My spouse ended up reacting negatively to the news about Maduro. More confusion (how is it legal, why wasn't congress involved), concern (what if we decide to occupy, what if it creates a power vacuum, what if it drags out and becomes a full fledged war), and suspicion (did we just do this for oil?).
I read out the "conditioning and trauma and past forever wars" post from earlier in the thread and they agreed with the sentiment and said "Who can blame us?"
We did have a great conversation where I outlined why this was actually a strong move with a clear path forward including:
1) Maduro wasn't democratically elected, making it arguable the person we snatched wasn't a president at all but a commie parasite
2) There is an elected leader or other clear options that can take over that are friendly with Trump and the US
3) The venezualen people, both in and out of the country, support this and are happy
4) There's an alternative revenue source they can turn to instead of drugs, oil, which we can help with (probably for some of it or a cut of the profits like the mineral deal with Ukraine)
In other words, there's a clear leader to step in to prevent a power vacuum or more of the same, an alternative path we can give them to help their country prosper, and a future positive relationship with the US which will benefit us both if it works out. Plus it means the new leader will likely accept venezualen illegals from us which simplifies deportation proceedings.
Looking at Argentina and El Salvador for example their positive relationship with the US results in trade deals and opportunities Venezuela of Friday would never get access to. We really do want a stable and prosperous South America if possible, and even though I want spics out of my country I also personally want them to do well in their own country. Stabilization helps with that because a fat, happy, wealthy country where people can work and make families is one that's less likely to choose extremism that can lead to a return of destabilization and people fleeing to the US and other countries to get away.
Anyway, all that said, it did make me think if we did go after Mexico next (I think a lot of that is stick shaking not genuine threats for right now, there's always a ton of opportunities to offramp before anything happens with Trump) what is their path forward?
Who could be put in power not owned by the cartels? How could they prosper? How could we benefit from their relationship with us if it turned positive? Agriculture, minerals, and manufacturing?
I think any country we intervene in needs a clear positive direction for it to work, so I'd be curious what this could look like in each country that's giving us problems.
