Judging Freedom - Matt Hoh : The Donroe Doctrine.

Episode Date: December 9, 2025

Matt Hoh : The Donroe Doctrine.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Thank you. Thank you. Hi, everyone, Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Tuesday, December 9th, 2025. Our dear friend, Matt Ho, joins us now. Matt, a pleasure, my dear friend. Thank you very much for joining us. The Don Row Doctrine.

I guess that's a play on words on the Monroe Doctrine. Trump's sort of inventing his own that even though the Monroe Doctrine, which is just a statement of principle, it's not a matter of law, that countries outside the Western Hemisphere should stay the hell out. Countries like the U.S. can do whatever they want to other countries in the Western Hemisphere. Do I read that right? That's exactly right, Judge.

And the Trump administration makes this point in their recent release national security strategy, where they don't use the phrase the Dom Roe doctrine, which I'm not sure who made that up, but I think it's a great term. But they don't use that phrase Dunrow Doctrine, they use the Trump corollarily, which, of course, is a follow-on to Teddy Roosevelt's corollarily on the Monroe Doctrine, which was integral or informative or foundational to Roosevelt's efforts to maintain American primacy in the Western Hemisphere, particularly through efforts such as the Caesar of Panama from Columbia and the creation. of the canal there, Doran Roosevelt's time. Trump has purported to create a no-fly zone over Venezuela. Now, the United States can't create a no-fly zone over any other country. Has he succeeded?

Can you fly from Miami to Caracas today? As far as I could tell, Judge, a number of airlines have canceled flights. I don't know why anyone want to challenge the Americans on this. And that's precisely the point. You know, a large aspect of this is to tighten the screws on Venezuela to make the sanctions bite even harder to cause panic, anxiety, frustration among the Venezuelan people. But also, as we know, no fly zones are very much preludes for war. No fly zones set the conditions for the U.S. military to operate in an airspace. So whether it was over Iraq through the 1990s leading up to the 2003 invasion where we had no-fly zones over both northern and southern Iraq or, of course, over Libya, where no-fly zone was mandated by the UN Security Council in 2011.

And then, of course, the United States and NATO far exceeded the guidelines or the limitations of that no-fly zone to turn that no-fly zone to turn that no-fly. fly zone order by the UN Security Council into a regime change order. But we've seen the precedent for no fly zones. And certainly, you know, as you're saying, the United States has no authority to do such, but it has in the past. And of course, this is either an extension of the sanctions or a prelude or a shaping of the Venezuelan battle space, if you will, to prepare for American military action. We have 20,000 troops, either aboard ship or not far away in Puerto Rico. And we have a dozen ships supporting the mothership, the USS Gerald R. Ford, which is the largest aircraft carrier in the world. Our mutual, wonderful friend and colleague, Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson,

estimates the cost of supporting that number of personnel and equipment is about a billion dollars a day. Yet, what does Trump plan to do with it? A land invasion? An attack by sea? Well, what is he going to attack? What legitimate bona fide military target down there creates a threat to American national security? Well, there's nothing, Judge, that creates a threat to American national security. to American National Security is the presence of our own forces there, creating the possibility of a failed state in Venezuela that would cause repercussions throughout the Western Hemisphere through instability, chaos, emboldening other organizations to try and overthrow their governments.

I mean, so the national security implications come here from our own actions. They come not from anything the Venezuelan state is due. And the Venezuelan state, you know, is pathetic. What threat can it pose to the United States? It could barely pose threats to its neighbors. It's a state that is not failed, but it's collapsing primarily due to American sanctions, you know, I think 12 rounds of sanctions since 2005, five American coup attempts since 2002, if we're keeping score. So the presence of this American fleet that's there that is too small to carry out an Iraq or an Afghanistan-style invasion, but is the right style is to carry out a Libya-style operation.

And so the idea being is that the Americans will provide the airstrikes, the drone strikes, they could provide the commander raids, they'd have the cash to pay mercenaries and militia groups, and it would be to create the circumstances. for opposition groups in Venezuela to depose Maduro and to take his place. And if anyone thinks that's going to go well, you know, I need to know which history books you've been reading because I can't find evidence of where something like that goes smoothly. I mean, best case, best cases you have a, there is no best case. I'm trying to come up with some way, judge that a military action against Venezuela wouldn't end up with different scenarios that all could lead to not just a great instability, civil war, suffering for 30 million Venezuelans, but could lead to great instability,

suffering, chaos, war throughout the continent, just as American military actions in Vietnam, in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya have all done. I mean, we could go through different scenarios where you could say, look, if Maduro is deposed, and the opposition groups led by Gonzalez and Machado take power. Well, what about the pretty large element of the population that are Maduro backers, that are Maduro supporters that have been usurped? Do you think anyone think they're going to sit quietly? So even if you have a smooth regime change,

you run into the issue of, okay, those who've been usurped are now going to fight to regain their lost power. Right? I mean, like, so all these different scenarios. If Maduro falls and Machado and Gonzalez and the opposition can't take power, well, then you have a civil war. And if Maduro doesn't fall, which is just as likely as all these other options, then you have a Maduro regime seeking vengeance trying to repress those who tried to overthrow them, who took part in this treasonous act. I mean, none of those scenarios bring about any degree of stability, bring about any degree of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, of, a. of anything benevolent or beneficial, I should say, to Venezuelan people, right?

