Different Decade, Same Story: Invasion of Iraq, err, I mean Venezuela

 

On January 3, 2026, I woke up with the news that the drunken frat boy that is our Secretary of Defense (they like to say war, but if some of you skipped a US Government lesson, it takes an act of Congress to change a cabinet position.) bragging on behalf of the regime that we invaded Venezuela and kidnapped the President of a sovereign nation. 

The shock and anger was beyond what I could handle and process. But then that disastrous press conference by a tyrant and wannabe emperor who is probably suffering from age-related dementia and appearing to be falling asleep while speaking just made it worse. But then when my pure hatred of him subsided enough for my political educated brain to analyze the event with history, foreign policy, and possible political outcomes, it occurred to me that he actually said, as the cliche goes, "the quiet part out loud."  And he did, 

"We're going to have our very large United States oil companies, the biggest anywhere in the world, go in, spend billions of dollars, fix the badly broken infrastructure, the oil infrastructure, and start making money for the country.” - Transcript of Press Conference of President Donald J. Trump, January 3, 2026.

First, it's not up to the United States to help Venezuela make money. Venezuela nationalized their oil in the 1970s with contracts to some private oil companies, which included Chevron.  Chevron is set to be the largest beneficiary of this illegal invasion and seizure of the country. Per a report from Reuters, Chevron is set to call employees back to work in Venezuela. Even though Chevron was allowed with US permission for them to continue operating and exporting Venezuelan oil even with the embargo in place. (https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/chevron-chartered-cargo-venezuelan-oil-departs-us-gulf-shipping-data-shows-2026-01-05/).

But many of Venezuela's problems began with the rise of Chavez, and his consolidation of power, though my socialist colleagues don't like to admit it, Chavez was an authoritarian hiding under the guise of socialism. And so the response was an embargo, preventing Venezuela from exporting their main commodity, oil.  The theory is that if people are starving they will rise up and overthrow their leaders, but the opposite could be true, if there is not enough strength in opposition then the people will be too weak to fight. So if the embargo would have been lifted the Venezuelan people would not be going hungry and their economy would be much better, and possibly there never would have been a mass exodus. I am not saying that Chavez or Maduro weren't bad for the people of Venezuela, they were, it's just that I think there would have been better multilateral options to assist the Venezuelan people. But its not up to us to decide on a sovereign nation's leaders, we can support change, again through soft power and pressure. But if those policies hurt the actual people and not the leadership, then time to devise another plan.

Second, this military aggression is not our first time in our experience of regime change in Latin America. Well, as many of you already know about the Monroe Doctrine, which was supposed to stop specifically the European colonization of the Americas, and at times, is used as a tool to expand American exceptionalism and imperialism. And people wonder why and complain that we are the "police" of the world, well, we are not police of the world, we just use it as an excuse to exert our military strength in the name of capitalism, and not democracy, as the lies from the past have told us.  And I, for one, never viewed that we should have that role. All I know is that we have used this excuse for regime change in Chile in the 70s and Panama in 1989, as only two examples of our "policing" in the Americas.

Chile had elected Salvador Allende in 1969 and was a socialist, which during the cold war, the United States deemed this as a communist threat to the Western Hemisphere, and with Cuba's Revolution earlier in the decade, this would be considered intolerable. In 1973, Pinochet was installed as the Chilean leader with the lie that the regime represented democracy. And now history taught us, Pinochet reigned terror on Chile for two decades, committing mass murder of political opposition, as some call, "politicide".  Politicide is the mass murdering (genocide) of political groups through the same tools used in genocides, except the target is political opposition. Though political groups are not recognized by the United Nations Convention of Genocide, I argued in my Masters thesis that they should be. And Chile was one of the case studies.

In 1989, the illegal invasion of Panama sticks in my mind, because it is my mother's country. At 18, I knew it was wrong, so in my undergraduate sophomore year, I wrote a paper on it on how it was illegal and broke international law, which killed 500 Panamanian people, mostly in the poorer areas. All because of one former CIA tool, who seized power, Manuel Noriega. Another leader who was accused of being a drug runner, etc. Sound familiar? 

The Trump regime used the exact same playbook as they did in 1989. Except for lying to us, like George HG Bush (Sr.) about it saving the free world or in the name of liberation and democracy. (Though the Neo-cons war hawks often would come close to the truth with "American Investments.")  But this current idiotic President, well at least because of his lack of verbal skills, actually gave some truth with the lies. So I guess that I can appreciate this rambling of mentally deteriorating and emotionally bankrupt conman that said basically that we were there for the oil.  Of course there were the usual lies about democracy and saving the Venezuelan people. If that sounds familiar, it's because we have used it over and over again, think Iraq.

