On Dec. 6, President Trump’s “War” Secretary Pete Hegseth took the stage at the Reagan Defense Forum to outline the latest iteration of U.S. foreign policy. The U.S. should not be “distracted by democracy building, interventionism, undefined wars, regime change, climate change, woke moralizing, and feckless nation-building,” Hegseth said. “We will instead put our nation’s practical, concrete interests first.”
As of right now, our nation’s practical, concrete interests apparently involve provoking a war against Venezuela. “Our” interests also include, for some reason, the Justice Department dropping bribery charges against FIFA mere days after its president awarded Trump the organization’s first-ever “Peace Prize.” A coincidence, surely.
What happens for the crowd in charge when the nation’s “practical interests” involve the interests of other nations? Well, they start by changing the definition of “America First.” America First doesn’t mean just the U.S.; it means the Western Hemisphere, as well. Department of War Press Secretary Kingsley Wilson has said, “America First means we need a Western Hemisphere where America is dominant.”
Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said, “If you’re focused on America and America First, you start with your own hemisphere where we live.” And Fox News host Jesse Waters summed it up quite succinctly when he said, “South America literally has the name America in it.” Another hot take from Tucker Carlson’s dim-witted replacement. As with the newly renamed Gulf of America, evidently slapping the name “America” on something makes it ours.
The doctrine of “no new wars” from the “president of peace” has hit a snag, though. The fact that Venezuela exists in its current form as a sovereign and left-led state is utterly reprehensible for those in charge, and the Trump administration cannot allow this slight to go unrequited.
While the U.S. war machine blows up boats allegedly carrying drugs, the White House pardons known drug traffickers. And though the U.S. claims Venezuela is responsible for sending lethal drugs like fentanyl to the U.S., the data contradicts that claim.
But since the unofficial slogan of U.S. foreign policy is, “Don’t let the facts get in the way of a good regime-change,” it is full steam ahead with the overthrow of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.
Since the U.S. operates as a global superpower, its leaders often feel the need to express that power through sanctions. The ruling class does not like other countries operating on their own without U.S. influence or in a manner that is perceived to be detrimental to U.S. imperial interests. And when they, like Venezuela, dare to do so, then the propaganda machine goes into overdrive to reframe those country’s actions as offenses requiring a U.S. response.
U.S. sanctions keep Venezuelan oil off the world market, so Maduro’s government is left with no choice but to “smuggle” its top product into the global supply chain. This U.S.-created problem then comes with its own U.S. solution: piracy, though Washington won’t call it that. The U.S. military recently boarded and seized a tanker off the coast of Venezuela and stole its cargo.
Since yet another costly and lethal war is not something the majority of the people in the U.S. want, the administration has to garner support for said war. Provoking Venezuela into reacting by stealing its resources is a good way to do that.
Corporate media has a job to do here as well. The people who watch their news program have to be convinced that a military intervention is not only a good thing, but absolutely necessary. And paid political pundits, having seen that manufacturing consent for war with Iraq was so successful, are using the same strategy to justify an intervention into Venezuela.
Jesse Waters on Fox News said recently, in reference to one of the alleged smuggling boats the U.S. has blown up, “That drugged-out dinghy was a floating weapon of mass destruction.” A pundit on Laura Ingraham’s Fox News show said, “Every boat carrying fentanyl and drugs in this country is a weapon of mass destruction.” Fox News is playing all their greatest hits.
It’s not just the press that’s replaying Iraq War re-runs. Now, the mouthpieces for the Trump administration are also claiming that drugs are weapons of mass destruction and that Venezuela is wielding them.
The president himself got in on the act, signing an executive order on Dec. 15 declaring fentanyl a weapon of mass destruction, saying that “America’s adversaries are trafficking” the drug in an effort to “kill Americans.” Never mind that fentanyl doesn’t come from Venezuela.
Never mind also that the pretext for the war in Iraq, those alleged weapons of mass destruction, of course, turned out to be non-existent. The Iraq war was a costly mistake that contributed to decades of deadly instability, but neither U.S. imperialism nor its cheerleaders in the media learned from the error.
The Iraq war script is certainly old and tired, but they are working hard to resurrect it, chapter and verse.
Donald Rumsfeld, former defense secretary for George W. Bush, pushed for war with Iraq, claiming that Saddam Hussein worked with and supported terrorist networks. Now, Secretary of State Marco Rubio says, “Iran, its IRGC [Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps], and even Hezbollah…they have planted their flag on Venezuelan territory with the full and open cooperation with that regime.”
The parallels continue. Former Vice President Dick Cheney, in the lead-up to war with Iraq, said, “I don’t think it would be that tough a fight.” On Fox News recently, Rep. Maria Elvira Salazar, of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said, “This is going to be an easy job for the United States.”
Even Sen. Lindsey Graham is reprising his same role from the Iraq days, saying back then on Meet The Press, “Saddam Hussein’s a threat to my country. He’s a threat to our way of life. He needs to go.” Now Graham is saying on the floor of the Senate, “Maduro is an existential threat to the people of the United States.” On Face The Nation, Graham said, “It is time for Maduro to go.”
Other catchphrases are being brought back into rotation as well. The removal of Hussein and Maduro would allow the U.S. to “transform the region.” The invasion of Iraq would bring with it “freedom and democracy,” and the U.S. would do the same for Venezuela. “Beacon of hope” is being thrown around again, too, as well as “shock and awe.”
There’s no point in throwing away the entire playbook when all you have to do is change a few names. Perhaps most disappointing of all is the fact that Rumsfeld and Cheney are looking up at us right now, wishing they could be here to see it.
As with all op-eds published by People’s World, the views reflected here are those of the author.
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