An “aggressor” tag is not new to the United States of America. That the US acts, de facto, as the global police, targeting those that are on its wrong side, has been well-documented. Adding to this, President Donald Trump got away with the worst provocation in geopolitical engagements on Saturday. The elected head of Venezuela, left-wing leader Nicolas Maduro, was dragged out of his bedroom along with his wife and then blindfolded and handcuffed in a US Naval ship before he was flown to New York by the elite Delta Forces of the American military. This was followed by Trump’s declaration that the US would now run Venezuela. The stated charge is that the leftwing Venezuelan government was facilitating drug trafficking to the US. Notably, the US bombings on boats “carrying” drugs to the US shores had killed over 115 persons; and a US court has indicted Maduro on drug trafficking charges.
That the Venezuelan opposition, backed by the US, had accused Maduro of rigging in the parliamentary polls there also formed the backdrop for the present US offensive. Yet, the real reason for the present provocation appears to be Uncle Sam’s greed to grab Venezuela’s oil wealth – the world’s largest, forming some 18 per cent of the total; and of which the country could tap only one per cent due to infrastructural inadequacies. Trump has stated as much and claims the US would now address this problem. It, however, matters little that Venezuela’s traditional ally Russia has condemned Trump’s action. Obviously, the US president chose a time when Vladimir Putin is seriously handicapped, caught as he is in a never-ending military conflict with tiny Ukraine. There’s little that Russia can do now to protect Venezuela’s territorial integrity. Nor can the United Nations step in or act effectively to help Maduro. The UN is proving to be increasingly ineffective in checking usurpations and recurrence of wars; and it’s more ineffective when it comes to disciplining the US. Worse, Trump is a hard nut to crack. The US had gone hammer and tongs against Iraq and its long-serving leader Saddam Hussein at the start of this century, and unseated and liquidated him. Americans invaded Afghanistan after the World Tower bombing. Yet, in both countries, they eventually left governance in the hands of natives and quit for good.
What would happen now in Venezuela is worth a watch. Trump got back to power a year ago with an aggressive mindset. He had the gumption to call the Canadian prime minister “governor” Trudeau – the obvious hint being that he considered Canada a US province. The abrasive act of aggression on Venezuela takes global diplomacy to a new (pitiable) normal – a scenario of might is right. Norms of territorial integrity have been thrown to the winds. However, for a nation like India or China, the saving grace is their population bulge. No one can take them for granted. Yet, the Trump effect on India was there for all to see — in the abrupt end to India’s Operation Sindoor, without it obviously achieving any end.
