[crazybonkersai]

It is shocking how openly US planning a war of aggression against Venezuela and the whole civilized world is just fine with it. EU could grow a pair and show the US that this type of behaviour is not accepted. Sanction the fuck out of the US regime, boot off Swift, kick American companies out of the EU market, barren American citizens from travelling to EU. EU can prevent this war, while it is not too late.

[oersted]

While I like the sentiment, we have to be somewhat pragmatic. The sanctions on Russia have had a deep impact on the EU economy, mainly the energy crisis and other connected systemic consequences. Germany and much of central and eastern EU became highly dependent on Russian natural gas over the last 20 years, and higher energy prices in general have been quite harmful to the already precarious industrial and agricultural sectors (high-tech farming as in NL, while quite profitable, is very energy intensive and sensitive to tightening margins).

Most of EU (and UK) is on (or near) recession right now, except for some southern EU countries which are doing surprisingly well, although relative to a long period of hardship after the 2008 crisis. It's not an acute recession, but there's no clear way out of this stagnation on the horizon, and the people are really starting to feel the squeeze.

Of course, the root cause of this is much deeper, the Russia situation was just the spark. EU industry has been complacent for decades, believing that while less competitive on costs and scale we still had the technological edge, which ironically led to severe underinvestment in R&D. And giving up on nuclear is backfiring badly too.

I do think the (shrinking) majority still believes that the (limited) actions against Russia were worthwhile, since they are not threatening sovereignty in general, they are threatening EU's territorial integrity at our doorstep. It is unacceptable, and while it is a heavy price, not retaliating would have much more catastrophic consequences.

But cutting off trade with US over Venezuela? Forget about it, EU's dependency on US is orders of magnitude higher than it was with Russia, it would be absolutely deadly to the EU economy.

[wiseowise]

Last time I've checked it was Pax Americana, not Pax Europeana.

> Checks registration date and comments

Ah, right, another Russian bot.

[farseer]

The EU is fine with it, because there are no principles in geo-politics. All their hue and cry about Ukraine is also because of their own security, not any virtue. Laughably it was the EU that went along with US plans to deorbit Ukraine from Russia's influence.

The only way for Venezuela to survive is to play dirty and be cunning/resourceful just like their Ukrainian counterparts fighting for their life.

[realusername]

You make it sound like it's a bad thing, being the subject of weekly nuclear threats and invasion threats like the EU is is a valid reason on its own to support Ukraine.

[drysine]

>being the subject of weekly ... invasion threats like the EU is

It is?

[realusername]

Yes it is, it happens almost every week.

3 days ago : https://www.politico.eu/article/medvedev-threatens-eu-freaks...

[drysine]

I see nothing about invasion there.

[realusername]

> Russia would pursue them in "all possible international and national courts ... and in some cases, extrajudicially,"

It's a textbook terrorist threat.

[Attrecomet]

Yes, Russian politicians like to voice ideas like that or just nuking EU cities. not sure if those are a weekly occurence, but its happened a couple of times this year, from officials mind you, so I wouldn't be surprised if state-run media or even just cranks that Putin likes to run for-out ideas through have weekly "Russians! We need to overrun the decadent EU" articles run...

[drysine]

A citation would be appropriate. Include the context too, like "If the EU sends troops in the Ukraine..."

[bojan]

> The only way for Venezuela to survive is to play dirty and be cunning/resourceful just like their Ukrainian counterparts fighting for their life.

You are trying very hard to make the situations sound similar, but they are not.

Ukraine is a democracy, Venezuela is not.

The scope of the attacks are entirely different. Still doesn't justify what Trump is doing, of course.

[vkou]

The scope of the attacks are entirely different. Putin's imperial adventures are driven by Ruso-dominated pan-slavism, Trump's are driven by oil. Entirely different, just like a tiger shark is different from a tiger. /s

Both also do it to distract from domestic problems with their regimes.

[Attrecomet]

I also wonder why the EU should invest a significant amount of political, economical and hard military power to protect a failing dictatorship?

Make no mistake, the EU is not "fine" with the war in the sense that they will express diplomatic criticism of the US when Trump finally starts his idiotic (and narcissistic, and corrupt, but I already said "Trump") war. They are "fine" with it in the sense that they won't self-implode their collective political careers and perhaps the EU itself by sanctioning the US and destroying the economy of the entire EU for fucking Maduro. Doing that would be idiocy.

[sigwinch]

Well, Guadaloupe, Martinique and Curaçao are part of the EU.

[Attrecomet]

And Belarus borders EU countries, but nobody throws a fit if the EU doesn't sanction Putin for making Lukaschenko suck him off. And wouldn't throw a fit if Putin decided his Lapdog needed to go.

[sigwinch]

I guess, in order to object to the Russian drone overflights, maybe they have to object to US refueling over Curaçao.

[mongol]

EU can't prevent this war.

[crazybonkersai]

Not with this kind of attitude for sure. EU can at least send a strong signal by doing concrete actions. Sanctions against American corporations and individuals, travel restrictions, SWIFT ban. These will make Trump think twice before waging acts of unprovoked aggression.

[mongol]

EU has to focus on its hostile neighbour to the east. I can see you are no fan of the EU but be realistic

[farseer]

Sanctions against someone they need to contain Russia?

[nusl]

Trump and the US has never shown to care about this. The current US gov seems fixated on attacking the EU and trying to break it up. If they want to go to war, EU won't be able to stop them. Perhaps if they gift Trump a plane, though.

[vkou]

No, but it can freeze the assets of its perpetrators.

[xkcd1963]

EU is a puppet state of the US empire.

[grunder_advice]

The EU has consistently been anti-Chavez and anti-Maduro, probably because the corrupt Venezuelan elites who escaped with their stolen millions after Chavez was elected, have been whispering in their ears ever since.

[apples_oranges]

War is bad .. yes very, of course, but look closer at life in Venezuela, it’s really gotten bad for people there.. millions left, just saying: regime change if it works might .. be good?

[orwin]

No. Currently it's still better than in Syria and Libya before their regime change. If a insurrectionist force existed, you would have a point, but even then it doesn't work when too much foreign meddling happens, just look at Libya. But Syria is probably the best example: foreign power meddling made everything worse for years. Foreign power switch target because of October 7th, let free reign to insurgent group, the regime change took what, 8 weeks? And it seems way more stable than expected.

[drysine]

Or maybe lifting sanctions against Venezuela that put it into poverty is good?

[elktown]

It will be interesting to see how quickly people & media will suddenly go "Well, actually Venezuela is a problem" or similarly spineless turnaround.