Veterans For Peace Condemns Trump’s Illegal War on Venezuela

Veterans For Peace unequivocally rejects the Trump administration’s escalating attacks and threats of war against Venezuela. The U.S. seizure of a Venezuelan oil tanker and President Trump’s unilateral declaration of a naval blockade of Venezuela and closure of its air space constitute a brazen escalation of military aggression and a violation of both the U.S. Constitution and international law.

The U.S. has continually attacked Venezuela since the inception of the Bolivarian Revolution a quarter-century ago. In 2002, a U.S.-backed military coup temporarily ousted then President Hugo Chávez before the Venezuelan people rose up and reinstated him. His successor, President Nicolas Maduro, has also survived several CIA-backed attempts to kidnap and assassinate him.

In 2015, U.S. President Obama falsely declared Venezuela an “extraordinary threat” to U.S. national security, a baseless position that justified imposing U.S. sanctions. Each subsequent U.S. president has expanded economic warfare to steal Venezuelan assets and to isolate Venezuela from global trade and international finance. The Venezuelan economy initially went into freefall, but with help from international partners, Venezuelans have recently begun to reverse the economic decline.

Despite the U.S. government’s failure to overthrow Venezuelan sovereignty, these interventions have inflicted untold suffering on the Venezuelan population. It is estimated that over 100,000 Venezuelans have died in recent years as a result of U.S. economic warfare. Far from being an alternative to war, U.S. sanctions are a form of warfare, and are often a prelude to military intervention.

Washington has increasingly resorted to violence to achieve what it could not accomplish through economic and political intervention. The U.S. has now amassed a huge armada of war ships off Venezuela’s coast in a blatant attempt at regime change and the seizure of Venezuela’s oil reserves, the largest known oil reserves in the world.

As veterans of U.S. wars in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan—wars based on lies that killed millions—we see through the familiar justifications for this latest escalation. Just as the “weapons of mass destruction” narrative led to the invasion of Iraq, today’s “war on drugs” rationale ring hollow, especially after Trump’s recent pardon of a major drug trafficker.

A war on Venezuela would be patently illegal. The UN Charter declares no country has the right “to intervene, overtly or covertly, in the internal affairs of other nations.” In order for a war to be legal under international law, it must clearly be in self-defense, and it must be approved by the UN Security Council. Furthermore, the U.S. Constitution gives the power to declare war to the Congress, not to the President. Even a Congressional declaration of war would violate international law and the democratic will of the U.S. people, 70% of whom oppose going to war against Venezuela, according to recent opinion polls.

Veterans For Peace demands that the U.S. government withdraws its military forces from the Caribbean and abandons its campaign of regime change in Venezuela and throughout Latin America. We call on all U.S. military personnel to fulfill their legal and moral obligation to refuse unlawful orders to participate in illegal wars or war crimes. When you take such a moral and courageous stance, Veterans For Peace and many others will stand with you.