From Oil Partners to Bitter Rivals

America and Venezuela used to be business partners. For decades, Venezuela pumped

oil and the United States bought it: U.S. companies invested in Venezuelan fields,

and Caracas relied on that revenue for government spending and exports. Politics mattered

less because the money worked for both sides and trade ties were strong. Then Hugo Chávez

came to power in 1999 and everything flipped. Shortly after his election,

he began reshaping Venezuela’s politics and economy around what he called the Bolivarian Revolution:

a project focused on redistributing wealth and asserting national control over Venezuela’s

vast oil resources. Chávez famously declared that the country’s oil belonged to the Venezuelan