Concerns have grown around the world over a possible Venezuelan invasion of Guyana. Guyana, a small South American nation of just 820,000 citizens, is oil rich and lacks military defenses, and Venezuela’s oil is running dry. With traditional norms against territorial conquest now eroding following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, some experts have warned that a Venezuelan invasion might be next.

Straight Arrow News contributor Peter Zeihan casts skepticism on those concerns and also argues that Guyana’s dense jungle forest acts as its own natural defense.

The following is an excerpt from Peter’s April 4 “Zeihan on Geopolitics” newsletter:

I’ve gotten a handful of questions regarding Venezuela invading the South American state of Guyana due to economic challenges and oil discoveries. The short answer is that I’m not worried about this, but here’s three reasons why.

This would be a difficult trek for the Venezuelans given the lack of infrastructure connecting the two countries. Venezuela also lacks a functional military that would be able to carry out this invasion. Lastly, the oil production in Guyana is predominantly offshore, so a land-based invasion is just impractical if the goal is to seize someone else’s oil projects. This one’s a nonstarter.

So, unless Venezuela magically fixes all of their military shortcomings, there’s no real concern of an invasion of Guyana. And that means the U.S. can forget about this area and focus on the bigger fish for now.