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Comment by dubeux | Hacker News Reader

I get slightly desperate realizing how people are lead to such naive discussions, even in a place with supposedly instructed, informed persons. Maduro may be a dictator, a murderer, whatever. This has absolutely no relation with the reasons for US invading, bombing and killing Venezuelans, or whichever country. For about a century, US has been doing it all over the world, not because they wanna live in a better, peaceful world - quite the opposite, they've been doing it for supporting coups and stablishing dictatorships that favour their supremacy, their role as the most powerful country in the world. Do you really, really believe Mr. Donald is very concerned about the lives of poor venezuelans? Or, just to stay in the region, he supports El Salvador dictator because he's a very nice fellow?

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I don't understand what you're saying here. First, yep, countries act in self-interest. There's no war in the history of the planet that was started out of the kindness of one's heart. That doesn't mean that the outcome of a self-interested intervention can't be just or good for the country in the long haul. I don't know how this one will pan out, but I suspect that the interests of the US and of the citizens of Venezuela are aligned much more closely than, say, in the Middle East.

Second, you're portraying US as a malicious actor operating in a vacuum. The reality is that there's a fierce competition between superpowers to broaden their spheres of influence and ultimately control the world. There's no future in which a relatively small, resource-rich, and politically dysfunctional country is left to its own devices. The choice is between Russia, China, and the US. Venezuela was more or less one of the Russian client states, and that status quo was maintained through undemocratic means, including mass murder of political opponents using the military gear provided by RU. Now, the US is going to try its hand, probably in a far less brutal way.

The US regime hates Maduro because he kept Venezuelan oil nationalized so it can be benefit the Venezuelan people rather than foreign shareholders of oil companies. Although US sanctions intended to choke their economy and bring about regime change have made that difficult in practice.

The interests of the US imperialists and the Venezuelan people therefore could not be more diametrically opposed.

Nobody was benefiting from the oil nationalization, least of all the Venezuelan people. All their oil engineers left! You can't walk around Doral, Fl; Katy, Tx; or Alpharetta, Ga without tripping over young venezuelans with petroleum engineering degrees who have fled the poverty and repression of Maduro's Venezuela.

All this guessing is based on historical examples of results of US involvement in Americas, I presume?

I'm playing devil's advocate as a non-interventionist but Panama was considered successful.

Grenada as well. One of the more successful countries in the Antilles.

reality has been a rules based order where states voluntary agreements with each other, not spheres of influence.

this is a change to how russia wants the world to work

It is very much about spheres of influence. Look at China and ports in Africa. And Russia trying to mingle in militias and whatnot. The US is losing a huge amount of influence currently, due to how they treat former allies in Europe and currently due to inept leadership playing a losing game. Russia same. Russia couldn't even defend its border, if Europe collectively decided to invade, to make them finally shut up. But Russia got nukes. It might soon just be an oversized North Korea, if it continues getting decimated in Ukraine. The only winner currently is China, who is catching up with the US in influence and military fast.

> I don't understand what you're saying here.

You clearly did, US is acting out of pure self interest and pretending otherwise.

> Second, you're portraying US as a malicious actor operating in a vacuum

Invading a foreign nation, stealing their resources and imprisoning thier leader is a malicious act, no matter how you slice it.

Just because there are other competitors or good "may" come out of it (so you say), doesn't justify it.

The mental gymnastics by Americans to position themselves as "liberators", while bombing other countries and stealing their territory / resources is stunning.

So, the taken is, as China and Russia are very evil, it's OK if the US is evil (but just a bit less than the other actors).

I though they (the US?) were aiming to be better. Like, the "great" in MAGA wasn't like in "great empire". /s

I believe the argument is, this can simultaneously be a bad thing yet the best achievable outcome within the current reality.

In other words, the point is that the hypothetical good choice is not actually on the menu.

I will note a similarity to the US political situation with respect to people who, rather than choose the lesser of two evils, opt not to vote entirely.

Nevertheless, that doesn't mean humanity shouldn't strive for better.

It's a win-win, it's good for Venezuelans and US wants the country to become an ally. People behind the decision probably took both into account.

In principle, it's morally good to overthrow a dictator in some circumstances. The most obvious example is North Korea - if the US had the ability to transition that country into democracy with little risk of something going wrong, they should obviously do that.

> It's a win-win

Bold statement considering the history.

win-win: Panama, Grenada.

not win-win: Brazil, El Salvador, Bolivia, Iran, Nicaragua, Chile, Haiti, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya.

