Fucking Moron (tm)

[timelets]

WSJ shows how Putin takes advantage of the incompetence of the Trump administration:

...the U.S. campaign spiraled into a foreign-policy debacle, thwarted by familiar adversaries, Russia and Cuba, as well as allies, Turkey and India—all countries that one way or another helped Venezuela sidestep U.S. sanctions, according to current and former U.S. officials and Venezuelan opposition activists. The European Union watched from the sidelines.
...
Almost half of the $1.5 billion in Venezuelan crude exported to India in the nine months after the U.S. sanctions was purchased by an Indian joint venture with Russia’s oil giant, Rosneft, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of data compiled by trade database Import Genius.
...
The United Arab Emirates has imported around $1 billion in gold from Venezuela since gold sanctions were imposed in late 2018, according to Venezuela trade records. U.S. intelligence officials say the actual amounts are far higher, based on evidence that Venezuelan gold is leaving the country masked as originating from Colombia, Uganda and elsewhere. The exports land in Turkey, the U.A.E. and other gold-trade hubs.

The Trump administration, confident Mr. Maduro would fall, didn’t foresee Russia leading the way for other countries to eclipse the sanctions.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/why-the-u-s-bid-for-regime-change-in-venezuela-faltered-11580138560

I wonder whether Iran is working around US sanctions using the same scheme.