know they they they still want
28:20maduro's government to try to you know have some kind of relationship with the trump administration
28:28but uh at the same time you have a secretary of the state with who is marco rubio which is of course very
28:35anti-cuba anti-venezuela and he has to take a more aggressive approach against venezuela because
28:45he comes from miami and miami's electorate is mostly cubans and now there are a lot of venezuelans
28:52and they like that also i think i think we learned some lessons with gaddafi and even saddam hussein but
29:00particularly with gaddafi he was not a good guy but we basically neutered him and i think that
29:10when we took him out afterward it was a big mistake because then it created chaos can uh a situation be
29:19set up or are is trump basically trying to negotiate a condition using good cop bad cop and some
29:26big ass guy you know some really tough people and military on the border a situation where maduro can
29:35basically be quiet and be allowed to survive and still cut back on the drugs uh and could the could he
29:46hold the cartels back in in check if he was getting enough money from uh oil i think so i think what it is
29:56it's uh that's the answer guys yeah that's what this is about yeah yeah this is about is a positioning
30:05to negate maduro's bad behavior and let him live live his life in peace as opposed to getting killed
30:12like osama bin laden yes and and to add to your point gary uh the day after if the the united states
30:22get rid of maduro i don't see it very friendly because as you as robert mentioned before and
30:29and it's true 100 there are colombian rebels in venezuela maduro for bad for good or bad uh reasons
30:41they they have a friendly relationship with maduro so if the united states government get rid of maduro i
30:48don't see the opposition having the strength and the force and the you know the power to control
30:57all those uh organizations criminal organizations within venezuela
31:03and it could be a i mean it could turn into a mess like i i don't think as bad as iraq or libya or
31:11something like that because venezuelans are not extremists religious extremists but
31:20the united states will have to you know spend more resources and money and human resources not only
31:28money to stabilize venezuela and that is something especially trump coalition they don't want that
31:34so what i hear you saying is we may have learned from our past mistakes that we basically put him
31:42in a box let him live his life in a box and limit his negative impact on us while controlling the other
31:49bad guys that would be worse if he were to fall yes rob does that make sense to you as a strategy
31:56yeah it makes sense to me but that doesn't mean i think that's what's going to happen
32:00um first of all is that what do you think is going to happen we we knew we knew that we needed to
32:06we needed to leave saddam hussein in place and bush took him out anyway which that was a mistake it
32:12created havoc yeah basically most of our problems in a significant part of the world we can trace back to
32:20that decision um also we have to look at operation just cause in panama as a model for what could
32:28potentially happen you mean taking out noriega in 1989 that was a much easier operation because we
32:35still had u.s forces we still had combat forces in panama we merely augmented them with the 82nd
32:42airborne or 18th airborne corps and yeah but also panama is much smaller venezuela is the size of texas
32:50yes and you can add 12 other points onto that so it is a far more complex uh situation but it but i bring
32:58it up because we've set the precedent the willingness to do it before okay um now the the venez venezuelans
33:07have everything from the very sophisticated sa 300 missile system from russia uh that they know how to
33:14use that is a significant threat to all u.s aircraft now could we defeat that would we defeat that yes
33:23yes i i believe we would they also are the uh they also have licensed manufacturing of the shahed
33:31the iranian shahed attack drones which have been uh attacking ukraine for several years now and those
33:39are manufactured in venezuela venezuela uh has enjoyed uh years and years of cuban military uh training
33:52and advising from all their combat experience in africa um they've had wagner group uh in theater
34:01they've had assistance you said the wagner group is in venezuela uh i don't know if they're under that
34:07name there now but wagner group has been invented in venezuela for a long long time defending uh russian
34:14interests in venezuela uh so there it is a very complex thing and even if you take all those all those
34:21weapons systems and all that military advisement aside they've got nearly 5 000 if you want to call
34:28them reservists and the collectivos in almost every single village in town and granted they're not
34:37they're not uh tier one special operators and maybe a lot of them are are wearing makeup with long
34:47fingernails they're out there for a party wearing the berets and everything it's more of a social event
34:51but they do have weapons and they and they are likely to respond they need to be dealt with they
34:56need to be accounted for in military planning so it is a very complex um situation and um and they are