Fair point, it's not certain that this will be a win for Venezuelans. But I think it probably will be. Economically it can't get much worse.

Win-win: France, Germany, Korea...

> Win-win: France, Germany, Korea

These countries don't well match those on the overthrowing-the-dictator list, which now includes Venezuela.

For Germany we defeated it's government with a crap-ton of help, after Germany had declared war on us. For France we ousted an invading foreign power (again, with a crap ton of help). For the third we were effectively partitioning the country in prep for the proxy war with the Soviet Union.

Japan is also a good example. If the US is going to marshall aid (or the equivalent) Venezuela for the next many decades then I think it'll certainly be a win-win.

Unlikely to happen though. More likely they will just engage in resource extraction. The US doesn't have the mindset of the past any longer.

given that the US again intends to attack and conquer panama, i dont think you could consider that a win

I mean this kinda implies that there's a chance it could fail but failure basically is no worse than doing nothing?

Most of those examples were failed or problematic countries before and after US intervention. If there's a chance of sucess that's better than doing nothing no?

Well, last time the US intervened in my country it was to actually install a dictator that would benefit them.

It's too early to say it's a win-win situation.

Which country is that if I may ask?

Chile, if the parent's contact info is indicative.

There we backed the overthrow of Allende's government and installed Pinochet.

Who hired former nazi torturers to kill the left wing.

> Who hired former nazi torturers to kill the left wing.

I can't tell if this is a question or an assertion.

If it's a question, Pinochet utilized Nazis to torture people (ex:Colonia Dignidad) and had lots of leftists tortured and disappeared (too many to list here).

If it's an assertion, yeah.

Assertion. Walther Rauff.

About half of south America.

_The School of the Americas has entered the chat._[1]

1: https://open.spotify.com/episode/2N77mwUI0pDOBOP6gIknkU?si=9...

Almost listened to all episodes now. America sure used to have a lot of bastard, still do but used to too.

Love a good Mitch reference!

And I went through a year or two of binging from the beginning and caught up to present day a year or two ago, but took a break for Jamie Loftus stuff and Knowledge Fight, as well as Some More News and Cool People Who Did Cool Stuff to help balance the bummer lol

Knowledge fight would be interesting, but always balk at their episode count. Also watch some more news when they have something interesting. Basically everything from the frequent bastards guests.

Maybe you'll like the Blowback podcast.

I’ll put that on the list, thanks!

There is a _lot_ of KF there, I started that from the beginning and I’m close to episode 300…I shudder to think how much of my last two years has been Alex Jones content…but it’s fascinating. And frustrating that his whole shtick seems so transparent yet too complex to get through to people already wrapped up in it

chile based on the email address in profile

It’s surprising how hard it is for some people to understand this. Yes oil blah blah. A few billion bucks, but the much bigger picture is (at least in this theory) Venezuela gets a democracy and the U.S. gets a stable strategic partner in an important part of its back yard. I’m not evaluating it yet, but there is definitely a bull case for this move on the geopolitical level.

> Venezuela gets a democracy and the U.S. gets a stable strategic partner in an important part of its back yard.

They wishes are, at best, one possible outcome from a long list of possible outcomes.

The most obvious example is a fantasy in your mind.

The most obvious counter-example is the entire history of unilateral regime change.

The US has not conducted a successful nation building project since WWII. This is not a coincidence. We don't have the capability.

Killing the dictator is the easy part.

South Korea. And Eastern Europe in the 80s.

Which Eastern European nations did the US build in the 80s?

> The most obvious example is North Korea - if the US had the ability to transition that country into democracy with little risk of something going wrong, they should obviously do that.

So let's say they take out Kim jong Un...

Now you have a country where every living being from their birth has been trained that US is bad and their leader is like God on earth.

Your 'little risk of something going wrong' is wishful thinking or naive

> > So let's say they take out Kim jong Un...

It will never happen because Kim has nukes. All these regime changes starting from the Afghaninstan, through Saddam, through Gaddafi....now Maduro they are just teaching strongmen to get nukes as the only way to be safe from U.S. (or others) regime change

Wouldn’t NK say the same against US? Are we the good guys? Or they are? Or nobody?

NK is a dictatorship with concentration camps, where a small group of people has 20 million hostages. The US is a democracy. (For the record, I'm not American and I wanted Harris to become the president.)

The definition of democracy usually includes the rule of law, that no longer exists in USA. Trump declared himself to be dictator, and his handlers are having him act that way. They take no account of USA law, nor of international law, nor ethics of any religious group AFAICT.

