In 1977, I backpacked through Venezuela and recall our bus driver filling his 800-litre fuel tank for just US$20. At that time, around two-thirds of Venezuela's cheap oil exports went to the US. Five decades later, Venezuela's vast oil reserves - still among the world's largest - continue to shape US policy, although US public discourse focuses almost entirely on Venezuelan drug trafficking.

Donald Trump has repeatedly claimed Venezuela is a major source of illicit drugs flooding into the US, accusing Nicols Maduro's government of complicity in narcotics trafficking. These assertions have been used to legitimise US military actions, including airstrikes on suspected drug vessels in Venezuelan and international waters, and a build-up of US naval vessels in the Caribbean near Venezuela.

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