rock45

I agree he needs out refinery's big time and we could pick up the oil we buy from him elsewhere.

I'm thinking about the future a little along the lines of bases for our forces if need be and maybe fast movers. I'm wondering can the US let say Colombia fall so far behind Venezuela and now with the Chinese getting a foot hold in 2009 in Ecuador isn't our turn for a move. One can only assume China will begin to show there products if allowed a foot hold? Besides house hold goods and TVs small arms and aircraft will follow. In two maybe three years China will have at least one or maybe two jets for export and the same for advance jet trainers. It takes four to five years to produce pilots and maintenance personnel that maybe say Colombia might get approval for F-16 at least. This way it give us a forward base that uses our base aircraft for parts and weapons at least and keeps a little foot hold in the region? We could do the same in Chile I guess but there too far away to be useful Colombia or northern Peru would serve our purposes better. I think northern Peru would be more helpful really as far as anti-drug forces go. It would cut the flow of drugs coming north from Bolivia, mess up the trade cutting across Brazil, and make it harder to reach the cartels in Colombia. Ecuador's would basically be closed since the new China/Ecuadorian thing will be happening? I just think we get let it grow too much without making some of our own moves. I don't want us to keep reacting to others lets pick somebody and go forward already. Reacting seems weak to me this is our door step.