And yet, that point does not and cannot exist in a vacuum…hence my point.

But your point is wrong.

No, not that there are serious geopolitical implications to Russia and China having influence in South America. Nor that it's supremely important for the U.S. to try to limit their influence.

It's your suggestion that the people on this board don't realize that.

Of course we do. These critiques of the Administration's plans are not critiques of their objectives. We're just noting that the things they're doing are not likely to achieve those objectives. So when you write:

We should just let China, Iran and Russia have a base there. They can run drugs, have terrorism base, Chinese listening posts and work to destabilize other countries in South America.

Sometime there are bigger things at stake. Maybe one day this board figures it out.

...it's just totally off base. We know there are important things at stake in Venezuela. What we're saying is that what the Administration actually did isn't likely to have any material impact on those things. Venezuela has been allies with China and Russia, and not the U.S., because it is a socialist dictatorship that represses human rights and expropriated tens of billions of dollars in assets from American companies and which regime draws enormous domestic political value from being antagonistic to the U.S. After the removal of Maduro, Venezuela is now a socialist dictatorship that represses human rights and expropriated tens of billions of dollars in assets from American companies and which regime draws enormous domestic political value from being antagonistic to the U.S. While Maduro is gone, none of the things that kept Venezuela in the Sino-Russia sphere of influence have changed.

It would be interesting to hear why you think this operation will actually lead to a material change in Venezuela - to hear you address the point we're actually making - rather than keep asserting that we're missing the point on how important China is. We know how important China is. We just don't think that this action materially affects Venezuela's posture via China.