Were Iraq & Afghanistan Just A Warmup Exercise?

Back on September 5, in a post entitled "Carefully Line the Inside of Your Combat Helmet with Tin Foil", I wrote:

"Many people believe that the prospect of an impending attack by the United States on Venezuela is the stuff of conspiracy theory at its craziest, and that is certainly correct. How could a country like the United States, which is now laboring under the pain of dealing with the worst natural disaster in its history, even contemplate engaging in a pre-emptive war, especially considering that it is already being pressed beyond its military limits in a conflict of monumental and vexing proportions against a guerilla insurgency on the other side of the globe?"

That was then. Stephen Lendman now writes at Signs-of-the-Times an article entitled,
New Estimate of Venezuela's Total Oil Reserves Makes It the Grandest of Grand Prizes for US with these quotes:

"...the country may be of far greater strategic importance to the US than we likely realized."

"...the country has greater reserves than Saudi Arabia..."

"...a US Energy Department expert believes Venezuela holds 90% of the world's super-heavy tar oil reserves - an estimated total of 1,360,000,000,000 (1.36 trillion) barrels. Let me repeat that - 1.36trillion barrels."

"Venezuela is likely viewed by any US administration as the world's most important source of future oil supply."

"...US instigated serious trouble is heading toward Venezuela..."

Let's see now, install some troops on the Mexican border, militarize the New Orleans area, predict a bad hurricane season for the Gulf, get somebody to check and see if those naval ships are still floating around in the Gulf of Mexico, and...oh yeah, tell the American people that our troops will be greeted with flowers and candy from the grateful Venezuelans for liberating them from their oi...,er, dictator.


UPDATE: Since posting the above article I came across the following:
New Book Claims China and U.S. Headed for War

The number of dead in the Afghan/Iraq Wars ranges from 100,000 to 250,000 depending on the source. Anybody care to speculate on the number of people that will die if the U.S. goes to war with China?