Even though the military was involved, I think this was officially a law enforcement action, much like capturing Manuel Noriega and sentencing him to prison.
Nicolás Maduro was indicted for various crimes in 2020. I have a feeling the "possession of a machinegun" charge will be dropped, but the US does have a long track record of saying drug activity affects the US enough that it can arrest and prosecute almost anybody.
The invasion of Ukraine, on the other hand, is -- I believe -- a regular military exercise. Putin has claimed that he wants to achieve some unusual goals ("denazify the Ukraine special forces"), but even those goals aren't really law enforcement.
Main difference is that Russia is 1409 days into their 3 day "special operation" that has obviously become a war, while this looks like it was actually a special operation.
A "special operation" that makes hypocrites of every US official complaining that the EU is engaged in over-reach* and that EU has no sovereignty in the USA, but still it is success (at least with regard to the immediately stated objectives) that's the difference.
Long term, I expect this to be a colossal failure for the USA, the USA has a very poor record for pulling long term benefits out of this kind of action, and Trump is a sub-unity multiplier on that.
That said, if I was anyone in Mexico right now, I'd be worried by the rhetoric. There's things Mexico can do to prepare for this, that's not going to be any fun at all for the USA. I can see a big pile of dry tinder here waiting to ignite, but I don't want to suggest details because path dependency is a huge variable, e.g. consider that Trump himself could be impeached for all the Epstein stuff at fairly short notice by Republicans worried he's dragging them down in domestic polls.
* with regard to the EU telling Big Tech that certain content is not welcome within the EU. I mean, imagine if any EU nation did this to forcibly extradite Musk. Or if the UK did it for 4chan. I wouldn't cry over either, but I would definitely be shocked. And neither Musk nor 4chan's staff have diplomatic immunity.
Ukraine has a democratically elected government and president who isn’t a dictator.
(I’m not trying to justify US action in Venezuela here. Just answering your question)
Ukraine hasn’t had an election in 6 years.
That's true, but how can elections be safely conducted during an active phase of the war?
Only during 2025 russian forces launched over 54,000 long-range drones and over 1,900 missiles
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Even though the military was involved, I think this was officially a law enforcement action, much like capturing Manuel Noriega and sentencing him to prison.
Nicolás Maduro was indicted for various crimes in 2020. I have a feeling the "possession of a machinegun" charge will be dropped, but the US does have a long track record of saying drug activity affects the US enough that it can arrest and prosecute almost anybody.
The invasion of Ukraine, on the other hand, is -- I believe -- a regular military exercise. Putin has claimed that he wants to achieve some unusual goals ("denazify the Ukraine special forces"), but even those goals aren't really law enforcement.
Main difference is that Russia is 1409 days into their 3 day "special operation" that has obviously become a war, while this looks like it was actually a special operation.
A "special operation" that makes hypocrites of every US official complaining that the EU is engaged in over-reach* and that EU has no sovereignty in the USA, but still it is success (at least with regard to the immediately stated objectives) that's the difference.
Long term, I expect this to be a colossal failure for the USA, the USA has a very poor record for pulling long term benefits out of this kind of action, and Trump is a sub-unity multiplier on that.
That said, if I was anyone in Mexico right now, I'd be worried by the rhetoric. There's things Mexico can do to prepare for this, that's not going to be any fun at all for the USA. I can see a big pile of dry tinder here waiting to ignite, but I don't want to suggest details because path dependency is a huge variable, e.g. consider that Trump himself could be impeached for all the Epstein stuff at fairly short notice by Republicans worried he's dragging them down in domestic polls.
* with regard to the EU telling Big Tech that certain content is not welcome within the EU. I mean, imagine if any EU nation did this to forcibly extradite Musk. Or if the UK did it for 4chan. I wouldn't cry over either, but I would definitely be shocked. And neither Musk nor 4chan's staff have diplomatic immunity.