January 3rd will go down in history books as the day that
the U.S. bombed the capital city of Venezuela, abducted its sitting president, and claimed it would take over and "run the country."Sign the petition to demand that U.S. military leaders push back and refuse to follow any further war-mongering orders like this!Donald Trump has spent months claiming that Venezuela is a hub for narcotics drug trafficking and has accused its president of involvement. In fact, six months ago, the U.S. declared that it had
placed a bounty of $50 million on President Nicolás Maduro's head.
As part of Trump's ramping up of violence against Venezuela, the U.S. military has infamously struck and sunk multiple boats sailing from Venezuela, intentionally killing any survivors. It also captured several oil tankers from Venezuela.
Upwards of 110 people died in these boat strikes.All of that escalated into Trump's actions at 2am local time in Caracas, Venezuela and several other states in the country. Experts in Latin America say the U.S. government targeted both military sites and also, allegedly,
civilian areas. Witnesses say the strikes apparently destroyed at least one apartment complex - during the early morning hours while people were sleeping - killing and injuring civilians.
Trump clearly violated international law. He also violated U.S. law, by not seeking approval from the U.S. Congress before these attacks.Now, Trump is also declaring that he believes the U.S. should
exert military, political, and economic control over the entire western hemisphere, terming this view alternately the "Trump corollary" and the "Don-Roe doctrine."
He's already trying to implement this in Venezuela, saying the U.S. should make decisions for the nation. According to Trump:
"We're going to run the country until a safe, proper and judicious transition" occurs, and said
Venezuela's massive oil reserves will now fall under U.S. control. (The country accounts for approximately one-fifth of all oil reserves in the world). Trump even threatened that he is
"prepared" to issue a second attack on the sovereign nation.
Obviously, governments around the world were shocked and outraged. Leaders from the EU, France, Spain, the UK, Brazil, China, Russia, and Iran all spoke out, pointing out how Trump's attacks against a sovereign nation and a sitting president violate international law and threaten global security.
U.S. military leaders need to also be pushing back against Trump, too. They swore an oath to protect the safety of the U.S. - and provoking war with Venezuela is not in the interest of Americans' safety.Sign the petition to demand that U.S. military leaders honor their oaths to follow the law and to refuse illegal and destabilizing orders from Trump!