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The United States of America is now at war with the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. Dozens of Venezuelan military targets have been bombed in the last few minutes, including a major army base just outside the capital. American Chinooks have been seen flying across the Caracas skyline.
This could be the most important geopolitical happening since the Ukraine War. We do it yet know if this will be a limited run of bombing like the Kosovo strikes, or a full on Iraq style invasion and regime change. If it is the latter, it will be an important test of America’s military might, and failure could very well be America’s Suez moment. I have speculated here several times that I thought the US would have difficulty conducting a thunder run of a non-peer or near-peer adversary in its current state, and it looks as though my theory may be put to the test. On a geopolitical and moral level though, I have little sympathy for Venezuela, for the same reason I have little sympathy for Ukraine. If you repeatedly antagonize your neighboring superpower, you get what you get.
This will also no doubt further fracture the Republican base in a major way, as interventionist neocons clash with America-First isolationists.
This is also adds to an intensifying pattern of conflict in multiple theaters that could lead to global war. It also increases the likelihood of a Chinese attack on Taiwan as American asserts are entangled in multiple theaters.
I will post more information as I hear it.
A true gentleman scholar post “inb4 source” and is vindicated in the light of history.
Edit:
There are now multiple airstrikes occurring within Caracas. The United States FAA has issued a NOTAM warning that civilian aircraft should avoid overflying the entire territory of Venezuela.
Reuters is now reporting that there are US ground troops active within the capital of Venezuela.
Maduro captured and in US custody. Absolutely unhinged but also, one has to say, immensely impressive move.
the twitter account @s2_underground (which had some good stuff on UKR war) is claiming that Maduro cut a deal with the US and the "raid" was mostly him waiting for a sweet 160th SOAR Uber Ride. I hate to "big if true" this, but @s2_underground is usually better-than-not on bre-confirmed breaks like this.
If you’re Maduro and think you’re going to be deposed, that’s when you resign, leave the crown for the next guy, and sail off into comfortable exile in Russia / China / Cuba / Brazil etc. Agreeing to some elaborate scheme where you spend the rest of your life in jail seems like a bad idea.
What if it was an "invitation to resign" when the Americans were right outside his door, so to speak.
"Hey, surrender now and get extradited to New York, or we're going to yeet you into the hereafter" type deal
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We can send him to Midway like Napoleon on Saint Helena.
El Salvador seems more likely. I'm sure Bukele would love to have him in CECOT.
This is the most Elba possible option. He speaks the language, has more in common with his captors than his exilers, and would be subject to local political volitility. He would become a hero.
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Maybe? The recent drama with tankers (one seized, one running away and claiming a sudden Russian flag) seems relevant. Either a nominal oil producing state needs more oil, or they were carrying something else the US didn't want getting through. Trying to import a bunch of air defenses (whether MANPADS or S-400s) seems like a good way to deter this operation if successful, or to trigger it while it's still a viable option.
It's possible they were importing weapons or something (which would explain the timing), but Venezuela needs naphtha to process their heavy oil, and that's what Skipper was supposedly carrying.
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Also black bagging his wife would point towards a deal.
I'm not sure if people normally grab family members in operations like this. They certainly didn't swipe the wives in the Bin Laden raid.
Maduro’s wife is (was) an actually-significant political figure in the regime, getting both of them would be necessary for any kind of clean regime change plan. If nothing else she would make a great figurehead for a continuation government, there’s a fair chance she would’ve been the successor had only Maduro been grabbed.
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Bin Laden's youngest wife was turned over to the Pakistanis during or after the raid; she was the only one there.
TIL. Looks like they do grab family members as standard practice on these things.
In any case she's been indicted too.
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Yeah, that makes sense of what we know so far, but it could all change as more information comes out. It does seem remarkably fast and easy from "American helicopters seen over Caracas" to "We've got the guy in our keeping" so some kind of "oh crap the Yanks are literally on my doorstep where's Donald's number again?" deal-making seems plausible, at least.
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Praying on this one.
?
Is this a reference I'm not picking up? Genuinely confused here.
No, I just woke up in the morning hoping we weren't going to spend $3,000,000,000,000.00 killing ten thousand brown people again.
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