[brendanyounger]

For anyone outside the US, exactly 0% of the populace is interested in a confrontation with Venezuela. This looks like an unpopular president eager for a rally around the troops moment and possibly taking over oil fields to reward his supporters in the petroleum industry.

[lovich]

It’s 0% until he says it’s good and then there will be a solid 40% of the population all for it

[dmurray]

Once an invasion is happening, a majority of the population will be in favour of it.

It was true when Nixon first spoke of a silent majority. It was true when the US elected leader after leader on a platform of prolonging or escalating wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Even WWII wasn't popular in America until you were in it:

https://news.gallup.com/vault/265865/gallup-vault-opinion-st...

[JumpCrisscross]

You’re comparing pre-Watergate, on one hand, and post-9/11, on the other hand, America to a country, today, that’s has strong elements in both parties that are furious about our track record and costs of foreign interventions.

[pessimizer]

Yet that furiousness hasn't ever delayed either of the parties for going on wars of adventure for even a moment. We made Al Qaeda a financial dependent within 20 years of 9/11. We funded Nazi militias to topple a government in order to harass a nearby enemy, who they think of as the Asiatic-Jewish-Muslim invader they want to fight off with pork, and whose language-speakers they'd like to ethnically cleanse from their country. We went out of our way to intervene and hold together a dangerously unstable apartheid state, and basically gave it a stake in our government. We're monsters.

The only unforced delay there has been on a military adventure since Bush Sr. pulled out of Iraq was Obama resisting interventions in Syria and Ukraine that were being heavily lobbied for by both his and his opposite party. Immediately reversed once he had one foot out of the door, and he had made up for it by bombing everyone else.

America, and I mean its electorate, finds joy in murdering nonwhite children, or Slavs, or really anybody that speaks in a language that sounds funny or gutteral. It makes us feel safe. They'll know not to mess with us, because they know we're not afraid to murder even the most innocent and saintly civilians. We'll give them the Nobel Peace Prize and kill them 10 years later. We'll give people the Nobel Prize who kill children. We'll hear about atrocities in Venezuela and wonder how we should invest.

[whimsicalism]

> Yet that furiousness hasn't ever delayed either of the parties for going on wars of adventure for even a moment.

This seems difficult to falsify. I can think of a number of recent post-9/11 potential flashpoints that have been avoided by politicians due to the current unpopularity of foreign intervention.

[lovich]

Once boots are on the ground, yea. I mean literally within 24 hours of him saying it’s good, 40% of the population will be for it even if we haven’t fired a bullet or sent in troops

[delfinom]

The far right podcasters and influencers have already been spending a week on saying its a good thing, that Venezuela is funding all the drug cartels and gangs in the US.

[jrs235]

Now the stupidity and comments around renaming the Department of Defense to the Department of War makes more sense. Seems if he can't win a Peace Prize he'll opt for a war one.

[collingreen]

Gosh, a couple weeks ago it was Canada and before that it was China! Who knew there were so many places that were the main source of all our problems. /s

[tick_tock_tick]

Ehh I think that phrasing doesn't really capture reality. It's better to say most of the USA population just doesn't care. Like if we started bombing them tomorrow everyone's going to go about their day maybe make a social media post about it but forget about it by the evening.

It will be like when Obama started bombing Libya or Syria. It's in the news but the average person doesn't care or retain that information.

Now if he tries a full ground invasion.....

[thisislife2]

Not sure that Americans (or even Europeans) don't (or wouldn't) care about it.

What I have personally observed is that there is really a strong moral dichotomy between western politicians and their citizens to such things. Most western politicians don't seem to really care about the brutality of warfare, and accept it as given and necessary for their (superpower-) politics. The people however do not hold to this. Considering them as two distinct entities does offer a better political perspective about a western country.

You can see this in the ongoing genocide in Gaza - there have been multiple, large protests in both US and Europe in the last 2+ years, and most western States have often tended to clamp down hard on the protests and the media to suppress it. Abuse of State power, by using antisemitism laws and even terrorism (see Why opposing Israel's genocide got me arrested for terrorism - https://www.middleeasteye.net/opinion/why-opposing-israels-g... ), against the protestors has also been a feature. Note that the politicians aren't ignorant, and recognize that there is genuine anger, if not discomfort, in the population to what is happening in Gaza. But most believe that suppressing these protests, along with some public platitudes ("yes, what is happening is horrible", "ceasefire is necessary", "aid should be allowed" etc. etc) but not doing anything really substantial or meaningful (i.e. taking actual action towards this) is enough to "pacify" the population. In some ways, it has been - despite public anger in the west to the Gaza genocide, most western superpowers have gotten away with doing nothing. But there have been political miscalculations too - sparks of these anger did give a burn to Biden / Harris in the US as some American democrats saw through their hollow platitudes and lack of honesty, and did not vote for them, contributing to Trump's victory ( see https://politics.stackexchange.com/q/89703 ).

This is why, in my opinion, we now see some European States rushing to recognize the State of Palestine, another public gesture that has high PR value but is meaningless in political substance (it is mostly meaningless as more than 80% or so of the world already recognize it as a State; but despite this, Palestine is still not allowed to even be a UN member - the US used its veto against the General Assembly to deny it membership). So I wouldn't say that western people don't care ... the politicians don't, and some of them do pay the (democratic) price of it.

[tick_tock_tick]

Gaza is the exception rather then the norm. I don't want to say propaganda because that implies some moral value on the campaign to make it relevant but lets be clear there is a campaign it's not organic in any way. Without said efforts Gaza would have been treated just like Libya or Syria. Probably worse because of Oct 7th.

