Nicolas Maduro and his wife awoke yesterday in a safe house on a heavily fortified military base in the center of Caracas. Courtesy of a brilliant, audacious U.S. military operation, the two ended their day in a New York City jail cell. The 1989 operation to apprehend the Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega required 27,000 American troops and took weeks to carry out. Removing the Venezuelan president from power, and from the country, took just two hours and 20 minutes. President Donald Trump characteristically described the operation as 'big stuff,' and for once he was right. Maduro's fall can and should serve American interests and transform Venezuela for the better. Maduro was corrupt and repressive. He was implicated in drug and human trafficking, and he stole his nation's 2024 election. He was also an incompetent manager who ran an oil-rich economy into the ground. Nearly 8 million Venezuelans have fled the country. The world should be better off after his departure. Whether the...
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