Veterans for Peace Stand Out Against Venezuela Strike
Protesters say they fear that the nation and its young men and women will get caught up in another war.
Veterans For Peace is a global network of military veterans and allies dedicated to creating a culture of peace through education, advocacy, and support services.
The organization aims to end all wars, raise awareness about the true costs of conflict, and help veterans and war victims worldwide.
Protest organizers Eric Wasileski, a Persian Gulf Navy veteran, and Rhonda Pastori, an Air Force veteran, described President Donald Trump's actions as illegal.
Wasileski emphasized that without the rule of law, society risks descending into mob mentality.
Venezuela has an impeachment process that they can use, and they should use their impeachment processes, he said.
"We say we're supporting and defending the Constitution. We're also saying that we're supporting the rule of law," Wasileski said.
"There are laws in place in nations to deal with corruption, and we hope that they will use those laws instead of expecting people to come and get their leaders."
The Trump administration has pressured Venezuela for months, including attacking small boats that are allegedly being used for drug trafficking. On Jan. 3, U.S. forces struck the nation's capital, killing more than 80, and an extraction team pulled out Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores.
Elected as president in 2013, Maduro had continued to maintain a brutal grip on power and his ouster was hailed by many Venezuelans who'd fled his regime. He was indicted by a federal grand jury in 2020 on drug trafficking and terror charges and arraigned Monday in federal court in New York.
The action, however, drew denunciations, with critics saying it was less about keeping Americans safe from drugs and more about grabbing the South American nation's oil. Just last month, Trump pardoned former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez, who had been sentenced to prison on cocaine distribution charges.
"President Trump’s unilateral military action to attack another country and seize Maduro — no matter how terrible a dictator he is — is unconstitutional and threatens to drag the U.S. into further conflicts in the region," said U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren. "What does it mean that the U.S. will 'run' Venezuela, and what will Trump do next around the world?"
The United States has been involved in oil wars since 1991, and this is just a continuation of that, Wasileski and Pastori said.
Venezuela has the largest proven oil in the Western Hemisphere and that is what Trump wants, just like what the U.S. wanted in Iraq, Wasileski said.
"We have the technology available for us to make electricity, for transportation, for heating, everything that the oil does we have that technology available to us. We need to transition. If we transition, we will stop making wars for oil, and we can live a better life," he said.
This intervention in Venezuela is distracting the public from national issues, several of which are happening this week, such as hearings on health care, Pastori said.
"Besides it being an unlawful act, this is how the U.S. has gotten our feet into more serious engagements," she said.
"The easy thing to do was getting Maduro out. Now what happens and our U.S. servicemen can't always speak freely as veterans, we're here to speak out for them on their behalf as well."
The rhetoric being used to justify the attack centers around drugs but that could not be further from the truth; it all comes down to the money, they said.
"Who knows what was going on behind the scenes that made Trump feel that this needed to be done," said Pastori. "Likely, it was oil corporations that wanted to get their feet back into the country of Venezuela and wrestle control away from the people there."
Pastori acknowledged that it is no coincidence that a quarter of Venezuela's population have left since Maduro took over.
"There's a reason for that, and regime change should not be the business of the United States," she said. "We have to be respectful of other nations' sovereignties. What on earth is China saying about this in regards to their relationship with Taiwan. What moral grand do we have to stand on when it comes to anybody else's behavior, when our administration handles things this way."
Pastori said their goal was to educate the public, and Wasileski strongly promoted pacifism, which means actively standing for justice without violence through peaceful protest and community education. Showing up at a rally or making a call to legislators can make a difference, they said.
The protest was strategically held outside the U.S. Army Career Center on North Street to inform prospective recruits about the realities of military service, Wasileski said.
"When I enlisted I didn't have all the facts, and I want to make sure young people understand what they get involved in, and war for oil is not honor. It's not duty, it's not defending our nation, and it's something else entirely," he said.
Editor's note: Two people were incorrectly identified and a wrong year was given regarding how the U.S. has been involved in wars over oil in an earlier version of this article. These have been corrected.
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