It’s very much a tendency of many leftists to be obsessed with the most “correct” position. It’s that idea of the Revolution needing to he perfect that Parenti ranted about.
I think part of it is a coordinated attack by some users (especially on reddit I’ve noticed) to turn MLs against the PSL. Mind you, I’m not exactly a die hard PSL supporter, but nearly every attack on them I’ve seen comes off as very… “perfectionist?” If I were to use a word.
It’s not like I’m convinced they’re the vanguard that’ll bring about revolution in the US, but I’m also not convinced that they’re on the same level of theoretical/organizational backwardness as the DSA (even them I don’t find myself 100% denouncing). Like, I guess from perspective, the bar is in hell, and I just want US leftists to lock in on trying to stop bombing my people’s region. I don’t exactly have allies here that’ll make sure I’m protected outside my community, so why go around d making unnecessary enemies is my view I guess.
The thing about Venezuela though, is that many global south Communists and analysts will also miss the broader situation. It floors me, because, like, does nobody remember the US just bombing fishermen with impunity and stealing oil vessels?!
What exactly was stopping the US from bombing the country into oblivion and then just moving on? Who the fuck was gonna stop them? Who gives a shit if the Bolivarian revolution continued after a sustained bombing campaign? The government in Venezuela doesn’t present any real isolated threat to the US, so regime change really only matters in so fat ad they can control their “backyard”.
But Iran, and the greater Axis of Resistance? They pose an exstistentional threat to the US Empire. A multipolor world connected through a paradigm of mutual development that comes about from the Belt and Road initiative is a threat the US will do anything to halt. Iran and the AoR are military threats to the overstretched US empire as well. Regime change, is a necessity for the US dominated global order to continue.
The US needed to make an example of Venezuela, but it needs to destroy Iran. We’ve seen what this current clique of capitalist in the US is willing to do, and how depraved they are. Does anyone really think that the world would stop the US from butchering thousands of Venezuelans?
Nothing would stop them if they wanted to. So I really struggle to see the choice Venezuela had in conceding to the US.
Maybe when the US is too focused on domestic instability, or if by some low chance a soc dem manages to get to power and chooses to dial back the militarism as a method of self preservation. Whatever it may be, the US needs to not be capable of terrorizing Venezuela for them to develop a sovereign national defense architecture.
Yeah, like if it came down to military confrontation, the US might have trouble occupying the country, but they could still do major damage. They eventually lost, in a sense, in Vietnam, but not before doing horrible damage to the people there, some of which is persisting damage from chemical weapons. Granted, the empire is not as powerful today as it was in Vietnam, relative to other militaries in the world. But it’s also more abstracted today, insofar as being able to do more with less boots on the ground, and has barbaric reasons to test that kind of technology on a target to refine AI and such.
Whether some of it was bluff, or fully real, the Maduro operation put Venezuelan leadership in a position where they were facing a threat of the leadership being annihilated vs. doing some dealing. I can’t remember the details offhand, but I remember an article about this, that IIRC the story is the other leaders were facing immediate threat of something happening to them too. Like the US basically had a gun to their head.
And considering what they managed to do in Iran, in spite of how capable Iran’s military is, I would not put it past them being able to do some precision assassination still, in a country that is positioned as much weaker militarily than Iran is. That would surely create blowback like it did in Iran, but Venezuela would have a much harder time turning that blowback into a military response that is capable of making the US hurt in return.
Either way, I’m not the one running a country with a gun to my head having to make that call and I have consciously tried to change my own mindset to sort of back off on matters like these when it comes to passing judgment on the peoples contending with them. In my case, there’s a layer to it where, being a “white” Yankee, I see it as part of unlearning the western superiority view; do I have experience running a country under the shadow of imperialism? No. Have I led to success, or taken over leadership on after it’s establishment, a people’s revolution? No. Have I even lived under the shadow of imperialism from the side of the most marginalized? No.
So I’d much rather be saying “I don’t know enough to pass judgment” than condemning some figure I know little about and never even bothered to learn the name of (Rodriguez) before the kidnapping of Maduro happened. I’m not gonna hold back to the point of making it a personality, where I don’t speak up on things I am informed on, but “no investigation, no right to speak” has something to it, I think. And investigation is more than reading a few headlines.
