“At the end of the day, Great Powers like the US (which is arguably still a superpower even if it was hitherto in decline till Trump’s return to office) always pursue their perceived interests but cloak them in the language of international law or norms, which is more palatable for the global public.” From Andrew Korybko at korybko.substack.com:
Trump 2.0 boldly explained how the US intends to restore its “sphere of influence” over the Americas in accordance with the new National Security Strategy, thus representing a Hyper-Realist approach in the sense of explicitly embracing the pursuit of power as a goal instead of denying it like before.
The US’ astoundingly successful “special military operation” in Venezuela, which aimed only at regime tweaking at this stage and not regime change like some mistakenly believe, has prompted a flurry of reactions from governments across the world. Venezuela’s strategic Russian and Chinese partners predictably condemned the US’ capture of President Nicolas Maduro while the US’ EU junior partner released a statement that lacked any criticism of the US but also didn’t endorse its actions either.
Therein lies the hypocrisy that was just exposed by the US’ “special military operation” in Venezuela since the EU would have certainly condemned Russia’s hypothetical capture of Zelensky in the harshest language possible. Their implied excuse for these double standards towards the US’ capture of Maduro is that he’s illegitimate, but Russia now deems Zelensky to be illegitimate too, so third parties’ assessments of other leaders’ legitimacy is ultimately subjective and this leads to the reality that was just exposed.
At the end of the day, Great Powers like the US (which is arguably still a superpower even if it was hitherto in decline till Trump’s return to office) always pursue their perceived interests but cloak them in the language of international law or norms, which is more palatable for the global public. The US previously relied on the “rules-based order” concept to justify its actions abroad, but this was eventually exposed by Russian media as pure hypocrisy, ergo why Trump 2.0 didn’t employ it this time.
