Tag: venezuela

Bipartisan senators to force vote blocking ‘unauthorized war’ in Venezuela

A group of bipartisan senators will force a vote on a War Powers Resolution to block the use of force by American troops within or against Venezuela after President Trump raised the possibility of attacks against Nicolás Maduro’s regime.

The measure is being led by Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.), a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) are co-sponsors. 

Trump said Wednesday he had authorized the CIA to carry out covert operations inside Venezuela, saying he was focused on “land” operations and raising the specter the president is looking to remove Maduro from power.  

“The American people do not want to be dragged into endless war with Venezuela without public debate or a vote. We ought to defend what the Constitution demands: deliberation before war,” Paul said in a statement. 

The effort marks the second time senators have sought to block Trump’s buildup of force in the Caribbean Sea. A vote on a War Powers Resolution last week failed 48-51, although it garnered support from Paul and one other Republican, Sen. Lisa Murkowski (Alaska).

“Americans don’t want to send their sons and daughters into more wars—especially wars that carry a serious risk of significant destabilization and massive new waves of migration in our hemisphere,” Kaine said in a statement. 

“If my colleagues disagree and think a war with Venezuela is a good idea, they need to meet their constitutional obligations by making their case to the American people and passing an Authorization for Use of Military Force. I urge every senator to join us in stopping this Administration from dragging our country into an unauthorized and escalating military conflict.”

Keep reading

Siege of Venezuela Escalates With Strategic Bombers Over the Caribbean, as Trump Administration Reportedly Unleashes CIA Covert Operations on Venezuela, Including Lethal Action

The conflict is in the air, in the sea, and in the shadows.

Today (15) was an eventful day in the Caribbean Sea, where the Naval siege on Venezuela keeps a steady pressure on the Socialist country.

During the morning, three United States Air Force B-52H Strategic Bombers were spotted over International Waters off the coast of Venezuela.

U.S. BOMBERS FLEX NUCLEAR MUSCLE NEAR VENEZUELA

In a sky-shattering flex that screams regime-crushing thunder, 2 USAF B-52H Stratofortress behemoths blitzed the southern Caribbean just 100~240 miles from Caracas.

“In a sky-shattering flex that screams regime-crushing thunder, 2 USAF B-52H Stratofortress behemoths blitzed the southern Caribbean just 100~240 miles from Caracas. They orbited for hours in a blatant missile drill that has Maduro’s dictatorship sweating apocalypse. Venezuelan F-16s scrambled like cornered rats, echoes of Trump’s anti-narco hammer.

Launched from Barksdale AFB with a shadowy tagalong, the 60-year-old nuclear titans, modded for cruise-missile hellfire, ghosted over Cuba and Mexico before locking onto Venezuela’s coast. They vanished in transponder blackouts that screamed stealth strike simulations, only to resurface gunning south in loops off La Orchila military isle.

The flight drew 5,000 trackers and ignited global panic as Caracas screamed ‘provocation!’ The Pentagon stonewalls it as ‘routine training’, but insiders whisper Trump’s lethal boat strikes, 5 dead last week, 6 this month, are escalating the shadow war.

The B-52s’ 1,600-mile AGM-86 Armageddon range puts Maduro’s palace squarely in the crosshairs.”

That led Caracas to scramble F-16s from El Libertador Air Base to respond to US B-52 bombers’ presence.

Keep reading

President Trump Authorizes CIA To Conduct Lethal Covert Action in Venezuela

The Trump administration has authorized the CIA to take covert action inside Venezuela, including lethal operations, The New York Times reported on Wednesday, as the administration’s push toward regime change heats up.

President Trump later confirmed that he authorized the covert action and said the US was considering attacks on Venezuelan territory. “We are certainly looking at land now, because we’ve got the sea very well under control,” he said.

US officials told the Times that the authority allows the CIA to take action against Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro or his government, either unilaterally or in conjunction with the US military. The report said it is not known whether the CIA is currently planning operations inside Venezuela or if the authority will be used for future plans.

