Peace Through Strength in Venezuela—and the World
January 3, 2026
By: Ahmed Charai
The rhetoric of international law all too often serves to buttress lawless regimes that undermine US interests.
The international system is confronting a profound moral and strategic crisis. For decades, the principle of state sovereignty—originally conceived to protect nations from external domination—has been systematically distorted into a shield for criminal regimes, failed states, and authoritarian rulers who brutalize their own populations while exporting instability far beyond their borders. When sovereignty is invoked to defend tyranny, it ceases to be a pillar of international order and becomes an accomplice to chaos.
Let us speak plainly. A regime that destroys its economy, terrorizes its citizens, fuels mass migration, traffics narcotics, and destabilizes neighboring countries forfeits its claim to legitimacy. The Venezuela of Nicolás Maduro was not a sovereign democracy; it was a collapsing narco-state. To hide such a regime behind legal formalism conveys no respect for international law. Rather, it is moral abdication.
For this reason, I support decisive American leadership, including firm action against the Venezuelan regime and the arrest and prosecution of Nicolás Maduro in the United States for crimes committed against his people and the wider region. Enforcing accountability is not a species of aggression. It is deterrence. It sends a clear message to other despots that mass repression, corruption, and transnational criminality will not be rewarded with diplomatic immunity.
Some voices in the West continue to argue that military restraint and endless diplomacy preserve peace. Recent history proves the opposite. From Caracas to Tehran, from Sanaa to Khartoum, passivity has entrenched authoritarian regimes, empowered extremist Islamist networks, and prolonged human suffering. The cost of inaction has repeatedly exceeded the cost of resolution.
https://nationalinterest.org/feature/peace-through-strength-in-venezuela-and-the-world
