ABC News Photo
By Scott Taylor
In the early hours of Saturday January 3, the US military staged a whirlwind military intervention in Venezuela. When the dust had settled, President Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Adela Flores were in US custody, charged with narco-terrorism and the possession of a machine gun. Canadian military analysts were quick to take to the airwaves to praise the precision and efficiency of the US special military operation.
Initially, no one wanted to address the legality of the Trump administration abducting a sitting President from a foreign sovereign state through the use of deadly military force. While 7 US service members sustained slight wounds, an estimated 80 Venezuelan and Cuban security forces were killed in the one sided clashes.
Trump's original premise for intervention in Venezuela was to stop the flow of deadly fentanyl into the US. However, when fact checkers pointed out that no fentanyl is produced in Venezuela and the majority of that county's drug exports are trafficked to Europe, Trump simply pivoted to say it was all about the oil.
While frightening on the surface, Trump's brazen honesty is a refreshing change from successive US administrations denying that oil was the driving force behind the wars in Iraq and Libya. The truly scary part is that Trump's initial success in Venezuela has simply emboldened his administration.
They have suddenly realized that there are no guard rails to stop them from literally acting like an unchecked super power within their own hemisphere.
Between Trump and his Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the US has already put Mexico, Cuba, Colombia and Panama on notice that they could be next.
Canada, while still on Trump's hit list to become the 51st state, is seemingly on his back burner for now.
However, the heat is definitely being turned up on Trump's desire to annex Greenland. This crazy notion was floated during his first term as President, but it was dismissed as a bad joke.
However after the military actions in Caracas, no one is laughing any more. Trump's narrative is that the US needs Greenland for their own national security. For the record the North Atlantic island territory of Greenland has been internationally recognized as the sovereign territory of the Kingdom of Denmark since 1814. But I digress.
Trump's assertion that Greenland is strategically important to the US, is true. Which is why Denmark has had a Cold War era security agreement with the US since 1951.
Since Denmark is a member of NATO any aggression towards the territory of Greenland would prompt a response from all 32 members of the alliance, including Canada. For the record, the RCAF have long utilized the US major military airbase in Greenland to facilitate the twice annual missions to resupply Canadian Forces Station Alert in the high Arctic. Known as Operation BOXTOP these two week long missions are conducted each spring and fall to provision CFS Alert with food and fuel.
Currently called US Space Base Pitiffuk, it was formerly known as USAF Base Thule. So while the world wrings their hands in frightened apprehension of Trump's next move and White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller boasts in the media that taking Greenland by military force is not off the table, the truth is the US already has more boots on the ground there than the Danish military.
As the Danish government were quick to point out, under Charter 5 of the NATO agreement, any aggression by the US on Greenland would either result in 30 member states rallying to Denmark's aid, or the dissolution of the alliance, or both.
To cloud the issue further, former US National Security Council member Alexander B. Gray was recently featured on Australia's 60 Minutes news program. His take was in line with Trump's in that he sincerely believes the US needs to annex Greenland in order to prevent Moscow or Beijing from doing the same in the future.
He cited the fact that Greenland could soon push for independence from Denmark.
To counter this argument, NATO leaders should immediately offer the autonomous Danish territory of Greenland permanent membership in the NATO alliance. If they decide to secede from Danish rule, they will still be protected by the collective. This would eliminate any encroachment by Moscow and Beijing.
And most importantly it would halt any need for the US to annex it.
