President Trump stands ready to send U.S. Big Oil into Venezuela en masse, but the messy reality of rebuilding a ruined industry takes many years

President Donald Trump says American Big Oil “want to go in so badly” into Venezuela and spend billions of dollars, but the reality is U.S. oil producers are hesitant, and it will take many years and many tens of billions of dollars to rebuild Venezuela’s decimated oil sector after the U.S forcibly removed and arrested leader Nicolás Maduro during a string of attacks on Jan. 3.

More than doubling Venezuela’s current oil production likely would take until 2030 and cost about $110 billion...