> In some ways, it has been - despite public anger in the west to the Gaza genocide, most western superpowers have gotten away with doing nothing.

What do you mean gotten away with? In the USA right by are large fine with the events happening and the only people on the left who are anger barely both to vote on a good day. I absolutely think if Harris had come out firmly condemning Israel her lose would have been even more dramatic.

There are no other "western superpowers" Europe is completely ineffective and has to rely upon the USA even for things literally on their doorstep. Which is why they do meaning less PR moves like recognizing them for statehood.

[thisislife2]

What do you mean gotten away with? - Meaning that by not taking concrete political actions, they are tacitly supporting the genocide by Israel. (By western superpowers, I mean US, UK and France).

[tick_tock_tick]

I mean how is that gotten away with? Your statement implies the western governments have gotten one over their people rather then just following the will of the voters (voters not people).

[thisislife2]

Yes, that is what I am implying. Even Trump pretended to care about Gaza, during his campaign. (But his political actions are all to the contrary, after becoming President). This highlights how even his campaign managers were acutely aware that he couldn't stand on a platform openly supporting Israel's genocide, if he wanted to win.

[voidfunc]

That's some heavy copium. Trust me, there are definitely some that want this.

[lupusreal]

How many of those people wanted it before they were told they do? 99% of Americans can't even point to Venezuela on a map.

[voidfunc]

No idea. Doesn't really matter tho does it? These are the same people 20 years ago that wanted to glass the Middle East.

Theres always been a strong war hawk position in American culture.

[lupusreal]

I do think there's a difference. Unfortunately a very large number of Americans have cult-related beliefs about the supposed importance of Middle Eastern affairs. There was genuine "grassroot" support for involvement there; so there was at least a genuine element of the government doing what the American people wanted from it.

With Venezuela, I believe that only a tiny portion of Americans had a preexisting desire for military intervention. This is a case of the government driving democracy in reverse by telling people what to believe. It's a far worse breakdown of democracy than the Middle East wars.

[delichon]

He wasn't quiet about it in the campaign. Presumably it was part of the package a plurality voted for.

https://www.donaldjtrump.com/agenda47/president-donald-j-tru...

  * Deploy all necessary military assets, including the U.S. Navy, to impose a full naval embargo on the cartels, to ensure they cannot use our region’s waters to traffic illicit drugs to the U.S.

From that it seems that embargos of Venezuela, El Salvador and Mexico are on the table.

[jleyank]

Given that it’s a big continent you’ll have to embargo south or Central America. Maybe both. Easier to put a barrier around the us.

[lupusreal]

Trump wags the dog. He has to be vocal about it to get his supporters to agree with it. Otherwise they'd be asking why we're starting another approach foreign war.

[voidfunc]

Glassing is different than conquering. I know folks that straight up support just killing everyone and everything there once and for all. Or at least they think that will solve the problem.

[lupusreal]

I can confirm that nuke em all attitudes towards the middle east are prevalent in America. Nobody could say the American people themselves didn't have a hand in starting those wars.

[moribvndvs]

If you portray yourself as a strongman, you have to do dipshit strongman stuff. Weirdly a thing Trump didn’t lean too hard into first term.

[idiomat9000]

Bush did not get his money worth from iraqs oilfields. The us is a netto exporter. Venezuela has nothing of value.

Its just another russian outpost sending refugee waves to support right wing parties in n asymetric wars.

Get a better narrative , your whole paranoid fever dream doesn't make sense..

[2OEH8eoCRo0]

I hate Trump but I'd be open to an Operation Just Cause 2.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_invasion_of_Pana...

[janice1999]

Why? Panama was a dictatorship ruled by a drugs lord in the 1980s. It's now a democratic country with competitive elections and orderly rotations of power.

[Manuel_D]

Presumably the above commenter is referring to an analogous intervention in Venezuela, not Panama.

[BryantD]

You know, you’re right and I totally missed the point.

If we want to assess the chances of a US intervention in Latin America producing good results, we should probably include the results of Operation Condor in our analysis.

[BryantD]

I would not say that Venezuela is currently having orderly rotations of power. Since the 2015 parliamentary elections, we've seen at least one constitutional crisis and the most recent election results are disputed.

I do not particularly think it's a good idea for the US to invade in order to overthrow Maduro, but I don't want to pretend he's more ethical than he appears to be.

[2OEH8eoCRo0]

Trump alleges that Venezuela is a dictatorship ruled by a drug lord.

[lupusreal]

It probably is, but why should anybody in America care? All intervention will do is drive America's international reputation even further negative, and probably cause a new wave of refugees (and people opportunistically claiming to be refugees) into America.

[IAmGraydon]

You were talking about Operation Just Cause, which was Panama, not Venezuela.

[sofixa]

It's extra funny because Noriega was in power in large parts due to him being useful to the US/CIA.

[janice1999]

Just like the Taliban.

[whimsicalism]

sure, we can send you on over

[2OEH8eoCRo0]

I've been to Afghanistan twice. Now I'm old.

[standardUser]

And that worked out so well that you want more US-led wars?

[yablak]

Afghanistan will do that to you

[JumpCrisscross]

We don’t need to depose Maduro. We need him, ironically, to stop creating problems outside his borders.

That means to withdraw from the Guyanese border. And to do something about his drug and emigration problems. The former could be achieved from offshore. The latter requires boots on the ground.

All of which is irrelevant because the only reason this is happening is to deflect from Epstein and and the deteriorating economy.

[whatsupdog]

I, for one, support the administration on this one. So your "exactly 0%" stat is totally wrong. What's you source? "Trust me bro"?

[lupusreal]

Why?