It’s very much a tendency of many leftists to be obsessed with the most “correct” position. It’s that idea of the Revolution needing to he perfect that Parenti ranted about.
I think part of it is a coordinated attack by some users (especially on reddit I’ve noticed) to turn MLs against the PSL. Mind you, I’m not exactly a die hard PSL supporter, but nearly every attack on them I’ve seen comes off as very… “perfectionist?” If I were to use a word.
It’s not like I’m convinced they’re the vanguard that’ll bring about revolution in the US, but I’m also not convinced that they’re on the same level of theoretical/organizational backwardness as the DSA (even them I don’t find myself 100% denouncing). Like, I guess from perspective, the bar is in hell, and I just want US leftists to lock in on trying to stop bombing my people’s region. I don’t exactly have allies here that’ll make sure I’m protected outside my community, so why go around d making unnecessary enemies is my view I guess.
The thing about Venezuela though, is that many global south Communists and analysts will also miss the broader situation. It floors me, because, like, does nobody remember the US just bombing fishermen with impunity and stealing oil vessels?!
What exactly was stopping the US from bombing the country into oblivion and then just moving on? Who the fuck was gonna stop them? Who gives a shit if the Bolivarian revolution continued after a sustained bombing campaign? The government in Venezuela doesn’t present any real isolated threat to the US, so regime change really only matters in so fat ad they can control their “backyard”.
But Iran, and the greater Axis of Resistance? They pose an exstistentional threat to the US Empire. A multipolor world connected through a paradigm of mutual development that comes about from the Belt and Road initiative is a threat the US will do anything to halt. Iran and the AoR are military threats to the overstretched US empire as well. Regime change, is a necessity for the US dominated global order to continue.
The US needed to make an example of Venezuela, but it needs to destroy Iran. We’ve seen what this current clique of capitalist in the US is willing to do, and how depraved they are. Does anyone really think that the world would stop the US from butchering thousands of Venezuelans?
Nothing would stop them if they wanted to. So I really struggle to see the choice Venezuela had in conceding to the US.
Maybe when the US is too focused on domestic instability, or if by some low chance a soc dem manages to get to power and chooses to dial back the militarism as a method of self preservation. Whatever it may be, the US needs to not be capable of terrorizing Venezuela for them to develop a sovereign national defense architecture.
Until then, they’re kinda forced to play it safe.
Yeah, like if it came down to military confrontation, the US might have trouble occupying the country, but they could still do major damage. They eventually lost, in a sense, in Vietnam, but not before doing horrible damage to the people there, some of which is persisting damage from chemical weapons. Granted, the empire is not as powerful today as it was in Vietnam, relative to other militaries in the world. But it’s also more abstracted today, insofar as being able to do more with less boots on the ground, and has barbaric reasons to test that kind of technology on a target to refine AI and such.
Whether some of it was bluff, or fully real, the Maduro operation put Venezuelan leadership in a position where they were facing a threat of the leadership being annihilated vs. doing some dealing. I can’t remember the details offhand, but I remember an article about this, that IIRC the story is the other leaders were facing immediate threat of something happening to them too. Like the US basically had a gun to their head.
And considering what they managed to do in Iran, in spite of how capable Iran’s military is, I would not put it past them being able to do some precision assassination still, in a country that is positioned as much weaker militarily than Iran is. That would surely create blowback like it did in Iran, but Venezuela would have a much harder time turning that blowback into a military response that is capable of making the US hurt in return.
Either way, I’m not the one running a country with a gun to my head having to make that call and I have consciously tried to change my own mindset to sort of back off on matters like these when it comes to passing judgment on the peoples contending with them. In my case, there’s a layer to it where, being a “white” Yankee, I see it as part of unlearning the western superiority view; do I have experience running a country under the shadow of imperialism? No. Have I led to success, or taken over leadership on after it’s establishment, a people’s revolution? No. Have I even lived under the shadow of imperialism from the side of the most marginalized? No.
So I’d much rather be saying “I don’t know enough to pass judgment” than condemning some figure I know little about and never even bothered to learn the name of (Rodriguez) before the kidnapping of Maduro happened. I’m not gonna hold back to the point of making it a personality, where I don’t speak up on things I am informed on, but “no investigation, no right to speak” has something to it, I think. And investigation is more than reading a few headlines.