Chapter 128: That Time I Fought a Diplomatic War in South America (3)

TL: Skye

In fact, the first country China approached in its attempt to isolate San Marcos was Venezuela.

China had extended more than $60 billion in loans to Venezuela, and the two countries were close enough that Venezuela was repaying that debt in crude oil.

Besides, it is a truth as old as time that when a creditor asks a debtor for a favor, the debtor has a hard time refusing.

There was just one problem.

Maduro, the man who had spearheaded Venezuela's pro-China, pro-Russia policy, had been hauled away.

Telsy Rodriguez of the Maduro Faction, who took power after him, had succeeded in gaining control over a significant portion of the government, but the chaos had yet to fully settle.

With domestic politics so unstable, she was in no position to grant China's request.

More importantly, San Marcos was a major source of cash, not only absorbing 180,000 unemployed Venezuelans but also paying $20 per worker every month, for a total of $3.6 million.

So Telsy rejected China's request and took the full force of Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Lin's immense fury(極大怒).

Of course, Telsy herself was a formidable woman who had risen to become the president(for real) responsible for an entire country, so she did not simply sit there and take it. She fired right back, but that did not make the whole thing any less infuriating.

Then, in the middle of all that.

“Madam President, Yu-jin Choi of San Marcos would like to speak with Your Excellency.”

Yu-jin of San Marcos requested a conversation with Telsy.

A request that clearly had some ulterior motive behind it.

‘What does he want?’

But she could not ignore it.

As I said earlier, San Marcos was not only a dependable source of cash that paid $3.6 million in fees every month, but once the money individual workers remitted home was included, its impact on the Venezuelan economy was far from insignificant.

In a shattered economy, cash that came in reliably every month was an irreplaceable lifeline.

“Please arrange a time.”

In the end, Telsy had no choice but to approve the meeting request.

I sat down in front of my laptop and faced Telsy Rodriguez on the screen.

A woman in her late forties. She had served as vice president under the Maduro administration and taken power after Maduro was removed.

‘She looks rough.’

Given the office she held, life must have been brutal.

The moment I saw Telsy's face, I knew.

‘She's in pretty much the same boat as me.’

Someone saddled with a broken country.

The difference was that I had already managed to get this country more or less back on track, while she was still stuck in the mire.

“Madam President, thank you for taking the time despite your busy schedule.”

“Not at all. I'm well aware of President Yu-jin Choi's reputation. And I'm grateful that you've been employing our workers.”

The usual diplomatic pleasantries followed.

The weather, how each of us had been doing, the fact that the Venezuelan workers were adjusting well. Formalities, yes, but necessary ones.

Once the brief icebreaking was over, I quickly got to the point.

“Madam President.”

“Yes.”

“Venezuela, as it stands now, has no way out.”

“......”

Telsy's expression stiffened on the screen.

In diplomacy, speaking this bluntly about another country's situation came close to outright rudeness.

But this was not a problem that could be solved by dancing around the subject, so I said it outright.

“Why not declare a default?”

“What?”

“Sixty billion dollars owed to China, seventeen billion to Russia, and tens of billions more to various international creditors. Altogether, it's about a hundred and fifty billion dollars, correct?”

I was talking about Venezuela's external debt.

As someone who had been through a moratorium myself, I offered my advice. Telsy hesitated, then pressed her lips shut.

“Meanwhile, what is your GDP? It's fallen to a quarter of what it was at its peak, and inflation is running above one thousand percent a year. More than half the population is below the poverty line, and tens of thousands are fleeing the country every month.”

Telsy's lips tightened. None of this was news to her. She knew it better than anyone.

“Repaying these debts normally is impossible. Your only path forward is to get American support, secure as much debt relief as possible on what you owe China and Russia, then cover whatever remains by selling resources.”

Telsy shook her head.

“The United States did not remove the former president for Venezuela's sake. They did it because they wanted our oil. If we take America's hand, they'll simply strip us of our resources in the end. We'd be better off strengthening cooperation with China and Russia and working the debt down piece by piece.”

It was the answer I had expected.

Anti-American sentiment ran deep in Venezuela. And after Maduro's removal, it had only grown stronger.

But I gave a faint smirk and asked.

“And has selling your crude to China all this time actually made Venezuela any better off?”

“......”

“China is taking Venezuelan crude at prices far below the international market rate, isn't it? At the worst points, you've been handing over oil worth $130 a barrel for less than $60. If you'd been paid fair market value, you could have cleared a substantial portion of the debt by now.”

That was an open secret.

During the Maduro administration, harsh US economic sanctions had prevented Venezuela from selling its crude at proper prices on the normal international market.

So it had been forced to sell crude at massive discounts to China, primarily to independent private Chinese refiners known as Teapots.

‘No wonder they could barely cover the interest.’

The exact spread varied from time to time, but Venezuelan crude was generally sold for ten to twenty dollars less per barrel than the international market price.

When cash dried up and things became desperate, deals were sometimes made at prices nearly forty percent below the international rate.

