For several months, the U.S. Armed Forces have been gearing up for a potential invasion of Venezuela under the false pretext of stopping international drug trafficking.
In addition to the massive military buildup in the Caribbean, which is the largest since the beginning of the Iraq War, the United States has killed over 80 people via military strikes in international waters near Venezuela and Colombia since Sept. 2. The Trump Administration also seized an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela on Dec. 10.
Despite what the Department of Defense says about countering narco-terrorism, their motives are quite clear: Venezuela is the most oil-rich country in the world with approximately 303 billion barrels, trumping both Saudi Arabia and Russia—and the United States wants it. Even the leader of the anti-Maduro Venezuelan opposition-in-exile, Maria Corina Machado, knows its value, as she advocates for privatizing Venezuelan oil and selling it to U.S. corporations.
For Venezuelans, the threat of American intervention in their country is nothing new. It is no secret that the United States government has long been pro-regime change.
However, the sentiment of resistance to American imperialism is strong. On Nov. 25, tens of thousands of Venezuelans demonstrated their disapproval by marching to protest American hostility and to defend Venezuela’s right to national self-determination.
The Venezuelan government has also confirmed preparations for guerilla war in the event of an invasion, making the millions of Venezuelan civilians in the national militia an even more forceful deterrent to imperialist intervention.
It is clear that any attempted invasion of Venezuela will surely turn into another one of the United States’ “forever wars,” like Iraq, Afghanistan or Vietnam. Time and time again, American politicians fabricate a cause for war out of thin air—only to send thousands upon thousands of soldiers to go die for the profits of a few CEOs. After all, it was only last year when Yemeni rebels repelled the repeated attacks on them by the U.S. Military.
All Americans must then ask themselves if they truly want another permanent conflict. How many men and women will be sent to terrorize the people of Venezuela? How many of them will die there? When the war against Venezuela is lost—which it will be—who will take the blame?
The morally bankrupt bureaucrats in Congress and the Presidency have no answer to these questions.
A war for control over Venezuela’s natural resources is not in the American people’s interests. Consistent bipartisan advocacy for U.S. intervention in the Global South only serves to distract from the exploitation of workers and other oppressed minorities at home.
The terroristic endeavors of the United States in the Caribbean and Latin America must be resisted, both by the Venezuelan people and their sympathizers abroad. From Alexandria to Caracas, the people of the world must speak out about this injustice, must write to their representatives, must protest in the streets, must demand that the United States lift its sanctions on Venezuela and terminate any plans for military intervention there.
