End of Restraint |
In the early hours of 3 January, the United States crossed a moral, legal, and historical threshold that should alarm the world. American forces bombed targets in Venezuela, including areas in and around its capital, and seized the country’s sitting president and his wife, transporting them in custody to New York to face trial. This extraordinary act was announced not through Congress, nor through any international body, but through a presidential declaration. This was not law enforcement. It was not diplomacy by other means. It was an act of war. The administration would like the world to accept this as routine ~ another “operation,” another “strike,” another exercise in enforcement. Such language is deliberately anesthetizing. Foreign territory was bombed. A sovereign government was violated. A head of state was forcibly removed.
If this does not constitute invasion, the word has lost its meaning. One need not harbour illusions about the Venezuelan regime to grasp the enormity of what has occurred. The country’s president has ruled repressively, undermined democratic processes, and presided over economic collapse that has driven millions from their homes. These facts are well documented. They are also beside the point. International order does not survive by granting powerful nations the discretion to overthrow weaker ones they deem immoral, inconvenient, or expendable. At stake here is not the character of a single leader, but the survival of restraint itself. Under the United States Constitution, the authority to initiate war rests with Congress.
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This requirement is not symbolic; it is fundamental. It exists precisely to prevent unilateral military action by a single individual. No such authorization was sought or granted in this case. There was no public debate, no vote, no collective reckoning before bombs fell on a foreign capital. A decision of irreversible consequence was made by executive fiat. International law is even more unequivocal. The United Nations Charter prohibits the use of force against another........