Trump says military conducted another strike near Venezuela

Among the many Donald Trump quests during this presidency, the war against drugs has been a major focus. Trump has changed the rules, allowing the military to engage targets.

That is not all, however, as another bombshell was just dropped this week on that front when a military strike was apparently conducted on a drug-related target near Venezuela.

Changing the rules

This is a very controversial position by Trump that is not even backed by everyone in the GOP.

For instance, Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) has stated that he believes this position is a violation of their due process rights.

Trump, however, has categorized these drug cartels as terrorists, which completely changed the rules, at least in his eyes, as to how he could fight them.

When the White House was asked about Trump’s position, it responded, “President Trump’s top priority is protecting the homeland, which is why he took the bold step to designate several cartels and gangs as foreign terrorist organizations.”

Another Strike

Trump has greenlighted roughly a half-dozen strikes at this point, every one of them obliterating what was believed to be a drug-smuggling boat and everyone on board.

Trump touted yet another strike on Tuesday, stating, "Under my Standing Authorities as Commander-in-Chief, this morning, the Secretary of War, ordered a lethal kinetic strike on a vessel affiliated with a Designated Terrorist Organization (DTO) conducting narcotrafficking in the USSOUTHCOM area of responsibility — just off the Coast of Venezuela. Intelligence confirmed the vessel was trafficking narcotics, was associated with illicit narcoterrorist networks, and was transiting along a known DTO route.”

He added, "The strike was conducted in International Waters, and six male narcoterrorists aboard the vessel were killed in the strike. No U.S. Forces were harmed."

While Paul does not like it, I love it, and I think this should have been done a long time ago; in fact, I think it was. I believe we have been conducting dark ops against narcos for years, but I prefer this wide-open approach as a bigger deterrent.

CIA operations

Trump added a little fuel to this fire on Wednesday by announcing that he had authorized the CIA to operate on Venezuelan soil. Why he would divulge that information is beyond me, as these agents rely on secrecy to carry out their missions.

He further announced that he is now considering conducting operations on Venezuelan soil, which could be perceived as an act of war. When Trump was asked about the operations, he responded, "I authorized for two reasons really. Number one, they [Venezuela] have emptied their prisons into the United States of America."

He then added "And the other thing are drugs. We have a lot of drugs coming in from Venezuela, and a lot of the Venezuelan drugs come in through the sea, so you get to see that, but we're going to stop them by land also."

I have zero issue with this other than the fact that I don’t think Trump should be mouthing off to the media about it, as it will only raise the level of paranoia that already exists among Venezuelan leadership. Keep in mind, the United States has a $50 million bounty on the head of President Nicolas Maduro, and Trump’s comments likely put a target on anyone who ever remotely resembles an American in that country. It was just not a smart thing to do.