alt Hacker NewsIt’s estimated there are over a million Venezuelans in the U.S. who fled the country. Over 600,000 are currently under temporary protected status with asylum claims. 7 million in neighboring countries.
Who gets to decide that this is good, but removing the dictator behind this is bad? Who gets to decide that we must live with this chaos because taking action might not reduce the chaos.
> Today it is 'overthrowing a dictator'; tomorrow it will be 'correcting an election'
Why? Those are two completely different things. We have the capacity to evaluate whether overthrowing a dictator is good or bad on its own terms.
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Sure you removed the "bad dictator". Gratz! Will you now leave Venezuelan oil alone ? I am guessing not. The U.S. oil companies effectively become the new dictator behind the scenes, at-least until people realize they are being merrily looted and rise up.
Respectfully, offering asylum to Venezuelan people and choosing to invade Venezuela and remove their dictator are nearly orthogonal. The USA could instead choose not to provide asylum to these people in the future, and accept the reality that for the millions it already has, it has made its bed so to speak.
One is a matter of internal policy, the other is a matter of international law and order. One the USA had complete and total control over for decades, the other is a delicate and precarious matter which requires significant planning, oversight, congressional approval, and international engagement.
> Why? Those are two completely different things.
These are different things, yes, but the problem is exactly that: the same methods and justification will be applied in either case, despite deserving totally different treatment. I believe this is the consequence of permitting brazen realpolitik principles into government.
There is more than just one person behind Venezuela's misfortune. The external pressure to undermine the country has been immense and shouldn't be discounted. As always, not black and white.
> Who gets to decide that this is good, but removing the dictator behind this is bad?
The sovereign governments who agree to take in refugees. It's not a complicated answer. They get to decide what happens within their sovereignty.
It is usually those who never experienced dictatorship complaining
If there are terrible crimes being committed by a dictator then there is the ICC and the UN. It would require building up rather than undermining the institution but it’s there.
> We have the capacity to evaluate whether overthrowing a dictator is good or bad on its own terms.
The US has claimed the capacity to make this evaluation before, repeatedly, and has been wrong in ways that killed hundreds of thousands of people. Maybe we're not the ones who should be deciding this unilaterally.
"Oh, but this time is different", you might say. "Maduro is an unambiguous dictator who stole an election, caused 7 million refugees, and was already under indictment. This isn't like Iraq, where we invented WMDs."
The justification was "real and documented" for Libya too (Gaddafi was about to massacre Benghazi, remember?). The result: Libya was rated as the Fragile State Index's "most-worsened" country for the 2010s decade, with ISIS using the country as a hub to coordinate regional violence and Libya becoming the main exit point for migrants trying to get to Europe. The intervention may have also made nuclear nonproliferation harder, since Gaddafi had already given up his nuclear program and then been overthrown anyway. Iran and North Korea both noted that "the Libyan crisis is teaching the international community a grave lesson".
The issue isn't whether Maduro is bad; he obviously is. It's whether US military intervention produces better outcomes than the alternative. I honestly hope it does this time. I truly hope it's a case of "a broken clock is right twice a day". But am I holding my breath? Absolutely not.