Venezuela

The US has bombed Venezuela and captured Maduro. What should one think about that?

Most people already hate Trump anyway, and with good reason, and we therefore immediately point out that the US attack is in violation of international law and the US's own constitution. Trump is behaving again like the gang leader he is, starting with the murder of ship crews in the Caribbean, then piracy of oil tankers, and now kidnapping and acts of war without a declaration of war or a UN mandate. This naturally goes against everything we stand for, so the condemnations are well-deserved.

On the other hand, Maduro is a dictator responsible for running Venezuela into the ground. Fifty years ago, Venezuela was one of the richest countries in the world, while now it is a country that millions of people have fled from and with an economy that has completely collapsed. So even though we do not support Trump's way of doing things, there are probably very few who have sympathy for Maduro.

I think the situation is a good opportunity to look a bit deeper into the responsibility for what has happened.

Why has Venezuela been run into the ground? And why is it that all of the US's other enemies also end up as dictatorial states with catastrophic economies? Cuba, Zimbabwe, Iran, Iraq...., you name it. Despite natural resources and good intentions, they all end up as dictatorial states with a catastrophic economy. There are plenty of corrupt dictatorial states with an oppressed population that are doing splendidly, just think of Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and Qatar. The failed countries end up where they do because they wanted to organize themselves differently and did not want to bow to US world domination like Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, and Denmark have done. Cuba, Venezuela, and the other countries would not allow foreign landowners and American and multinational companies to steal their natural resources, so they nationalized their oil or gave the land to local farmers. This is their crime, and we do not allow it in the West. In our world order, we have the freedom to choose the form of government and economic policy that is in our interest, but one does not have the freedom to choose a different policy that is in the interests of local citizens and farmers. If one offends the interests of the US-controlled multinational firms, we go in with our rules-based world order with international boycotts and sanctions, and that is what has run their economies into the ground.

When a country has democratic backing to stand up to the US and wishes to be master of its own house, tremendous external pressure arises, initiated by the US and with the full backing of, among others, Denmark and all other rich countries. Assassination of politicians, massive economic support to rebel groups, and assistance with any coup attempt that the opposition in the country can think of. This has been the reality from the start in all the countries that have stood up to US world domination. No democracy can withstand it. Chile in 1973, where the US overthrew Allende, is not an isolated example. All countries that wanted a different path have either had to abandon their plans or barricade themselves against the external pressure. It is this situation that develops into dictatorships and poor economies in all the countries that have attempted to implement a political system where the interests of the population come before those of multinational companies.

Our worldview is shaped by our experiences. We observe that things go badly in all the countries that try to combat inequality, and therefore believe it is a bad idea. You observe that things go badly in countries that restrict the actions of multinational companies, even though they don't pay taxes and even though they plunder the countries. The reality is that it is the US's global military and economic exercise of power that creates this reality, and not the political idea of organizing countries for people and not for corporations.

Why do we allow homeless beggars on the streets in Denmark, while the rich keep getting richer? Why do we allow children not to receive the care they need in institutions, even though we know they develop psychological problems as a result of neglect, while at the same time we have rich individuals and companies in the country who wouldn't even feel the tax increase needed to create a better life for the poor? It's not because we don't want to help the poor. It's because the rich would immediately send their money to tax havens like the Cayman Islands if we did that. And why don't we just prevent the rich from doing that? It's because then the hammer would fall from the international community, first from the OECD, and ultimately with military force from the US. This is the world we live in. It is a world where we have the freedom to organize ourselves in the best possible way within the frameworks that serve to maintain the interests of the US and multinational companies. Conversely, we do not have the freedom to create a society where, for example, society owns the oil and natural resources, or where one combats inequality in society.

The reason that Maduro, Fidel Castro, and Robert Mugabe were disastrous presidents for their countries was not because their political projects were bad. It was because they tried to implement them in a world where the power structures do not allow countries to make their dreams of justice a reality. The smart political leaders in the world abandon their naive dreams of a better world and organize themselves according to the Western world's capitalist frameworks, where oil cartels own the natural resources and billionaires keep getting richer, while the poor get a food voucher as compensation for surviving one more winter.

Maduro was not a hero. He was a bad leader, because one should only fight for a cause if one has a fair chance of winning. And that applies no matter what one fights for, and one does not have a fair chance of organizing a society where one nationalizes the oil resources that Trump's sponsors believe are theirs.