Comment by wat10000
6 days ago
I think I see the disconnect. I thought you were saying that it’s ok for an entity to recover its own stolen property by force, and conflating the United States with US-based oil companies. But you actually meant that recovering anyone’s stolen property by force is right.
Suffice to say I don’t agree with this expanded version in all cases, especially when it’s the military doing it.
Yes I would argue this is a fundamental aspect of property rights. Stolen property held with intent to deprive the owner of the assets, has no legitimate title to be held by the person holding it. Therefore you definitely do not do anything wrong to the thief by taking it.
Whether you do anything wrong to the real owner very much depends on the intent and actions taken after you take it from the thief. If the owner asked you to take it, then well you have clearly done nothing wrong. If the owner did not ask you, then it depends on your intent and your immediate disposition to the owner. If you did not intend to deprive the owner of the property from enjoying the property for any additional time, and you took all reasonable actions to return it immediately, then it definitely cannot be theft against the thief nor the owner. Therefore it is at the very least not wrong, and probably right.
I do very much doubt though that the US military will simply take the assets, immediately return them to Exxon et al, and that will be that. And the drug and machine gun charges against Maduro, are certainly not defensible in my opinion.