If successive presidents of the United States once claimed to spread freedom and defend democracy to justify propping up dictators, bombing faraway lands and invading countries, the current administration has made no such excuses.
Last week, US security forces abducted Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife from a compound in Caracas and presented both in a Manhattan courtroom on charges of drug smuggling.
Yet in subsequent interviews with several US news outlets, US President Donald Trump made clear that the reason for this unprecedented, and likely illegal, military action was to commandeer Venezuela’s vast oil reserves.