The US military has been drawing up plans to launch strikes on Venezuelan territory and potentially capture strategic ports and airfields, actions that would almost certainly lead to a full-blown war. The US military campaign in the region has so far involved a buildup of warships and about 10,000 US troops in the Caribbean and strikes on five boats that the US has claimed, without providing evidence, were running drugs.

Keep reading

US Bombs Another Boat Off the Coast of Venezuela, Trump Claims Six ‘Narcoterrorists’ Killed

The US military has bombed another boat off the coast of Venezuela, according to a statement from President Trump, who claimed, without providing evidence, that the vessel was carrying drugs.

The president also claimed that the strike killed “six male narcoterrorists,” bringing the total number of people extrajudicially executed by the US military since the bombing campaign started on September 2 to 27. The Trump administration has not presented any evidence to Congress to back up its allegations that the boats it has been bombing were carrying drugs or that the victims were “narcoterrorists,” a term used to justify the killings.

“Under my Standing Authorities as Commander-in-Chief, this morning, the Secretary of War, ordered a lethal kinetic strike on a vessel affiliated with a Designated Terrorist Organization (DTO) conducting narcotrafficking in the USSOUTHCOM area of responsibility — just off the Coast of Venezuela,” Trump wrote on Truth Social on Tuesday.

“Intelligence confirmed the vessel was trafficking narcotics, was associated with illicit narcoterrorist networks, and was transiting along a known DTO route. The strike was conducted in International Waters, and six male narcoterrorists aboard the vessel were killed in the strike. No U.S. Forces were harmed. Thank you for your attention to this matter!!!!!!” he added.

The president’s post included a video that appeared to show a boat that wasn’t moving getting struck with a missile, then exploding.

The latest US strike on a boat in the Caribbean comes amid reports that the Trump administration is considering bombing Venezuela as part of an effort to oust Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. The administration is using drug trafficking allegations as a pretext to push for regime change in the country and could potentially take military action directly against Maduro.

In response to the pressure, Maduro and his top officials have denied the drug trafficking allegations by pointing to data that shows the majority of the cocaine that is produced in Colombia doesn’t go through Venezuela. President Trump has framed the military campaign in the region as a response to overdose deaths in the US due to fentanyl, but fentanyl isn’t produced in Venezuela, and it does not go through the country on its way to the US.

Keep reading

Why we need to take Trump’s Drug War very seriously

Donald Trump has long been a fan of using the U.S. military to wage a more vigorous war against drug cartels in Latin America. He also shows signs of using that justification as a pretext to oust regimes considered hostile to other U.S. interests.

The most recent incident in the administration’s escalating antidrug campaign took place on October 3 when “Secretary of War” Mike Hegseth announced that U.S. naval forces had sunk yet another small boat off of the coast of Venezuela. It was one of four destroyed vessels and a total of 21 people killed since late September. The administration claims they were all trying to ship illegal drugs to the United States.

Colombian president Gustavo Petro said publicly Wednesday that one of the vessels was carrying Columbian citizens and that they were killed. Two administration officials confirmed to the New York Times that Colombians were on one of the boats blown out of the water. The White House called Petro’s claims “baseless” and “reprehensible.”

However, Trump’s enthusiasm for the military option in the war on drugs long predates this episode. Mike Esper, who served as secretary of defense during the final stages of Trump’s first term, relayed in his memoirs that the president had seriously explored the option of conducting missile strikes against suspected traffickers in Mexico. Esper recalled that his boss asked him at least twice in 2020 about the feasibility of launching missiles into Mexico to “destroy the drug labs” and wipe out the cartels.

The president considered such a drastic step to be justified because Mexican leaders were “not in charge of their own country.”

