US invades Venezuela

The United States invaded Venezuela this morning and captured its president, Nicholas Maduro, and his wife:

The United States launched a “large scale strike” on Venezuela, captured President Nicolás Maduro and his wife and flew them out of the country, President Donald Trump said in a social media post early Saturday. Overnight, explosions shook multiple locations across Caracas, including at key military facilities, and aircraft were seen flying over the Venezuelan capital.

Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodríguez said earlier Saturday that the government did not know where Maduro or first lady Cilia Flores were and demanded “immediate proof of life.” The country’s interior minister, Diosdado Cabello, described the U.S. attack as “cowardly.”

U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a statement Saturday morning that Maduro and his wife were facing federal charges in the Southern District of New York, where Maduro was indicted in March 2020 on narco-terrorism charges. Trump has accused him of heading a narco-trafficking gang that is flooding the U.S. with illicit drugs — a claim Maduro denies.

It's hard to get past "what the fuck?" I have a lot of thoughts, none of them completely coherent yet.

My biggest problem, which feels like the day exactly 37 years ago when we invaded another neighboring country and arrested their dictator, is that this isn't on its face a completely bad act (though it is prima facie illegal). But I simply don't trust the administration's motives or their motivations, and I have misgivings about how our adversaries (our real adversaries, despite what the OAFPOTUS and his droogs believe) will read this.

Steve Inskeep lays out that last point:

Other nations are condemning the U.S. strike, but some governments may not mind the precedent. Russia may see a double standard: If the U.S. can take out Maduro, why can’t Russia take out Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyy, or the inconvenient leader of any other former Soviet republic? Why can’t China capture the president of Taiwan? We can say that these situations are different, of course, that Maduro was indicted in the U.S. and so forth, but others will overlook this.

This act is deeply destabilizing to Venezuela, obviously; but also to friendly nations in the region, to Europe, and to East Asia, not to mention to our moral standing in the world. As The Guardian's Julian Borger writes, "From the point of view of global stability, the worst thing about the Maduro rendition is that it worked."

Venezuela is simply not a threat to the United States and never has been. But Venezuela has the largest proven oil reserves in the world, oil that the OAFPOTUS's donors and Russian dictator Vladimir Putin would very much like to exploit. That's what I meant by trusting their motivations: at least when we arrested Noriega, there was a legitimate US interest in the Panama Canal that explained, without excusing, President George HW Bush's actions.

I didn't like Bush's policies, but I didn't think he was a corrupt person who put himself before everyone else. The OAFPOTUS is a demented malignant narcissist who is incapable of putting anyone else before himself, so now we just have to figure out what he gets out of dozens of Venezuelans dying this morning. (It doesn't help that the OAFPOTUS sounded like a not-very-bright child when speaking with reporters a couple hours ago.)

I had planned a completely different post this morning, which I will set for publication later this afternoon. Right now, I'm still thinking about this troubling military adventure.

Oh, by the way, we have another anniversary today: on 3 January 1925, 101 years ago, Benito Mussolini declared himself dictator of Italy.