If observers were still in doubt about the motivations behind the US intervention in Venezuela, President Donald Trump dispelled much of that uncertainty himself during his press conference on Saturday. Whereas the seizure of Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro had previously been justified primarily on the basis of drug-trafficking-related charges, President Trump devoted a substantial part of his remarks to Venezuela’s oil wealth, the profits to be made from it, and the prospect that the United States would “run” the country for an unspecified period of time. In other words, while oil was probably not the sole reason for this intervention, it was undoubtedly a crucial one.

Two weeks ago, the European Commission proposed a Critical Raw Materials Act (CRMA) with the aim of securing the EU's access to a secure, diversified, affordable, and sustainable supply of critical raw materials. The proposal is a response to concerns about the EU's dependence on raw material imports and the supply risk associated with them. A recent report identified thirty-four raw materials as "critical" due to their importance for the EU's economy. "Lithium and rare earths are already replacing gas and oil at the heart of our economy," declared Commission President Ursula von der Leyen in her 2022 State of the Union Address, warning that "we have to avoid falling into the same dependency as with oil and gas."