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As someone old enough to have seen the US invade too many countries, I'm struck by the lack of effort put into justifying this sort of military action these day
by slg 10mo ago
As someone old enough to have seen the US invade too many countries, I'm struck by the lack of effort put into justifying this sort of military action these days. There is going to be a lot of debate over whether this specific operation was legal and I have no idea where the courts or history will ultimately land on that decision. But the way they don't even try to convince us this is necessary anymore is a sign that wherever the line is, we let it slip too far.
- sedan_baklazhan 10mo agoWell, "Venezuela has stolen American oil which is in Venezuela". Isn't that a justification?!
- egeozcan 10mo agoJust like how Denmark and Greenland stole American land that happens to be where Greenland is. Or Canada. Seriously though, even the imperial ambitions from the guy feels racist :) I guess Turkey can stop worrying on thanksgiving days. I have a lot of conflicting views with both the "left" and the "right" these days, but it seems the so-called "conservatives" are not that conservative in their ambitions, no?
- JumpCrisscross 10mo ago> the way they don't even try to convince us this is necessary anymore is a sign that wherever the line is, we let it slip too far A lot of Americans don't care. They either actually don't care. Or they sort of care, but are too lazy and nihilistic to bother doing anything about it. Like, this entire exercise is a leveraged wager by the Trump administration that this will not cost them the Senate in any of these states next year [1]. [1] https://www.270towin.com/2026-senate-election/ https://www.270towin.com/2026-senate-election/
- tweakimp 10mo agoI think also many dont have the time or ressources to care. If you live a precarious life, you are happy if you can pay for food and your home.
- tdeck 10mo agoAs an American, I think we make this excuse too often. People have opposed and overthrown their governments more effectively under much harsher circumstances.
- the-smug-one 10mo agoIt's probably because it was harsher that they did so.
- keybored 10mo agoWhat data do you have that they don’t care? Waging a war is a pretty massive thing to not care about. I would think that someone would either be positive or negative towards it. Because even if they don’t care about invading countries per se they would presumably care about what their presumed tax money is spent on. Of course being “nihilistic” is a different matter. > Or they sort of care, but are too lazy and nihilistic to bother doing anything about it. Typical. Doing anything about US foreign interventions is a very tall order in a country where the vast majority are politically disenfranchised (with income and wealth as a proxy). It’s difficult enough for domestic affairs, like getting universal healthcare. Much harder to fight the war machine. Americans did put up a fight against the interventionism of the Reagan administration. But that didn’t stop the funding of the Contras. “All it did” was force the interventions to become clandestine. (A big contrast to this admin.) But ordinary Americans do have the largest power in all of the world to fight the war machine of their own country. That ought to be encouraged. But as usual we see the active encouragement of nihilism from comments where A Lot Of X are deemed to be useless for this particular purpose. Ah what’s the point, People Are Saying that everyone around me are useless or politically katatonic. Typical.
- blell 10mo ago[flagged]
- skibidithink 10mo agoEven the slightest shadow of a "rules-based international world order" is dead. And all it took was some post-pandemic inflation.
- tsimionescu 10mo agoInterestingly, this is not just flaunting international law. It is a blatant violation of federal domestic law in the USA itself: Congress is the only body that can declare war, and they have not done so. The Presidency has no right whatsoever to attack a foreign country without a declaration of war. While yes, Congress authorized the "War on Terror", there is very obviously no possible justification for applying that to the case of Venezuela.
- pjc50 10mo ago> Congress is the only body that can declare war, and they have not done so. People keep saying that, and it bears no relation to the actual post-WW2 US military history. How many declared wars have there been since then?
- Ancapistani 10mo ago> The Presidency has no right whatsoever to attack a foreign country without a declaration of war. That’s… just not true. George Washington himself authorized the US Navy to attack French vessels in the Caribbean in 1798 - with no declaration of war.
- SilverElfin 10mo agoIt’s funny how the America First, America Only crowd is cheering on this shameless regime change whose ultimate goal isn’t about drugs or democracy, but getting access to oil and minerals to make the Trump family richer. And that’s so why there is a lack of effort to justify it. The right has been compromised and will support anything the party does - deporting citizens, invading countries, making things unaffordable with tariffs.
- JumpCrisscross 10mo ago> how the America First, America Only crowd is cheering on this shameless regime change Is it?
