I never imagined I would be writing these words, but here we are:
I stand with the people of Venezuela.
Not with any particular government or leader, but with a nation that has just been attacked – illegally – by the President of the United States, without the approval of Congress, in clear violation of both American constitutional law and international law.
Strip away the chest-thumping rhetoric and the familiar justifications, and what remains is uncomfortable in its simplicity: a unilateral act of war, ordered by one man, without democratic consent, against a sovereign country that posed no imminent threat to the United States.
This is not strength. It is lawlessness.
The U.S. Constitution is explicit. Congress – not the president – has the power to declare war. That safeguard exists precisely to prevent impulsive, politically motivated, or self-serving military adventures. When a president bypasses it, he is not defending democracy. He is undermining it.
International law is just as clear. The UN Charter prohibits the use of force against another state except in self-defence or with Security Council authorisation. Venezuela attacked no one. No such authorisation exists. Labeling this as anything but an illegal act of aggression demands willful ignorance.
Yet, true to form, Trump will demand universal acceptance. To trust the instincts of a man who has repeatedly expressed admiration for authoritarians, hostility to international law, and contempt for democratic norms. A man whose foreign policy is indistinguishable from impulse, grievance, and spectacle. A man who treats war as performance and human lives as collateral to political theatre.
The precedent here is terrifying
If the United States – a country that never stops lecturing others about the “rules-based international order” – can simply discard those rules when inconvenient, then they cease to be rules at all. They become weapons, deployed selectively against enemies and ignored for friends.
This is how the post-war order collapses: not with a single catastrophic moment, but through repeated acts of hypocrisy that hollow it out from within.
Let’s be honest about who pays the price.
It will not be Donald Trump, safely insulated from consequences.
It will not be the architects of escalation in Washington think tanks.
It will be Venezuelan civilians – people who have already endured years of economic pain, sanctions, and instability – who will now live under the shadow of foreign bombs and regional chaos.
Standing with Venezuela does not require romanticising its politics or ignoring its internal problems. It requires recognising a basic principle that should never be negotiable: no country has the right to attack another simply because it can.
For decades, the United States has insisted that sovereignty matters – except when it doesn’t. That democracy must be respected – except when the outcome is inconvenient. That international law is sacred – except when it restrains American power.
This attack strips away the pretence.
If you believe in peace, you must oppose it.
If you believe in democracy, you must oppose it.
If you believe in international law, you must oppose it.
Silence now is complicity. Hand-wringing later will be meaningless.
The world does not need another “coalition of the willing”, another illegal war sold with vague threats and manufactured urgency. It needs restraint. It needs accountability. It needs leaders who understand that power without law is not leadership – it is empire in decay.
So yes, I stand with the people of Venezuela.
I stand against illegal war.
I stand against presidential authoritarianism masquerading as strength.
I stand against the dangerous idea that some nations are entitled to break the rules simply because they wrote them.
And I stand with the people – everywhere – who will suffer the consequences long after the press conferences end.
History is watching. And it will not be kind to those who cheered this on.
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Well said, Roswell.
Thank you, Steve. I’m really pissed-off about this.
How the hell is this not being called a war crime by international and our national media – let alone other countries and “allies”?
Sorry but the US is up shit creek without a paddle, and any respect I may have had in the past for the administration there has long gone.
Trump is a criminal arsehole and unfortunately there are enough arse licking sycophants over there allowing him to do whatever he likes.
I’d say their democracy is fucked, and will be for some time before his shitshow has been erased from history.
Trump says that Maduro and his wife have been captured why doesn’t he come right out with the truth, Maduro has been kidnapped!
Now, if he next tells us that he has Kidnapped Netanyahu and handed him over to the ICC in accordance with a legally valid arrest warrant, that would be assisting the global order and the rule of international law and the cause of democracy.
Now, if Australia decides to break the AUKUS agreement, Trump can issue an arrest warrant for Albo then come in and take him under cover of the US armed services.
No wonder Trump admires Putin.
