US forces have seized an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela, in a major escalation of Donald Trump’s four-month pressure campaign against the South American country’s dictator, Nicolás Maduro.

    • That Weird Vegan@lemmy.blahaj.zone
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      4
      ·
      2 days ago

      Nah. The US can do what they want, but don’t those other countries DARE fall out of line. That’s why the Ukraine was forced to give up nukes, but the USA is fine to keep theirs

  • sp3ctr4l@lemmy.dbzer0.com
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    14
    ·
    edit-2
    2 days ago

    US Navy in the Red Sea:

    We are conducting freedom of movement and trade, anti piracy operations.

    US Coast Guard in the Caribbean:

    Look at me, look at me.

    I am the pirate now.

  • itisileclerk@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    45
    arrow-down
    2
    ·
    2 days ago

    USA turns into Taliban country. Taliban originaly is “political and militant organization with an ideology comprising elements of the Deobandi movement of Islamic fundamentalism and Pashtun nationalism”, now is just “political and militant organization with an ideology comprising elements of the MAGA movement of Evangelical fundamentalism and WASP nationalism”

    • Digit@lemmy.wtf
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      15
      ·
      2 days ago

      Taliban

      Remember when the CIA funded and armed what became the Taliban?

      Remember when the CIA had their guy running the Taliban?

        • Digit@lemmy.wtf
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          edit-2
          2 days ago

          Oh, maybe I’m conflating the Taliban with Al-Qaeda a bit (and [for the next part of this] maybe even ISIS too a bit? idk) ~ I’m no Whitney Webb for this stuff, so do use several websearch engines likely to be honest about this stuff for yourself, but…

          Tim Osman? (Whom you may know by another name.)

          Then after that there was that guy they once called a terrorist, then put a suit on and invited to the white house… I’m terrible with names… was it… Ahmed al-Sharaa/Abu Mohammad al-Julani?

          Hard to keep track if not paying close attention.

          Hard to keep paying close attention after seeing the same old ploys and fakery played out over and over.

          “Pick up the gun”

          “You all saw him. He had a gun.”

  • SpiceDealer@lemmy.dbzer0.com
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    173
    ·
    edit-2
    3 days ago

    Starting a nonsense war under the guise of “spreading democracy” just to take their oil reserves so that rednecks back home can pollute the air and warm the earth with their oversized trucks. Can it get any more American this?

    • DoucheBagMcSwag@lemmy.dbzer0.com
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      55
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      edit-2
      3 days ago

      He wants to declare war on Venezuela next year (or hopes that he can agitate them enough to commit an act of terror on the US) so he can deny midterm elections because he knows the GOP majority will potentially be cooked

      Remember how much his eyes shifted when he was told that elections can be delayed due to a country being at war

      • FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        15
        arrow-down
        2
        ·
        3 days ago

        He’s not 100% wrong.

        I’m sure he remembers fondly how every single news network praised him profusely when he dropped the MOAB on Afghanistan.

        He knows very well how much the US loves a warmongering president.

          • FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            3
            ·
            edit-2
            2 days ago

            No, this was in his first term.

            Here’s an article on it: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-39598046

            But yeah, every single news outlet sang his praises after this. I specifically remember being on the treadmill in the gym, watching CNN, and I’ll quote Fareed Zakaria: “In that moment, he became president of the United States.”

            This country loves war to the point of absolute absurdity.

        • Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          3 days ago

          I’m starting to get the impression that a large fraction of Americans have lustful thoughts at the idea of mass murdering civilians (including children) as well as at the idea of their “leaders” having sex with children.

          Theirs is a diseased relationship with power.

          • FlashMobOfOne@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            3
            ·
            2 days ago

            We are a nation that really has never given a crap about bombing civilians en masse. Hell, President Obama, whom many still revere, dropped 20,000 bombs just in the last year of his presidency and killed an American citizen in Iraq ordering a bombing as well.

            • Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              2
              ·
              2 days ago

              At one point President Obama had the definition of “enemy combatant” be changed to “Any man between the ages of 16 and 60” because the numbers of “collateral” civilian casualties from the drone attacks he ordered were so bad.

      • n0respect@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        7
        ·
        edit-2
        3 days ago

        Remember

        It looked like he thought no one had ever thought of it before, and that he was a genius.

      • Tollana1234567@lemmy.today
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        4
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        3 days ago

        same tactic bush used to get elected, make a ware gives brownie points to the election in thier favor.

  • Mk23simp@lemmy.blahaj.zone
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    214
    ·
    3 days ago

    Huh, I wonder why they seized it instead of shooting it like the others? It couldn’t possibly be for the oil, right?

      • frongt@lemmy.zip
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        26
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        3 days ago

        Never heard of human trafficking?

        Oil is just a lot more profitable and easier to work with.

        • chaogomu@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          26
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          3 days ago

          Trump has plenty of experience as a human trafficker, but those were underage models in his little fake modeling agency, Trump Model Management, which was a friendly competitor to Epstein’s MC2 Model Management.

          But I can understand him not wanting to draw on that experience here. That and Hegaeth is a murderous fuck, and he was the one awake enough to give the order.

      • Agent641@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        4
        ·
        3 days ago

        You’re not getting paid top dollar for your people? You should see my people guy, he do you a good deal.

      • Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        3 days ago

        I genuinelly believe at least some people in positions of power inside and around the MAGA-Fascist party have plans to make Slavery legal again.

        (I would certainly bet that Peter Tiel is one of those).

    • iAmTheTot@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      55
      arrow-down
      9
      ·
      3 days ago

      I mean, I know what your point is, but can we actually just be thankful that they did not in fact blow up an oil tanker and spill all that into the sea?

        • MrMakabar@slrpnk.net
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          1
          ·
          2 days ago

          Venezuelas oil infrastructure is in such bad shape, that oil spills are pretty common. Lake Maracaibo has them on a regular bases.

    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      8
      arrow-down
      3
      ·
      edit-2
      3 days ago

      I can think of a few reasons why the US Navy wouldn’t want to fire high explosives into a contain full of flammable materials, depending on the range of their artillery.

      Also definitely possible they’re just doing Privateer shit with Navy assets. I do wonder whether the vessel gets impounded or just escorted to a friendly port in El Salvador or Honduras and quietly re-flagged and titled.

  • Arancello@aussie.zone
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    47
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    3 days ago

    Welcome to the sixteenth century! When Queen Elizabeth couldn’t afford to go to war against Spain so created ‘letters of marque’ which legalised piracy against Spain and its empire. Single handedly created the pirate economy.

    Then, welcome to the eighteenth century, when america created the fiction of the Barbary Corsairs to legalise american piracy of the atlantic trade.

    Isnt it Mark Twain who states that history rhymes?

    • HereIAm@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      6
      ·
      2 days ago

      I don’t think there is much they can do. No one is going to want to stand up against the US in this, and any escalation from Venezuela would be incredibly costly for them. I suppose there are two things they can hope for; hope the US population throws up enough of a stink the trump changes his mind or wait for something else to come around to occupy his attention.