Well, howdy there, internet people, it's Bell again. So today, we're going to talk about

Trump's blockade. Trump announced a naval blockade of Venezuela through a rambling social media post

that in relevant part says, quote, Venezuela is completely surrounded by the largest armada ever

assembled in the history of South America. It will only get bigger, and the shock to them

will be like nothing they have ever seen before, until such time as they return to the United

States of America, all the oil, land, and other

assets that they previously stole from us. In context, he appears to be talking about oil production

facilities in Venezuela that are nationalized. He then added, quote,

Therefore today, I am ordering a total and complete blockade of all sanctioned oil tankers going into and out of Venezuela. It's unclear at time of recording how many oil tankers

are actually going to be impacted by this?

Almost immediately, we got questions about whether a blockade is an act of war.

Most questions about the laws of war like this have a pretty nuanced answer.

This one? Not so much.

A naval blockade is pretty much always considered an act of war.

This is a big deal, if Trump actually means the word he used. Another common one is, how are the

various embargoes legal, but a blockade is an act of war. That's easy too. Military force, or at least the

threat of it, is used in a blockade. The next question is, is Trump really going to blockade Venezuela?

Look, it's Trump. We have to entertain the possibility that he literally doesn't understand

what he just said. His exact words were, a total and complete blockade of all sanctioned oil

tankers. In Trump world, that might mean nabbing sanctioned tankers and not actually setting up a blockade. That being said,

it seems clear Trump wants regime change in Venezuela, and the rest of the post talking about

oil and land takes this into a bizarre new level. It certainly seems like he's trying to set the stage for war. Representative

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