Esper’s account is not the only evidence of Trump’s enthusiasm for the military option. After a 2019 incident in which cartel gunmen massacred a family of American Mormon ex-pats in northwest Mexico, Trump reacted with a tweet insisting that “this is the time for Mexico, with the help of the United States, to wage WAR (sic) on the drug cartels and wipe them off the face of the earth. We merely await a call from your great new president!” He added: “If Mexico needs or requests help in cleaning out these monsters, the United States stands ready, willing & able to get involved and do the job quickly and effectively.”

Keep reading

Maduro Offered the US Access To Venezuela’s Oil and Mineral Resources To Avoid War

The government of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro had offered the US access to Venezuela’s oil, minerals, and other natural resources as part of a potential deal to avoid conflict, The New York Times reported on Friday.

The report said talks on the potential deal went on for months despite the US increasing military pressure on Venezuela and bombing boats in the Caribbean, but they have ceased since President Trump recently ordered his special envoy, Ric Grenell, to halt diplomatic efforts with the Venezuelan government.

Under the potential deal, Venezuela was willing to open up all existing and future oil and gold projects to US companies and give preferential contracts to US businesses. The report said Maduro was also willing to make other significant concessions concerning Venezuela’s relationship with other countries, including reversing the flow of Venezuelan oil exports from China to the US, and ending contracts with Chinese, Russian, and Iranian firms.

Maduro’s government has also continued accepting US deportation flights despite the military tensions. According to ICE Flight Monitor, a group that tracks US deportation flights, since February, the US has deported more than 10,000 Venezuelans on 58 flights, including nine that landed since the US bombed its first alleged drug-running boat in the Caribbean on September 2.

An official familiar with the issue told The Wall Street Journal last week that Venezuela remained “one of the best relationships” the US has had on deportations.

The Trump administration has permitted some trade with Venezuela by reinstating Chevron’s license to pump oil in the country in July, but US officials seem determined to escalate. Multiple media reports have said the US is now considering launching direct airstrikes on Venezuelan territory and that the real US goal is regime change, though it’s being dressed up as a counter-narcotics operation.

Keep reading

Russia accuses US of planning coup in Venezuela

Russian Ambassador to the UN Vassily Nebenzia has accused the US of plotting a coup in Venezuela under the guise of an anti-drug campaign.

Washington has deployed marines and warships off of Venezuela’s coast and has carried out airstrikes on alleged drug-smuggling vessels. At least four boats have been sunk, killing more than 21 people. Caracas condemned the move as a violation of its sovereignty and requested an emergency UN Security Council session, warning the operation sought to topple President Nicolas Maduro and threatened regional peace.

At the session on Friday, Nebenzia said Russia “strongly condemned” the US campaign, calling it “a flagrant violation of international law and human rights.”

“We are witnessing a brazen campaign of political, military, and psychological pressure on the government of an independent state with the sole purpose of changing a regime unfavorable to the US,” he stated, noting that the coup plot is being carried out “using the classic tools of color revolutions and hybrid wars” by “artificially fueling an atmosphere of confrontation.”

Keep reading

US ‘war on drugs’ is just another regime change attempt

The United States is once again targeting Venezuela, in Washington’s long quest for regime change in the country.

What the Trump administration falsely claims is a war against so-called Venezuelan drug smugglers, has seen the extrajudicial killings of 21 Venezuelans in the past few weeks. US troops, aircraft and warships have been moved near Venezuelan waters, which some fear indicates a coming US war on the country.

The US military made several separate attacks over the course of the past month on boats US President Donald Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth have claimed were carrying drugs “enroute to poison Americans”. Neither Trump nor Hegseth provided any evidence or the specific locations of the incidents.

One would think that the legally appropriate way to deal with drug traffickers (if that is in fact what the Venezuelans were to begin with) would be to arrest them and put them on trial. Instead, the men were killed on sight, apparently with missiles that also conveniently destroyed all the evidence. Trump’s justification was to claim they were “extraordinarily violent drug trafficking cartels and narcoterrorists” and that they “POSE A THREAT to U.S. National Security, Foreign Policy, and vital U.S. Interests.”

To sum it up, we have extrajudicial assassinations in international waters, without congressional approval.

