Despite his anti-establishment reputation, Trump is continuing the U.S. empire tradition of threatening regime change and meddling in other countries’ affairs, not only in the Middle East and Africa, but now with a focus on South America as well.
The Trump administration upheld the Obama-approved arms sale, agreed to in December 2016, that would equip the Peruvian government with techy war gear.
In February of 2017, Peruvian President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski (PPK) visited the White House where Mr. Trump was urgin his guest Head of State to “use [the newly acquired military weapons cache] well” during a press conference.
Fast-forward to May 2017 just a few short months later, and Trump continues to publicly announce that he is urging Peru to work with the U.S. and his administration against Venezuela cloaked under the usual humanitarian rhetoric that is used to rationalize these sorts of actions to the public.
Then, again in September 2017, Trump had dinner with South American leaders specifically to discuss the future of Venezuela.
“’The U.S. president is ‘looking forward to discussing the crisis in Venezuela, as well as our increasingly strong economic ties, shared goals for elevating the prosperity of our peoples, and the extraordinary success of like-minded Latin American nations in recent decades,’-his National Security Adviser, H.R. McMaster, said at a White House press briefing Friday.”
Then in August 2017 mixed messages were sent from Rex Tillerson first stating all options are on the table and hinting at the potential for regime change to two weeks later, H.R. McMaster stating that the U.S. is not anticipating overt military intervention in Venezuela. The economic warfare continues however, and it is designed to bring the country to its knees, ensuring that innocent civilians are suffering greatly under these policies.
Is the Trump administration considering launching another proxy war in the name of revisiting places to make safe for democracy? If so, Mr. Trump can hardly be characterized as anti-establishment.
