Second, you're portraying US as a malicious actor operating in a vacuum. The reality is that there's a fierce competition between superpowers to broaden their spheres of influence and ultimately control the world. There's no future in which a relatively small, resource-rich, and politically dysfunctional country is left to its own devices. The choice is between Russia, China, and the US. Venezuela was more or less one of the Russian client states, and that status quo was maintained through undemocratic means, including mass murder of political opponents using the military gear provided by RU. Now, the US is going to try its hand, probably in a far less brutal way.
The interests of the US imperialists and the Venezuelan people therefore could not be more diametrically opposed.
this is a change to how russia wants the world to work
You clearly did, US is acting out of pure self interest and pretending otherwise.
> Second, you're portraying US as a malicious actor operating in a vacuum
Invading a foreign nation, stealing their resources and imprisoning thier leader is a malicious act, no matter how you slice it.
Just because there are other competitors or good "may" come out of it (so you say), doesn't justify it.
The mental gymnastics by Americans to position themselves as "liberators", while bombing other countries and stealing their territory / resources is stunning.
I though they (the US?) were aiming to be better. Like, the "great" in MAGA wasn't like in "great empire". /s
In other words, the point is that the hypothetical good choice is not actually on the menu.
I will note a similarity to the US political situation with respect to people who, rather than choose the lesser of two evils, opt not to vote entirely.
Nevertheless, that doesn't mean humanity shouldn't strive for better.
In principle, it's morally good to overthrow a dictator in some circumstances. The most obvious example is North Korea - if the US had the ability to transition that country into democracy with little risk of something going wrong, they should obviously do that.
Bold statement considering the history.
win-win: Panama, Grenada.
not win-win: Brazil, El Salvador, Bolivia, Iran, Nicaragua, Chile, Haiti, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya.
Most of those examples were failed or problematic countries before and after US intervention. If there's a chance of sucess that's better than doing nothing no?
It's too early to say it's a win-win situation.
They wishes are, at best, one possible outcome from a long list of possible outcomes.
The most obvious counter-example is the entire history of unilateral regime change.
Killing the dictator is the easy part.
So let's say they take out Kim jong Un...
Now you have a country where every living being from their birth has been trained that US is bad and their leader is like God on earth.
Your 'little risk of something going wrong' is wishful thinking or naive
It will never happen because Kim has nukes. All these regime changes starting from the Afghaninstan, through Saddam, through Gaddafi....now Maduro they are just teaching strongmen to get nukes as the only way to be safe from U.S. (or others) regime change
Overthrowing a dictator most often gets either a new dictator or years of brutal violence and turmoil
Were you in favor of the Iraq war?
USA military should be taking heed of their own country's laws before pretending to be enforcing laws in other countries in order to further enrich their oligarchy.
Sure, remove the NK dictator that USA is partly responsible for being put in to power ... but only with international agreement and a plan for rapid move to have open elections. USA is in no place to do this given the lack of democracy there.
Do you really believe the story about freeing Venezuelan's? You're in for a surprise then when USA rapes them for their oil.
I’m sure a lot of Americans will be celebrating it on the streets. Will that be a win win too?
Oh would you look at that
There's also rampant mismanagement, poor infrastructure, and sanctions affecting the output and outcomes. See also: "resource curse"
In this case, the people of Venezuela are desperate to get rid of their socialist government. It has, predictably and inevitably, led them directly to poverty, starvation, and violent repression.
I have a lot of reservations about the way in which Trump is operating and in this case, the legality of every aspect of how he is doing this operation in Venezuela. Despite all those reservations, this is a rare situation where this action benefits everyone and the world.
The large majority of what I'm seeing is from the other side of the aisle.
Mossadegh Arbenz Allende Goulart Lumunba And Maduro was elected as well though you can go on with it being corrupt if you want.
These are just the ones we directly overthrew who were elected. There are 20 more or so we’ve done so indirectly.