They share same respect for international law and sovereign nations
Disgraceful
This is an international outrage. Trump is clearly insane. Is there any evidence at all to support his narcoterrorist allegations against Venezuela? Although we (Australia) have no skin in this game, we must call out this breach of international law. It is to be hoped Congress can rein tge idiot in, demand the repatriation of zmaduro and his wife and wuthdraw all of
F the military from the region.mind you, given our pusillanimous position on Israel’s genocide I won’t hold my breath.
Do we have any actual evidence to back up the Orange Madman? Until proof is provided it’s just the typical demented bullshit from Donnie. Trump could not resist parading Maduro like a chained prize right from the time he was supposedly captured and would (and possibly will) parade him in a Trumpian version of a Roman triumph in Washington.
Why bother putting Maduro in a court, his guilt is 100% guaranteed and it will be a show trial. Horribly, I possibly see a death sentence looming, but I really hope I’m wrong.
What an absolute shitshow. We are sleepwalking into yet another war, orchestrated by the US. Trump is not a lone actor, he is aided and abetted by his sycophants. Shame on you all 😭😭😭
Why do we continue a relationship with a rogue nation who are simply acting as thugs?
Make no mistake,we are being used by the great Satan, and our name will be on that list somewhere.
The writing on the wall is clear as day, and I would certainly support any Australian political party which shows a bit of guts in separating us from USA, and its little partner Israel.
Its common sense, its ethics, its us as a proud nation saying we want no truck with these criminals, which may cost us a bit , but we can then hold our head high.
I stand with Venezuela.
The Albanese government makes me ashamed to be an Australian every time it says Australia stands with Israel, or Australia stands with the USA.
This is the most blatant example yet of how dangerous this president is. Remember, he’s only a quarter of his way through his term.
When will people wake up? There is no “Constitutional” or “International” law, to claim such, is just window dressing.
The law is and always has been the power of the sword (might is right) and always has been.
Once again the so called FREE world just looks on, ignoring the fact their country could be next in Trump’s dream, remember, he is going to make “America great again”.
Jeffrey Sachs sums this all up -https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LhZuTOuwKGA
The US’ illegal “special military operation” in Venezuela is a monumental geopolitical development that will serve to coerce the remainder of the Latin American hemisphere into capitulating to America’s greed for natural resources. With Israeli connivance USA will next attack Iran with a similar plan to decapitate the legitimate Iranian executive and capture the Ayatollah. USA is activating its long held plans to achieve World dominance by attacking weaker adversaries who refuse to submit to it.
I stand with Venezuela.
The cruel, vapid thing known as Trump is reacting to losing power, having his ambitions thwarted and dying alone; righteous.
Venezuela has more proven oil reserves than any other country and are recognized as the largest in the world, totalling 300 billion barrels (4.8×1010 m3). Saudi Arabia comes in at around 267 billion barrels. But due to US sanctions Venezuela has been exporting principally to China (80%) and Russia but well below capacity.
Trump now intends to build up the Venezuelan oil export capacity and as the US will be ‘ruling’ Venezuela, Russia and China will become US customers.
We’ll see how that works out, but whatever the case, the prospects for settling the Ukraine war will not be looking good: Trump’s buddies are in Russia and China, not Ukraine [and of course Israel]!
The US now has effective control of the largest oil reserves in the world and that is the main game – how China reacts to this remains to be seen.
https://www.worldometers.info/oil/oil-reserves-by-country/
Felonious Trump and his pet maggot Pete Hogshit are boasting about their criminality, murder, theft, violence. What a primitive, hunnish act. The Orange orifice is surrounded by professional perverts, greedy and parasitic, making “international law” a vaporous mirage, a poor joke on all of us. A new year begins with ever more crime and violence, evil.
I stand with Roswell and the people of Venezuela against 21st century US imperialism.
As Archie observes above, the USUKA vassal payment to the USA to ”purchase” redundant atomic submarines that may never be delivered, exposes any Australian belated defence of our national sovereignty to invasion by American forces on any pretext, possibly the non-payment of US tariffs by penguins on our Macquarie Island.
Successive Australian governments have followed ”economic policies” that since Menzies have sold out Australian interest to any foreign entity or government prepared to become a ”political donor” to either major party.
ex Connor was correct ….. Australia should develop their own natural resources and benefit from the profits of products manufactured from them.