- SilverElfin 10mo agoI have seen many people on X who have a profile saying America First or America Only or both post messages supporting the boat strikes or “thanking” Hegseth or whatever. Among big influencers - Matt Walsh, Benny Johnson, others have all supported the narrative in one form or the other. For example Johnson pushed the conspiracy theory that Venezuela rigs elections in America. Often they use dishonest language to shill their support for what’s going on - “we don’t want a new war but here’s ten reasons why Venezuela is bad”
- tempodox 10mo agoAncient wisdom: Anything before the word “but” is bullshit.
- gnz11 10mo agoOdds are they are bot accounts on X and not real people. Also, don’t forget Benny Johnson and other influencers were getting payed by Russia to push out these narratives. https://apnews.com/article/russian-interference-presidential-election-influencers-trump-999435273dd39edf7468c6aa34fad5dd https://apnews.com/article/russian-interference-presidential...
- taurath 10mo ago
- perihelions 10mo agoTo briefly quantify some things: US public support at the onset of the Afghanistan invasion polled at 88% [a]; at the onset of the Iraq invasion, 62%, rising to 72% [b]; and Venezuela here and now polls at 30% supporting "U.S. taking military action in Venezuela" [c] (Nov. 19–21 2025). [a] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_public_opinion_on_the_war_in_Afghanistan#International_public_opinion_compared_to_American_public_opinion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_public_opinion_o... [b] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_opinion_in_the_United_States_on_the_invasion_of_Iraq#Invasion_of_Iraq https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_opinion_in_the_United_S... [c] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/poll-venezuela-u-s-military-action-trump/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/poll-venezuela-u-s-military-act...
- belorn 10mo agoPublic opinion in 2001 and 2003 followed the 9/11 terror attack and was very fresh in peoples mind. A more recent war (2015) would be the attack on Yemen by Barack Obama. I can however not find any good public opinion for that war.
- gusgus01 10mo agoWe've been bombing Yemen on and off since post 9/11, including a rather large attack with UK support just last year (2025). Are you thinking of the Saudi-led intervention that occurred in 2015 in Yemen as part of the Yemeni civil war? Or maybe when we built a base there in 2011 to facilitate more drones?
- estearum 10mo agoI don't think Americans perceive much of a difference between attacking Al Qaeda++ in Afghanistan versus in Yemen, certainly not enough to see it as "a different war", and it's not clear that perception is incorrect.
- Fade_Dance 10mo agoEntirely different, from an American perspective. Afghanistan had the context of 9/11. All Americans knew about 9/11, and most cared strongly about it. I doubt most Americans know anything about Yemen or know anything about any US involvement there, nor do they care. Military strikes in Yemen aren't seen as the same war. Afghanistan and Iraq were boots on the ground, building up military bases, hearing about the occasional death of US personnel, etc. It's also decades apart. When it comes to Yemen, the average American is probably entirely unaware of it, and the ones that do know about it are definitely going to place it in the Palestine/Israel context (which has huge mindshare circulation here, All things considered - we usually just ignore things outside of US borders and this is ultra politicized here). Maybe without that element, there would be more truth to what you were saying, but it's definitely in the Israel/Hamas war bucket as of now.
- pqtyw 10mo ago>these days Panama and Granada in the 80s weren't that fundamentally different. And before that US had a very long history of invading or intervening in Latin American countries due to various often dubious reasons. If anything the last few decades might have been the exception.
- nairboon 10mo ago> There is going to be a lot of debate over whether this specific operation was legal There might be a local debate about the legality in the US. But from the outside perspective in terms of international law, there is not much to debate. Unless i missed some UN resolution, the US has no jurisdiction in Venezuela.
- mrtksn 10mo ago>There is going to be a lot of debate over whether this specific operation was legal Or maybe there wouldn't be any debate and people will move on to the next bombastic thing he does. Populists get away with everything by simply not engaging, people get tired and seek new entertainment and there's no actual checks and balances beyond the decency. When someone has no claim of decency, they are untouchable. No one will ever arrest them, stop them or deny them anything because they can just replace those who do not obey. Maduro, Trump, Putin, Erdogan, Orban and many others are made from the same cloth.
- andai 10mo agoIt was one or two elections ago that we entirely dropped the pretense of dignity. Quite refreshing, actually. Earlier today I heard the argument that idealism was promoted in the West because it encourages a separation from reality and makes people easier to control. I consider myself an idealist. I just don't believe that ignorance and delusion are the means by which an ideal can be brought about.
- inglor_cz 10mo agoThis is a consequence of the society concentrating on its internal culture war. International politics became irrelevant to most voters; they don't really have any personal stake in it anymore, or they at least don't feel so. Their kids won't be drafted to war.
- jordanpg 10mo agoAnd let's not forget that the stated rationale in this case, drugs, is very obviously pretextual.