Furthermore, on September 12, 18 armed US personnel from the US Navy destroyer USS Jason Dunham boarded and occupied a local tuna fishing vessel Carmen Rosa for 8 hours in Venezuelan waters, in yet another direct provocation of Caracas.

Keep reading

When Presidents Kill

During the past six weeks, President Donald Trump has ordered U.S. troops to attack and destroy four speed boats in the Caribbean Sea, 1,500 miles from the United States. The president revealed that the attacks were conducted without warning, were intended not to stop but to kill all persons on the boats, and succeeded in their missions.

Trump has claimed that his victims are “narco-terrorists” who were planning to deliver illegal drugs to willing American buyers. He apparently believes that because these folks are presumably foreigners, they have no rights that he must honor and he may freely kill them. As far as we know, none of these nameless, faceless persons was charged or convicted of any federal crime. We don’t know if any were Americans. But we do know that all were just extrajudicially executed.

Can the president legally do this? In a word: NO. Here is the backstory.

Limiting Federal Powers

The U.S. Constitution was ratified to establish federal powers and to limit them.
Congress is established to write the laws and to declare war. The president is established to enforce the laws that Congress has written and to be commander-in-chief of the armed forces.

Restraints are imposed on both. Congress may only enact legislation in the 16 discrete areas of governance articulated in the Constitution — and it may only legislate subject to all persons’ natural rights identified and articulated in the Bill of Rights.

The president may only enforce the laws that Congress has written — he cannot craft his own. And he may employ the military only in defense of a real imminent military-style attack or to fight wars that Congress has declared.

The Constitution prohibits the president from fighting undeclared wars, and federal law prohibits him from employing the military for law enforcement purposes.

The Fifth Amendment — in tandem with the 14th, which restrains the states — assures that no person’s life, liberty or property may be taken without due process of law. Because the drafters of the amendment used the word “person” instead of “citizen,” the courts have ruled consistently that this due process requirement is applicable to all human beings.

Basically, wherever the government goes, it is subject to constitutional restraints.

Tribunal Trial

Traditionally, due process means a trial. In the case of a civilian, it means a jury trial, with the full panoply of attendant protections required by the Constitution.
In the case of enemy combatants, it means a fair neutral tribunal.

The tribunal requirement came about in an odd and terrifying way. In 1942, four Nazi troops arrived via submarine at Amagansett Beach, New York, and exchanged their uniforms for civilian garb. At nearly the same time, four other Nazi troops arrived via submarine at Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, and also donned civilian clothing. All eight set about their assigned task of destroying American munitions factories and infrastructure. After one of them went to the F.B.I., all eight were arrested.

At trial, all eight were convicted of attempted sabotage behind enemy lines — a war crime. The Supreme Court quickly returned to Washington from its summer vacation and unanimously upheld the convictions. By the time the court issued its formal opinion, six of the eight had been executed. The two Americans were sentenced to life in prison. Their sentences were commuted five years later by President Harry Truman.

Keep reading

Trump has yet to provide Congress hard evidence that targeted boats carried drugs, officials say

The Trump administration has yet to provide underlying evidence to lawmakers proving that alleged drug-smuggling boats targeted by the U.S. military in a series of fatal strikes were in fact carrying narcotics, according to two U.S. officials familiar with the matter.

As bipartisan frustration with the strikes mounts, the Republican-controlled Senate on Wednesday voted down a war powers resolution that would have required the president to seek authorization from Congress before further military strikes on the cartels.

The military has carried out at least four strikes on boats that the White House said were carrying drugs, including three it said originated from Venezuela. It said 21 people were killed in the strikes.

The officials, who were not authorized to comment publicly about the matter and spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the administration has only pointed to unclassified video clips of the strikes posted on social media by President Donald Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and has yet to produce “hard evidence” that the vessels were carrying drugs.

The administration has not explained why it has blown up vessels in some cases, while carrying out the typical practice of stopping boats and seizing drugs at other times, one of the officials said.

Keep reading