After several months of tension between the U.S. and Venezuela, the conflict reached its climax in the early morning of January 3. American troops, under the orders of Donald Trump, launched “Operation Absolute Resolve” – bombing northern Venezuela, especially Caracas, while Delta Force special operations forces kidnapped President Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores. The president and first lady were taken aboard the U.S. warship USS Iwo Jima and transported to the United States. The master of political survival, Maduro, finally fell after surviving attacks for 13 years. With this dangerous move, Trump once again crossed the Rubicon (he first did so by bombing Iranian nuclear facilities in June), and the consequences could be far-reaching.

First and foremost, by carrying out armed attacks on the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela and kidnapping its president, Trump mocked international law in the crudest way, as well as U.S. domestic law. Bombing a sovereign and independent state and abducting its president are illegal under the United Nations Charter. According to the U.S. Constitution, the president can order short-term military strikes or interventions only if U.S. national security is at stake. For everything else, Congressional approval is required. Trump obtained neither approval from the U.N. Security Council nor from the U.S. Congress for his actions. This should alarm not only the citizens of the U.S. and Venezuela but all of humanity. The commander-in-chief of the world’s foremost power is acting recklessly, like a teenager playing a video game.

The same applies to the U.S. Navy’s so-called “anti-terrorist” operations in the Atlantic and Pacific, which for weeks have been attacking ships from Venezuela and other nearby countries under the pretext that they are transporting drugs to the U.S. Even if that were true, such operations can only be authorized by the U.N., since they are conducted in international waters. While Maduro is illegally in power due to falsifying the 2024 elections and his regime is partially involved in drug trafficking and responsible for brutal repression of the opposition, this cannot justify Trump’s actions. This is classic armed aggression and interference in the internal affairs of an independent state. Anyone........

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