Now Australian voters are left with a third world export economy where European and American corporate interests practice the same financial skulduggery to keep the profits for themselves, thanks to our lax tax laws and an occasional ”useful idiot” politician prepared to be privately rewarded for betraying their country.
Note that all the countries that America has attacked in recent history are peopled by non-English speaking citizens. The unstated underpinning to that observation is the ever-present racism and race-based sense of superiority that characterises most of America’s behaviour, NGO presence in third-world countries notwithstanding (and anyway, many of them are fronts for entities like the CIA).
When did America ever invade an English-speaking nation? Ever?
Way beyond time to cut all ties to that maleficent and malignant nation, but don’t hold your breath expecting it to happen. I see Albanese has already burbled some sycophantic rectal lingering sweet words of endorsement for the Bloat’s actions.
In the case of Iran, there has been a predictable American-UK proclivity for sanctioning the nation, its officials and even their allies since the Iranian Revolution, resulting in, among other negative impacts, reduced oil production revenue by the country long-demonized by much of the West.
The 1979 Iranian Revolution’s expulsion of major Western nations was in large part due to British and American companies exploiting Iran’s plentiful fossil fuel. The expulsion may have been a big-profit-losing lesson learned by the ‘energy’-corporation heads, one that they, via intense lobbyist influence over the relevant governments in Washington D.C. and London, would resist reoccurring anywhere globally.
It would be understandable if those corporate fossil-fuel interests would like Iran’s government to fall thus re-enabling their access to Iran’s resources.
If Iran were to militarily surrender to Western forces thus big corporate interests, soon-enough afterwards it will also be compelled to surrender access to much of its vast fossil fuel reserves to American and British ‘energy’ companies. Those corporations, and likely Israel’s government/interests as well, know there’s still much to be effectively appropriated.
The 2003-11 U.S./British invasion and prolonged occupation of Iraq may also have been partly motivated by such Western insatiable corporate greed. According to AI Overview (for what it’s worth), “some [U.S.] companies did secure lucrative contracts for oil services and exploration in Iraq following the war.” Also, “British oil companies, particularly BP, significantly benefited from the Iraq War by gaining access to and exploiting Iraq’s vast oil reserves.”
I read/heard nothing in the mainstream news-media about these post-war foreign fossil-fuel-corporation incursions into Iraq; and I doubt that the morally-/ethically-challenged media would report on similar big-business incursions into a post-war Iran.
American comedian/actor John Mulaney compared the Donald Trump presidency to a horse that has broken loose inside a hospital: “It’s never happened before. No one knows what the horse is gonna do next, least of all the horse. He’s never been in a hospital. He’s as confused as you are.”
It’s a very funny analogy, however legitimately worrying. Trump is the very unstable, vengefully angry and self-centered/-serving type willing to take the world for a most brutal spin, perhaps even for the sake of him making it into the historical-‘greatness’ books.
Early on Nov.6 of 2024, Donald Trump publicly stated: “Many people have told me that God spared my life [from two assassination attempts] for a reason. And that reason was to save our country and to restore America to greatness.” … Then again, Adolf Hitler also escaped assassination attempts made against him, most notably that foiled effort called the July Plot or Operation Valkyrie, and may have also mused that something divine spared his life.
The institutional ‘Christians’ who still vocally and politically support Donald Trump tend to see him as literally Godsent. Many also perceive Trump’s presidency as divinely-intended punishment against liberals. If anything, he’s evidence of a great evil being unleashed onto a largely powerless world. Ergo, if Trump does end up boding well for the world, it will have been accidental.
Yes Roswell, well said.
Trump has always been at war, illegal war – it’s his lifelong m.o., accompanied by ignorance and incompetence.
Once smiled upon as a ‘loose canon’, then suck-holed to as he accumulated aspiring flunkies and a blackmailed congress, now he’s the rabid top dog and high-roller of the biggest ‘rogue state’ ever known. The ‘rogue state’ in disguise was a long time coming, but inevitable.
Albo, Marles and Wong’s recurring nightmare brought to light through Trump’s incessantly applied dark days. As portrayed in Frank Sterle’s 2nd comment, opening para, now galloping off over the horizon on a Donnie-spree.
I too stand with the people of Venezuela, and also the ‘Pink Tide’, and antifa.