US STRIKES VENEZUELA / CAPTURES MADURO

  • Thread starter Thread starter nycfan
  • Start date Start date
  • Replies: 2K
  • Views: 60K
  • Politics 
chrissteel said:
a few points made my elliot abrams at national review a few days ago i hope he is right

President Trump is pressing, harder than we did in his first term (when I served as special representative for Venezuela), for change. This is very much in the interests of the United States. The greatest refugee flow in the history of this hemisphere, the 8 million Venezuelans who have fled, will not stop as long as Maduro is in power. The drug flows out of Venezuela will not stop as long as his regime remains, because it relies on income from drug (and also gold and human) trafficking to survive. And the cooperation between that regime and hostile powers — Cuba, Russia, China, Iran — and terrorist groups like Hezbollah will not stop because they help the regime survive and share its hostility to the United States.

I read and hear the objections: After Maduro may come chaos, as in Libya or Iraq, or divisions such as we see in Syria, and there’s no reason to think what comes next will be any better.

These arguments show a lack of familiarity with Venezuelan history, today’s Venezuela, and Latin American politics and society. The divisions that we see in many Middle Eastern countries — historical and geographical, such as in Libya, or social and religious, as in Iraq or Syria, do not exist in Venezuela’s quite homogeneous society. Venezuela is surrounded by democracies and is one of the rare non-democratic countries in this hemisphere. Venezuela, unlike most Middle Eastern countries, has a history of democracy starting with its overthrow of a military dictator in 1958 and lasting until Hugo Chavez began to destroy it 40 years later. Democratic institutions do not need to be invented, but rather restored and reinvigorated.

Nor is there a case in Latin America where a transition to democracy was followed by the kind of social and political collapse into anarchy that some analysts seem to fear. In Venezuela, a new government will of course have to deal with the military — but that was true of every Latin American transition, and in no case has there been a successful military coup reversing the transition. As to the “colectivos,” irregular paramilitary groups that the regime has organized to intimidate the opposition, they too will have to be dealt with — but their power comes from their ties to the regime. Once its ideological, political, financial, and military support ends, the strength of the colectivos will wane steadily.

Nor are arguments that the Venezuelan opposition is hopelessly divided and incompetent true. The opposition united behind Machado despite ideological differences and past rivalries.
Click to expand...

Abrams is a war criminal who ought to die in jail. He knows Latin America from a certain angle of approach but he is quite blind in some significant ways just the same.

1954 Guatemala -- The US overthrows a democratically elected government and subsequently an authoritarian right-wing military government moves into the vacuum -- stays for decades.

1964 Brazil -- US backs a military coup that takes out Goulart, a democratically elected president -- an authoritarian right-wing military government moves into the vacuum -- stays for decades.

1973 Chile -- US backs a military coup that takes out Allende, a democratically elected president -- an authoritarian right-wing military government moves into the vacuum -- stays for decades.

Those are just the first three examples that came to mind...there are others throughout the history of US interventions in the region.

I understand that Maduro is not a democratically elected head of state and even Abrams gives at least lip-service to the chance of a military government moving in ("In Venezuela, a new government will of course have to deal with the military." See above). All of the examples that I have given are from decades ago and happened in a Cold War atmosphere as well which gave militaries the kind of 'cover' to proclaim themselves "anti-communist' and needed for an effective transition to democracy -- the kind that brought suppression of speech and death squads to set the tone. Is the current political environment significantly different? We'll see...Bukele in El Salvador is an authoritarian technocrat "Crimefighter," while sympathetic to trumpism governments now exist in Chile and Honduras. In the coming months elections will happen in Costa Rica, Colombia, Haiti (perhaps), Brasil, and Peru. More trumpist authoritarianism may come to power in those cases, or course in different ways given the various unique histories of those nations. Hard to see the circumstances in the region being as favorable to actual democracy as Abrams is asserting (but then his idea of democracy has historically been narrow to fallacious). This move is potentially un avispero (or a wasp's nest) unless there has been some very thoughtful planning on the part of the trump administration.
 
donbosco said:



"Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, have been indicted in the Southern District of New York. Nicolas Maduro has been charged with Narco-Terrorism Conspiracy, Cocaine Importation Conspiracy, Possession of Machineguns and Destructive Devices, and Conspiracy to Possess Machineguns and Destructive Devices against the United States. They will soon face the full wrath of American justice on American soil in American courts. On behalf of the entire U.S. DOJ, I would like to thank President Trump for having the courage to demand accountability on behalf of the American People, and a huge thank you to our brave military who conducted the incredible and highly successful mission to capture these two alleged international narco traffickers.

7:25 AM · Jan 3, 2026"

I am reminded of Hamlet here...

The point Shakespeare works to make in Hamlet is that when wrath dominates reason, justice is perverted and social order collapses.
Click to expand...

Was Maduro possessing machine guns and destructive devices in the United States? If he was in Venezuela, how is that a violation of US laws?
 
Ramrouser said:
Why cant y’all simply celebrate this “win” for the USA? This hurts China and may be the final nail in the coffin for the dictatorships in Iran and Cuba?

Plus, the Venezuelans sure seem happy today.
Click to expand...
Probably because we have critical thinking skills and the ability to comprehend why this is long-term bad for US and world security
 
donbosco said:
This move is potentially un avispero (or a wasp's nest) unless there has been some very thoughtful planning on the part of the trump administration.
Click to expand...
Given that "thoughtful" and "advanced planning" are words that no one associates with Donald Trump or most of the people in this administration, I seriously doubt that much planning or foresight has gone into thinking about or organizing for the consequences of what we've just done.
 
CFordUNC said:
Click to expand...

That is a hell of a point.

Also on another related point, this is what you get from that SCOTUS ruling. There is absolutely no incentive for the POTUS to consider legality anymore for these types of official acts.

We will get far more of this this time around. That SCOTUS ruling will likely be viewed by historians just as Dred Scott.
 
Last edited:
CFordUNC said:
It truly is the most curious coincidence of all time that the United States only ever seems to be interested in democratizing nations with enormous oil reserves.
Click to expand...
Also probably a double word score for Trump that the recipient of the most recent Nobel Peace prize is from that country as well.
 
My initial reaction—

Winners:

1. Venezuelan opposition in the country and pretty much all Venezuelans living abroad.

2. Big Oil

3. China

4. The Gulf oil countries

5. The Florida GOP

Losers:

1. Ukraine

2. Taiwan

3. America’s ability to oppose authoritarian attacks on other nations around the world.

4. Congress, yet again.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top