Die Illusion des „Völkerrechts“ in Venezuela
https://www.wsj.com/opinion/international-law-venezuela-nicolas-maduro-united-nations-china-russia-c68f4427?mod=hp_opin_pos_1
Die Illusion des „Völkerrechts“ in Venezuela
https://www.wsj.com/opinion/international-law-venezuela-nicolas-maduro-united-nations-china-russia-c68f4427?mod=hp_opin_pos_1
9 Kommentare
[Bypass paywall](https://www.wsj.com/opinion/international-law-venezuela-nicolas-maduro-united-nations-china-russia-c68f4427?st=zi8KHi&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink)
Yes I think the international law argument is murky, and politically weak ground to stand on. Force has been used to remove dictators in far less surgical ways from Libya to Iraq to Panama. Arguably Maduro was not the legitimate leader of his country.
Better, if you’re Dems, to be skeptical of taking on expensive nation building in Venezuela. We broke it, now we own it. Let that be the political message.
The other argument is Trumps erratic behavior. People bring up International Law because Trump talks about Greenland, etc. as if he’s ready to steamroll the rest of the hemisphere. This doesn’t do him any political favors. Instead of the narrative being about toppling a cruel dictator, he overindulges and shifts the narrative to crazy topics.
Another example of Trump squandering a good hand he’s been dealt
>>Liberal internationalism is a moral and political failure if it can’t distinguish between the aggression of Russia and China to swallow neighboring democracies and a U.S. military action to arrest a lawless dictator in league with the world’s worst actors.
Most people already fail to distinguish Russian or Chinese aggression and U.S. military action.
Aside from that, International law was already a tool of the victors of WWII to establish a post-war order beneficial to their interests.
It was always, going back to Westphalia, a tool of the powerful states to impose their interest over the weaker ones.
If we want to use international law and the assent of the wider international community as the basis of sovereignty, then large portions of the international community didn’t recognize Maduro as the legitimate authority of Venezuela.
In addition to the other more common argument that force is what de facto determines sovereignty, plainly obviously Venezuela didn’t have any recourse here.
They do not, as it was just demonstrated, possess “sovereignty.” Not in the backyard of the USA.
International law only applied to non super powers
Trump himself asserts the reason for this special military operation was to control the oil in Venezuela. People around him saying it was for democracy, removing a cruel dictator, or bending the rules for a greater good are convincing themselves rather than some undecided audience.
>Second, does this qualify as U.S. self-defense against the Venezuelan regime’s drug smuggling and use of migration as a weapon?
Also, accusing Venezuela of using migration as a weapon and a justification for self-defense is just dehumanizing for me.
The US and Europe officially adopted the „one China policy“. The WSJ should then accept that a Chinese invasion of Taiwan would be a legitimate act of an internationally recognized government trying to restore law and order to one of its provinces.
That is what a modicum of intellectual integrity would require them to admit, right?
The WSJ’s handwringing about international law being a „tyrant’s best friend“ would be laughable if it weren’t so dangerous.
They claim Maduro is illegitimate because of a disputed election, so invasion is fine – but Zelensky’s term expired in May 2024 with no elections held, opposition parties banned, curtailment on using the Russian language in the public sphere, and critical media shut down while he rules by indefinite decree.
By the WSJ’s own logic, Russia can send Spetsnaz into Kyiv tomorrow and cite this exact editorial as justification. China can do the same with Taiwan, claiming the „illegitimate separatist government“ doesn’t represent the real authority that „consents“ to reunification – it’s Venezuela’s playbook verbatim. The „self-defense against drugs“ argument is preposterous when Trump explicitly said „we’re taking their oil“ and Rubio declared „this is our hemisphere“ – this was never about drugs, it was resource theft and regional domination.
And spare me the „world’s worst actors“ rhetoric when Saudi Arabia (absolute monarchy, Khashoggi murder, Yemen genocide) and Egypt (military coup dictatorship) are top US allies – the „bad actors“ label is applied purely based on whether you align with Washington.
The real joke is the WSJ claiming Russia and China already violate international law so it’s fine if we do too, which obliterates the entire justification for supporting Ukraine – why should anyone respect sovereignty if America won’t? You can’t invoke Article 2(4) for Ukraine while shredding it in Venezuela.
Russia and China are taking notes, and when they make their next moves citing the Venezuela precedent, they’ll be logically correct.
For those of you on the left who support Maduro and his illegitimate Socialist party mafia government, the 8 major crimes that in combination support his arrest by force are:
1. Providing oil supplies and military aid to President Assad of Syria and his hard left Ba’ath Socialist government, directly helping Assad’s murderous government forces to gas, massacre or otherwise torture to death 500,000 Syrian old people, women and children.
2. Creating a shadow oil trading and financing hub, to „wash“ Russian oil and pass it off as unsanctioned Venezuela oil, to enable Russia to continue fund its invasion of Ukraine and directly causing the deaths of tens of thousands of Ukrainians.
3. Artificially soaring „murder“ rate to hide the face that government death squads are going around killing thousands of political opponents and dissidents each year in Venezuela, under the guise of „armed robbery“ or „home invasion“.
4. Creating a drug narcotics trading and financing hub, using the profits to fund Hezbollah and Hamas in joint venture with the Iranian government, to directly cause the deaths of hundreds of Israelis.
5. Threatening to invade and planning the invasion of neighbour country Guyana, and to steal their oil fields for personal gain.
6. Using a policy of hyperinflation to steal from Venezuelan people, particularly the poor, and impoverish the middle class, to weaken all domestic opposition.
The hyperinflationary economic collapse has led to a mass migration of 8 MILLION Venezuelan refugees to neighbouring countries and the US – with the taxpayers of these foreign countries having to pay for the welfare, while Maduro and his socialist cronies pocket the oil revenues.
7. State-sponsored antisemitism that has targetted the large Jewish population, reducing the number of Jewish Venezuelans by 90% from 40,000 to 4,000.
8. Signing deal with the Chinese Communist government to supply China with oil in the event China invades Taiwan.
Take over a region and you a criminal. Take over a country and you are a sovereign.