Very pointy boatRussia is now launching a two-pronged attack on South America, hearts to the North and minds to the South.
The batting of the eyelids is steaming towards Venezuela right now. The nuclear powered battle cruiser "Pyotr Veliky" (Peter the Great) passed the straits of Gibraltar yesterday on its way across the Atlantic and is due to arrive in Venezuela for bi-national naval maneuvers at the end of the month. According to the ship's stats it carries cruise missiles (non nuclear tipped for this trip, so they tell us) with a range of up to 500km, so it won't be long before the US 4th Fleet coincidentally in the area right now is in range (if the Russkies feel like a potshot..which i doubt).
As for the business dealings (apart from the Russian takeover of Venezuela's gold industry slated for early 2009 and Russian oil company Rosneft trying to get its hands on a piece of prime Venezuelan real estate in the last couple of days), that's covered by today's news that Russia via its Gazprom state oil company wants to buy the 20% of Repsol (REP) currently in the hands of Spanish building company Sacyr Vallehermosa (who have announced intention to sell already). The Spaniards are clearly being semi-forced into an asset liquidation by the world downturn, as there wouldn't be much reason to sell its REP for a mooted €3.5Bn when it has the chunk on its books at €6.525Bn.
So with Repsol YPF a major part of Argentina's industrial life, the Russians are looking to open up a second LatAm front, as it were. Let's see how this one progresses.
The batting of the eyelids is steaming towards Venezuela right now. The nuclear powered battle cruiser "Pyotr Veliky" (Peter the Great) passed the straits of Gibraltar yesterday on its way across the Atlantic and is due to arrive in Venezuela for bi-national naval maneuvers at the end of the month. According to the ship's stats it carries cruise missiles (non nuclear tipped for this trip, so they tell us) with a range of up to 500km, so it won't be long before the US 4th Fleet coincidentally in the area right now is in range (if the Russkies feel like a potshot..which i doubt).
As for the business dealings (apart from the Russian takeover of Venezuela's gold industry slated for early 2009 and Russian oil company Rosneft trying to get its hands on a piece of prime Venezuelan real estate in the last couple of days), that's covered by today's news that Russia via its Gazprom state oil company wants to buy the 20% of Repsol (REP) currently in the hands of Spanish building company Sacyr Vallehermosa (who have announced intention to sell already). The Spaniards are clearly being semi-forced into an asset liquidation by the world downturn, as there wouldn't be much reason to sell its REP for a mooted €3.5Bn when it has the chunk on its books at €6.525Bn.
So with Repsol YPF a major part of Argentina's industrial life, the Russians are looking to open up a second LatAm front, as it were. Let's see how this one progresses.