Iraq, George W. Bush with his "Mission Accomplished" banner after the "toppling" of Saddam Hussein which ended up being a longer quagmire than Vietnam, which also was started over some lies of WMD (Weapons of Mass Destruction). And of course, Trump used similar "national security" by practically calling drugs WMDs by accusing Maduro and his wife of being international drug dealers while giving the convicted drug-dealing former Honduran President a pardon. Same shit, different decade.  And like Bush (Jr.) this regime's entire goal is "nation-building" much like W's.  As he stated in the same rambling almost incoherent press conference:

"We're going to run the country until such time as we can do a safe, proper, and judicious transition. So we don't want to be involved with, uh, having somebody else get in and we have the same situation that we had for the last long period of years. So we are going to run the country until such time as we can make a safe, proper, and judicious transition." (https://rollcall.com/factbase/trump/transcript/donald-trump-press-conference-venezuela-maduro-january-3-2026)

In a matter of days though, Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, managed to contradict the orange wannabe emperor by ensuring that we won't be controlling the government, but Rubio definitely has stated that we will control the oil. And that idiot President stated on his social media company in effect that "he" would be in charge of the oil. So I expect oil companies and other morbidly wealthy companies and individuals will be wanting to divide up Venezuela. And honestly, I don't see the difference between Trump and Maduro with a hunger for power and greed.

Anyway, it has become clear that this is Rubio's plan using the stupidity and beta "machoism" of the Secretary of Defense to want to use our military and its members like toy soldiers and the bended knee of Attorney General Bondi and FBI Director Patel to drum up drug charges. 

Anyway, these are not America First policies, not by a long shot. These are capitalists' first policies on an international scale, which so happens to help their ethnic cleansing "America First" policies with the hope that my Venezuelan immigrant siblings return to their country. Again "America First" is the most white supremacist bullshit line. It is never about the people, not in Venezuela, not in the United States. It's about making as much money as possible while exploiting everyone.

It is laughable that Americans were concerned about Venezuelans starving in the streets due to their leadership, as I see social aid, like SNAP being cut here. If it was about democracy and human rights, we would have cut our ties to Saudi Arabia and Israel (especially under Netanyahu's regime). 

But for the past 30 years, all I know is that our "Wars" and regime changes can be linked to one thing: oil. And I must give the wannabe emperor credit for making it clear because Iran, Nigeria, and Venezuela have one major thing in common. So what will this regime change cost us? Another 20 years? How many people must die? And if bitching about paying taxes, how much will this cost us in dollars? Enough to fund healthcare, housing and education for Americans that I do know. 

Finally, with the wannabe emperor's infantile demands of Greenland and Canada, and then threatening Iran, and of all countries Mexico and Denmark, it boggles the mind how so many Americans are willing to let this happen.  We are becoming Hitler's Germany or Napoleon's France in this scenario. We will not be on the right side of history, far from it. And you add that to the ICE brutalizing immigrants and killing American citizens (Renee Good in Minnesota). ICE is being the gestapo, and this is not an exaggeration. This regime's policy and its goals are ethnic cleansing of the United States. And with imprisoning immigrants in prisons in El Salvador and African nations like Eswatini, South Sudan, and Ghana to name a few. If the American people do not stop this tyrannical regime then we will be the axis of evil. But it seems that many Americans like this idea of a strong and powerful tyrant. (And Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, seemed to love it the most, as he shows that he has no intention of stopping this regime from doing whatever it wants. He has surrendered our power to a fascist authoritarian. And I tell you all, whether you are Republican or Democratic, Red or Blue, Conservative, Liberal or whatever, I don't even care if you voted for him, we are at the beginning of the end of our democracy. and if something is not done soon, we all stand to lose it all. But maybe that is what many of you want.) The morbidly wealthy are not smarter or better than any of us. They just have more money to corrupt even the best of us.

The fault of human beings is that they always seem to kiss the ass of the morbidly wealthy narcissists of the world. Some just are always looking for a messiah, even if that messiah leads them off a cliff or destroys the world. Trump is that orange calf of a messiah and he will burn up this world if it means more power and money for him. Anyway, I am afraid to be a part of this country and its thirst for blood and resources to make more money for the rich and powerful, as the United States and the world are being destroyed. We keep fighting for the greed of others, sacrificing ourselves and our children, while being brainwashed about the romanticized version of war and honor. They use that against us, against each other.  Right now, my sons are 18 and 17, and will soon be 19 and 18. My two sons could be drafted, if the Heritage Foundation's Project 2025 plans go through, as it calls on bringing back the draft. As my sons' ride or die, I will do anything to make sure that doesn't happen. 

All I know is that Baron Trump and the sons of the Heritage Foundation should be the first ones on the fucking plane or boats, for I am not willing to sacrifice my blood in the name of oil.