It seems that one of Trump's Defense Secretaries has a new "tell all" book coming out, and in it he talks about how Trump wanted to bomb the drug cartels in Mexico and how awful that was.
I mean, what a shocking, awful, disgraceful violation of International Law - sending an attack into the territory of a sovereign ally. Unthinkable! I mean, he probably wouldn't have even let the government know he was going to attack!
Sort of like this:
That's Barack Obama his own self, saying that he basically knew he was violating International Law, for good reasons. And what was the reason? 3,000 dead Americans, and the Pakistani government unwilling or unable to do anything about the perpetrators on their soil.
So what was Trump's reason? Oh, wait:
More than 100,000 people died from drug overdoses in the U.S. in 2021, more than in any other year on record, according to provisional data released by the National Center for Health Statistics Wednesday.
So Osama bin Laden killed 3,000 Americans and was killed ten years later. That's 300 a year, or about one a day. The cartels kill 100,000 each year, or about 275 Americans a day. But it was awesome that Obama violated International Law and it's The Worst Thing Ever that Trump even thought about it.
It makes you suspect that all this pious bloviating from the "Elites" is a bunch of hooey. And it makes you wonder if they think that 275 people from Youngstown, Ohio and similar places in the hollowed out "Fly Over" America are less valuable (and less worthy of protection) than one person working high finance in the World Trade Center.
Actually, I don't wonder at all. It does make me wonder if J.D. Vance is right: "If you wanted to kill a bunch of MAGA voters in the middle of the heartland, how better than to target them and their kids with this deadly fentanyl?..."
Man, Trump sure hired a bunch of snakes in the grass.
"International Law" is a euphemism for nothing more - nor less - than the accumulation of international treaties signed between some countries (are there any treaties signed by all countries, including the "neutral" ones not having official political positions on the given issue/topic?). How, to what degree, and even if any given treaty's terms apply to your country, not to mention when, are all questions that are up for negotiation. Until some country has the military wherewithal to say they aren't. Or are. And only for as long as that remains the case.
ReplyDeleteOne way to deal with this recurring issue of Presidential ignorance upon assuming office is to make pre-election "day" (its own issue) discussion of the current state of US treaties a part of the regular election cycle (possibly during the summer of the Presidential election year). Yes, I know, not gonna happen.
Take anything Esper says with a 5lb bag of salt…
ReplyDeleteThe "Powers That Be" respect International Law when it is of benefit to themselves, and ignore it likewise.
ReplyDeleteWhat all three before me said.
ReplyDeleteWhile I can't confirm it's real, I've also read that what Trump said was more in the context of brainstorming "what can we do to stop the floods of drugs?" and that was more a suggestion than a command. Some people misunderstand brainstorming so badly you just can't do it around them.
Add to that the US had been supporting some of the cartels vs. others, and before that the black agencies have been using drug sales to support themselves back to (at least) the CIA in Vietnam.
Look up Jesus Vicente Zambada-Niebla who was a logistics guy in the Sinaloa cartel (there are other family members in the cartel, so you have search the whole name). It seems that Operation Fast and Furious (remember that?) wasn't specifically to run guns to the cartels to make a gun control argument, it was to arm Sinaloa against the other cartels. It wasn't to kill off the others and then nuke Sinaloa. It was a trade deal.
At the time, Mexican state governments were saying we don't fight drug trafficking, we try to manage it. Ten years later, I think the cartels are the government.
Yea, but how many critters in the grass are not snakes?
ReplyDeleteIf I were president, I don't think I'd trust a single one of any of them put up to be on my cabinet.
Just making note of how screwed this place is.
I somehow think the good people in Mexico would be tickled of we bombed the cartels back to the stone age. But that is just me.
ReplyDeleteBesides invading Pakistan to kill Osama and getting Quadiffi killed, I heard rumors that the Obama Administration considered sending special forces across the southern border to kidnap/kill cartel leaders in Mexico. But I guess they got cold feet.
International law is just a reflection of who has the power. Consider the differing reactions to Bush and Putin doing exactly the same thing. Essentially a preventative war to preempt something that another nation might do but hasn't done yet plus human rights violations (Kurds vs ethnic Russians) by the invading power.
ReplyDeletePersonally, we would be better off if they just bombed the shithole hives in THIS country!
ReplyDeleteOverlooked is all the bravery it takes to expose your bosses' perfidy 2 years after he's no longer in charge. You have to wonder if any of these clowns would have risked their positions to stop him had he committed.
ReplyDelete