Also, paying another country to run your concentration camps is no less evil.

The US government is not even in the same universe as NK in regard to what they do to their population.

Yet, we’re heading a dangerous path.

Ice could easily start rounding up citizens soon… I mean “domestic terrorists” which is how anyone opposing Trump could be labeled soon

If only it were that easy…

Overthrowing a dictator most often gets either a new dictator or years of brutal violence and turmoil

Were you in favor of the Iraq war?

This is "we don't let poor people have money because they'll only get fat if they have food to eat" levels of rhetoric.

USA military should be taking heed of their own country's laws before pretending to be enforcing laws in other countries in order to further enrich their oligarchy.

Sure, remove the NK dictator that USA is partly responsible for being put in to power ... but only with international agreement and a plan for rapid move to have open elections. USA is in no place to do this given the lack of democracy there.

Do you really believe the story about freeing Venezuelan's? You're in for a surprise then when USA rapes them for their oil.

How would you feel if Iran captures Trump, a convicted felon with no respect to the rule of the law, running crypto schemes from the office and with proved connections to a pedophile ring trafficking and planning for a 3rd therm and staying in the office for life?

I’m sure a lot of Americans will be celebrating it on the streets. Will that be a win win too?

I don't think Americans would celebrate on the streets but many would be secretly happy. How would I feel? Depends on what I think would be the consequences for the world.

You can know the consequences only in retrospect, not when its time to celebrate or not.

Is it?

"Trump announced US oil companies will rebuild Venezuelan oil industry

Oh would you look at that

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ZaKSfiOzCw

The US could be acting in their own interest and their actions could benefit Venezuelans at the same time. Venezuela has insane amounts of oil and could be the Saudi Arabia of south America. Why aren't they? Why are there food shortages there? Where's all the oil revenue going? Why isn't there more oil revenue?

A major factor is that Venezuela's oil is mostly heavier crude, which is denser and more viscous. This makes it costlier and more difficult to extract and refine, and usually sells for a lower price than lighter crude.

There's also rampant mismanagement, poor infrastructure, and sanctions affecting the output and outcomes. See also: "resource curse"

Well it could have something to do with the US previous involvement in Venezuela dating back over 100 years.

Sometimes bad people do the wrong thing for the wrong reasons, but there is some good aspect to it.

Based on where I was born and my background, I should not know as much as I do about Venezuela. Improbably, life led me to develop close ties to some Venezuelans, and with them as a window, I've learned a lot about that country.

In this case, the people of Venezuela are desperate to get rid of their socialist government. It has, predictably and inevitably, led them directly to poverty, starvation, and violent repression.

I have a lot of reservations about the way in which Trump is operating and in this case, the legality of every aspect of how he is doing this operation in Venezuela. Despite all those reservations, this is a rare situation where this action benefits everyone and the world.

HN comments is a heavily biased and propagandized place. The most moderate opinion you'll find here will be something like "actually Venezuelans are happy that they are being bombed by the US!"

> The most moderate opinion you'll find here will be something like

The large majority of what I'm seeing is from the other side of the aisle.

Literally the top comment of the post right now is saying that a lot of Venezuelans are happy and that Maduro is bad

Yeah, what a weird comment...

Have you considered that it might not be HN being propagandized but instead all other social medias from which you likely use to construct your worldview? It would be an incredible waste of time to try and sway opinion here on global politics.

Out of all the sources I'm checking with different political biases this is one of the few places that people are so desperately trying to frame a country bombing another country to steal their oil as something good

Trump just literally announced that oil companies are coming to get the Oil of Venezuela. Sorry, everything else was naive to believe.

Ironic comment. El Salvador’s president has extremely high approval ratings and was definitely elected democratically. The US hasn’t ousted a democratically elected government since the end of the Cold War (as far as I know).

Could it be because democratically elected governments are becoming a thing of the past?

Uh what? I’m all about American hegemony but let’s not stupid.

Mossadegh Arbenz Allende Goulart Lumunba And Maduro was elected as well though you can go on with it being corrupt if you want.

These are just the ones we directly overthrew who were elected. There are 20 more or so we’ve done so indirectly.

You missed the part of my comment that said “since the Cold War”. All of your examples are during the Cold War, of course. (Other than Maduro, and I don’t think most people believe he was democratically elected.)

Uh you had ww2 there first no?

Nope, you can confirm you misread

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