At the time, roughly eighty percent of Venezuela's total crude exports flowed to China. Worse, this was not oil being sold for immediate cash. Much of it essentially served as repayment on oil-backed loans tied to the enormous $60 billion debt Venezuela owed China, which only made Venezuela's situation even worse.

‘Plenty of people probably stuffed their pockets, too.’

No cash might have entered the government's official accounts, but corrupt senior officials had almost certainly pocketed enormous kickbacks while arranging those bargain-basement oil deals with Chinese brokers.

‘And the money they siphoned off is probably sitting in tax havens somewhere, laundered through layer after layer.’

Perhaps she knew that too, because Telsy bit her lip.

I asked her again.

“And the reason you still can't decide to default is because of your domestic situation, correct? I know things aren't easy with food shortages and government finances scraped down to nothing. If you declare a default, Venezuela will immediately be shut out of international financial markets. If imports stop, the food situation will get even worse, and you're worried public backlash could bring down the government.”

Telsy did not answer. The silence itself was confirmation.

“We can take some of that pressure off.”

Telsy's eyes changed.

“First, food. We'll raise San Marcos's food production to more than two hundred percent of its current level and supply it to Venezuela at low prices.”

“......”

“If we expand cultivation at Tortilla Farm and raise output in the Southern Agricultural Zone, it's entirely possible. Use that food to ease public discontent.”

Telsy stared intently at the screen.

Food was the Achilles' heel of the Venezuelan government. If the people starved, the government fell. Offering to solve that problem was practically the same as offering to guarantee the regime's survival.

But the real offer came next.

“And one more thing.”

“...What is it?”

“San Marcos will absorb up to one million Venezuelan refugees.”

Telsy's mouth fell open.

“...One million?”

“Yes. One million.”

An aide hurriedly whispered something into Telsy's ear. She looked offscreen for a moment, then turned back to me, unable to hide her surprise.

One of Venezuela's biggest headaches was the refugee crisis.

Millions had fled abroad as the economy collapsed, and their influx into neighboring countries was causing diplomatic friction.

The refugees could not return home, families were being separated, dissatisfaction among those left behind kept growing, and public trust in the government had hit rock bottom. It was a vicious cycle.

And I was offering to take in a million of them?

San Marcos?

Frankly, from Venezuela's perspective, this was the kind of offer they could only welcome with open arms.

“Taking in that many people would be an enormous burden for you.”

“We'll manage.”

Telsy fell silent for a moment. Apparently, she needed time to process just how extraordinary the offer was.

“...What do you want?”

There it was.

“Simple.”

I leaned forward.

“As I said earlier, declare a default and take the hand of San Marcos and the United States. Use this opportunity to switch sides from the Red Team to the Blue Team.”

Telsy's expression grew complicated.

“...That won't be easy.”

“What's difficult about it?”

“The United States is the one that removed Maduro and threw us into chaos. We cannot trust them.”

“I acknowledge that.”

I nodded. I had no intention of whitewashing what the United States had done to Venezuela.

“The people are another problem. Join hands with the country that removed Maduro? They won't accept it. Everyone knows American companies are still after our oil. Half the country grinds its teeth at the mere mention of the United States.”

“There is a way around that.”

“...What?”

“San Marcos will take the lead instead of the United States.”

Telsy flinched.

“Condemn China and Russia for calling themselves allies yet failing to protect you when you needed them most. Then tell the public you're forming a new alliance with San Marcos. We'll coordinate by providing food aid at the same time. Wouldn't that play pretty well?”

“......”

“Not the United States. San Marcos. A neighboring country across the Caribbean. A friendly nation employing 180,000 Venezuelan workers, supplying you with food, and taking in one million refugees. The public may not be able to accept America, but surely they can accept San Marcos?”

Telsy's eyes narrowed.

“...So San Marcos intends to lend us its name and serve as the front.”

She was a politician, all right.

She grasped what I meant immediately.

I admitted it openly.

“In Korean, we call that a Figurehead.”

“You're very candid.”

“Doesn't honesty make things easier for both of us?”

Silence followed for a moment. I could see Telsy exchanging looks with the aides offscreen.

“I can't make this decision immediately.”

Telsy spoke carefully.

“Give me some time. We need to discuss this internally.”

“Of course. I won't rush you.”

I nodded.

“Let me ask you just one last thing.”

“Go ahead.”

“What does San Marcos gain from all this?”

“That...”

When I fell silent for a moment, Telsy nodded as though she had expected exactly that.

“You've already struck a deal with the Americans, haven't you? And your compensation is probably a share of the profits from developing the oil fields.”

“......”

“I thought as much from the beginning. I already know you're close to Drump. And I imagine at least some of what you've offered will be paid for with American money.”

Telsy's gaze sharpened.

“Still, there's no question that your proposal benefits Venezuela, so I'll let that slide.”

“...Thank you.”

“I'll contact you through the hotline soon.”

“Understood.”

With a click, the screen went dark.

“Whew.”

I leaned back against the chair.

*****

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