35:04very good at identifying internal threats like when was it was it two years ago three years ago where our
35:11former green berets went down there and uh create uh attempted a coup d'etat yes yeah yeah and and it i
35:21think whether that was officially sanctioned by or unofficially sanctioned or supported in some way by
35:29an american three-letter agency or not some type of bay of pigs thing i i don't know but i think it it
35:37showed america's misreading the tea leaves and what was possible this was during the biden administration
35:44right i i think so i think so i can't remember i think it was only been back in office for nine not
35:52not even nine yeah yeah but yeah i think it was after the pandemic so it must have been biden administration
35:58yeah i think yes there are uh the opposition would welcome a u.s and an intervention to a degree they
36:09definitely wouldn't want us to blow up their power plants and blow up their water and sewage treatment
36:15plants and sit around with tanks for endless days i mean that that wouldn't be a good idea but there are
36:21people that would like to see something like that but yeah how once you kick a significant portion of
36:29the country out of power and you take the means of support away from them then then you have to deal
36:34with that insurgency and it is uh it would be a significant undertaking to invade okay carlos yes
36:44uh and carlos and romero do you guys see the influence of china increasing or decreasing in venezuela
36:54i see it increasing i agree increasing uh maduro has no i mean nobody else to ask for help
37:05because russia is in is at war with ukraine russia is in trouble right now russia's economy is not good
37:12so putin doesn't have the resources to help maduro right now and china uh well for for example last week or
37:24the week before i don't remember exactly china sent an offshore platform to venezuela which costs one billion
37:35dollar to extract some oil from some oil wells the international companies left and maduro is relying on china
37:46more and more to get resources to get some you know food in imported from china to venezuela
37:54and to get some kind of hard currency from china and yeah what i hear you saying is
38:02going back to the theory that we propagate we proposed a few minutes ago that if trump
38:09were to give maduro a way out where he could live his life out in peace that would also be
38:17a blow to china because he would part of that deal would be leave china alone do i have that right
38:25yes yes maybe but but you have to take also into consideration that
38:30venezuela's economy is very small right now we we used to be third or fourth economy latin america and
38:39now venezuela's economy is the size of maybe guatemala so there is not a big issue i mean regarding
38:50venezuela's uh economy if if you try to get a you know a a bigger deal with china so
39:03using for instance using tariff from venezuela it doesn't make any sense because venezuela has
39:09no trade whatsoever with no trade whatsoever with you know more countries comparison by the way the
39:15u.s has a gdp of 29.18 trillion dollars mexico 1.85 brazil 2.18 and venezuela
39:280.48 like 400 yeah yeah yeah so so yeah besides the drug business uh is there is no you know menace to
39:42the united states from venezuela that so basically we can accomplish what we need for our own national
39:50security through economic actions and a little bit of a military show of force without doing anything
39:56more yeah yeah okay in general very simply uh rob are you optimistic or pessimistic as to how things
40:07are going to go with the u.s and venezuela uh in a word or two i don't i i'm neutral on how things will
40:19go between the united states and and venezuela okay romero
40:26i'm pessimistic uh uh for i mean for venezuela i think the economic situation will deteriorate
40:35because the united states will keep applying pressure on maduros and for the united states
40:42the i mean we will the status quo will stay i mean you're gonna get the oil from venezuela
40:52produced by chevron and maybe maduro and trump you know get some kind of agreement to reduce or to
41:02get some you know some force uh against the cartels or the drug business and that's it i don't see you
41:12know any any more than that carlos what what's your view i think maduro is not going anywhere and uh i
41:22still think a little bit of hope which i've said since last year is that um trump could do a deal
41:30with maduro yeah he's that malleable i i think you're right yeah and i i would agree and i will i
41:38think he trump will do it because trump could win in multiple ways he could negate the negative stuff
41:45coming out of maduro by giving him a safe place to live he could nail he could get rid of he can
41:50reduce china's influence i see win-win all across the board well so he keep you know he could say hey
41:59keep taking back the migrants uh sell oil uh just you know don't send that many drugs and that's not
42:07a frame of agreement you know he's yeah he has no problem dealing with dictators so why not so that's
42:15funny i don't think it's my baseline scenario but it's a greater than zero probability okay
42:23i want to thank everybody be well stay safe and god bless america
42:37you
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