Trade

Washington has spent decades treating defense and trade as separate files. That division is finished. Export controls, tariffs, and supply-chain security are now instruments of deterrence against Beijing, and their overlap shapes both the dollar and Pacific alliances.

Venezuela now supplies roughly 200,000 barrels of oil per day to the United States, up from near zero two years ago. Not diplomacy. Markets. The Trump administration recognized what three decades of sanctions never accomplished.

The world is rediscovering that geography matters, and the nations that control strategic chokepoints are rewriting the rules of trade, energy, and military power. America is late to this game.