What is unfolding right now is not foreign policy. It is imperial violence, plain and unapologetic. The United States is once again asserting itself as a global enforcer—bombing, abducting, destabilizing—under the tired disguises of “security,” “law enforcement,” and “counter-terrorism.”
This is not theory. This is practice. And the practice is deadly.
From Venezuela to Nigeria, U.S. power is being projected through explosives, coercion, and the assumption that American authority overrides sovereignty itself.
Caracas Under Fire: The Kidnapping of a Sovereign Leader
In early January 2026, the United States carried out a military operation on Venezuelan soil that crossed a line even by Washington’s own long history of interventionism. Airstrikes hit Venezuelan infrastructure. Special forces seized Nicolás Maduro, the sitting president of a sovereign country, and transported him to the United States to face trial.
Let’s call this what it is: a state kidnapping backed by bombs.
No Congressional declaration of war.
No United Nations mandate.
No international legal framework.
Just raw power asserting itself.
This act shattered any remaining illusion that international law applies equally. It sent a message to the Global South that elections, borders, and self-determination only matter when they align with U.S. interests. Venezuelan soldiers died. Civilians were caught in the chaos. Entire neighborhoods were terrorized from the sky—all to demonstrate that Washington still reserves the right to decide who governs whom.
This is not justice. This is imperial theater, enforced by missiles.
The Real Motive: Control, Not “Democracy”
The justification is always dressed up nicely—drugs, corruption, stability, human rights. But the pattern never changes.
Venezuela sits on vast oil reserves. It has refused full submission to U.S. economic and political control. For that, it has endured sanctions that strangled its economy, blockades that functioned as collective punishment, and now direct military assault.
This is economic warfare escalating into armed force.
Imperialism in the modern era doesn’t always look like boots marching through capitals. Sometimes it looks like sanctions that starve a population. Sometimes it looks like courts weaponized across borders. And sometimes, when those tools don’t work fast enough, it looks like bombs and abductions.
Nigeria: Bombs by Invitation Are Still Bombs
Across the Atlantic, the same logic plays out differently but just as brutally.
U.S. forces launched missile strikes in northern Nigeria under the banner of counter-terrorism, targeting insurgent groups operating in the Sahel region. These strikes were conducted with the approval of the Nigerian state—but approval under dependency is not sovereignty.
Nigeria is resource-rich, strategically critical, and politically pressured. Foreign military intervention there is framed as “assistance,” but it reinforces a system where African security is outsourced to Western firepower. Civilian communities live under constant threat from above, never knowing when “precision strikes” will miss their mark—as they always do.
Imperialism has evolved. It now wears the language of partnership while retaining the substance of domination.
A World on Edge—and an Empire That Answers to No One
Global reaction has been swift and angry. Governments, human rights advocates, and anti-war movements have warned that the Venezuelan operation sets a terrifying precedent: if the United States can seize a foreign head of state by force, no country is safe from imperial reach.
But warnings don’t stop empires.
The United States operates with veto power, unmatched military capacity, and an ideological belief that its actions are inherently legitimate. Accountability is optional. Consequences are for others.
This is how instability is manufactured—then blamed on the very regions being destabilized.
Revolutionary Truth: Imperialism Is Not an Abstraction
Let’s be clear and unsentimental:
Bombing sovereign nations is aggression, not defense.
Kidnapping elected leaders is colonial behavior, not rule of law.
Sanctions that kill slowly are still weapons.
“Counter-terrorism” without accountability is a blank check for violence.
Imperialism is not a debate topic. It is a system that kills workers, displaces families, and props up corporate power. It externalizes violence abroad so profits remain comfortable at home.
And every time it goes unchallenged, it grows bolder.
What Resistance Looks Like Now
Revolutionary opposition today doesn’t mean slogans without strategy. It means:
Ending unchecked war powers and rejecting executive militarism.
Building international solidarity that links struggles across borders instead of letting nationalism divide the exploited.
Exposing the economic interests behind intervention—oil, arms, finance, and geopolitical leverage.
Defending self-determination as a non-negotiable principle, not a favor granted by empires.
Empires do not reform themselves out of kindness. They retreat only when confronted—politically, economically, and morally.
The future will not be secured by aircraft carriers or drone fleets. It will be shaped by people who refuse to accept a world where one nation claims the right to dominate all others.
That refusal is not extremism.
It is survival.