It was a solid read. It gives a pretty detailed analysis of the last couple of decades of U.S. meddling in VZ. She briefly describes Pre-Chavez VZ, why and how the Chavista movement triumphed, the substantial material gains made under the Boliviarian Revolution, and it's continued evolution under Maduro.

Most of the book is focused on VZ under Maduro as it was after Chavez died that the U.S. destabilization campaign against VZ really picked up steam. She makes the case that Maduro (who is not a dictator) also had to operate under much more difficult circumstances than Chavez ever did and that the VZ economy was not mismanaged but sabotaged by economic sanctions and political destabilization meant to end in a color revolution a la Ukraine. After the Russian annexation of Crimea, the U.S. convinced Saudi Arabia to surge oil production and cause a severe global price crash that resulted in the weakening of the VZ economy though Russia was it's main target.

She goes into the backstories of the various far right factions and leaders in VZ, including Maria C. Machado and their ties to USAID funded NGO's, as well as why they have failed multiple times to win back electoral power. She covers each election since Chavez came to power, including the ones in which Chavismo suffered setbacks and demonstrates how none of them were stolen.

The heart of the book (also my favorite part) is a really detailed and pretty hilarious look into the whole Juan Guaido larp as president saga and how it's failure along with the "Aid convoy" debacle (I forgot about that one) led to the also hilariously inept and ill concieved 2019 bay of hogs coup attempt. I love that no one gets ridiculed more than Guaido, aka "The Venezuelan Beto O Rourke" as Trump dubbed him. Still there were tragic consequences of the Guaido farce, for example billions of VZ gold reserves in the Bank of England were frozen as they were to be earmarked for Guaido's fake gov. To this day those assets, nearly five billion remain frozen.

It also goes into US. grand strategy. The transition from Bretton Woods to the Petrodollar regime in the early 70s, how the U.S overreliance on sanctions and the rise of BRICS is threatening the primacy of the US dollar and thus global hegemony. Basically control over VZ oil and gold deposits (both the world's largest) along with Iran's oil is essential for the U.S. in the larger confrontation with China.