So, I mean, everything we kind of, as we game out, what can occur here with U.S. Military Act of Venezuela, it all ends up, you know, via different routes in the same place. Disruption, dismay, you know, repression, possibly, violence, suffering civil war in Venezuela. And then, of course, the great danger that it would expand beyond Venezuela's borders. which, you know, you already have American officials saying such a thing. You have people like Machado saying that the goal is to go from Venezuela to Nicaragua to Cuba. And you can imagine these various groups throughout the region that are out of power, seeing as their best way to get into power is to show the Americans that they're worthy of their support

or that or believing that if we stage a coup here, we stage an uprising, the Americans will come and back us just as they did in Venezuela. I mean, so we're really looking at a situation where Venezuela and military action there could ignite the whole region into not just instability, but into war. If Maduro has made offers to the State Department for the sale of oil at terms acceptable to the State Department, Why Venezuela? What more do they want? Why does Trump want to replace Maduro with this lady that works for Mossad, Mashado?

Because, Judge, I wish it was so as simple as just the principle of the dollar. You know, I mean, and I think a lot of people get wrapped up in that. A lot of people think that that's an explanation for all the America's imperial endeavors, that that's the explanation for why the empire does what it does. And it simply isn't that. There's much more softer, cultural, ideological, personal reasons in all of this. You know, it'd be very simple to say it's about the oil and stop. But that doesn't get to say Marco Rubio's obsession with Venezuela.

That doesn't get to the point of why the United States, beginning with the George W. Bush administration, was so bedeviled, so upset, so frustrated with the idea of a socialist country in South America that wasn't underneath the purview or the authority or wasn't a vassal of the American Empire, right? I mean, so this gets into personal reasons. At the time when the Georgia v. Bush administration attempts the first coup against Hugo Chavez in 2002, there's still those relationships there that would have allowed for, you know, unrestricted oil interplay between the U.S. and Venezuela, you know, so this goes back, this goes farther than the idea of just needing to control the oil, because as you said,

that seems to be something that Maduro and the Venezuelans have offered up, but rather it's this idea that an affront, this insult, this example of a nation not being under the yoke of the American Empire cannot be allowed to exist. And as the United States, if you read that national security strategy that the Trump administration put out, you know, makes very clear the need for control of the Western Hemisphere. You know, the United States Army judge actually just got rid of their Southern Command, their Northern Command, their Forces Command, and created what's known as a Western Hemisphere Command. You know, this is all underneath this idea. of re-centering the American Empire, of consolidating, of controlling what are the United States's

most important geographical concerns. And Venezuela is the first example of that. And the one issue, too, that haven't touched on at all is that of China. And this idea that if you look at a map you look at who are the who is the largest trading partner for most central and south american states now it's china and if you're going to go forward with this policy of re-centering the american empire of the donro doctrine or the trump cholera you can't have china being the trading the largest trading partner for most essential in south america and so again you have to start somewhere so you start in venezuela you um you um you um argued in this, well, it argued, stated, you made the case in this interview you did with the Middle Eastern television reporter that it's important for troops to have a moral construct so they believe morally in what they're doing.

What conceivable moral construct would the troops have who murdered the 81 boat people at sea in the Caribbean? Right, Judge. I mean, so the idea of these lies of the administration that somehow this is all about protecting the American people from the nefarious narco-terrorism carried out by the dictator Maduro and his regime of Venezuela, no one in the administration cares, whether that you or I or most of the folks who are listening who don't believe it or anyone else in the world believes it. They need, though, some type of narrative. They need some type of storyline for those who are carrying out these policies to believe in, right? There needs to be some fiction. There needs to be some tale. There needs to be some construct of morality that the men and women who carry out these policies can tell themselves so that there's no doubt. And, you know, I mean, of course, there's media reasons for it, public relations reasons for it.

But I think that essentially, when the American government lies about what it's doing, it's not so much that expects other people to believe it. It just wants its own people to believe it. So this idea for the drone operators who are firing those hellfire missiles murdering unidentified, unknown people and boats in international waters, what they're telling themselves then is that I'm doing this because each of those boats is carrying fentanyl, and each of those boats will bring a degree of suffering and harm. to countless American families after their husband, their son, their daughter, whoever overdoses.

You know, that's the storyline. That's the tale you have to tell yourself. And I know this from experience, you know, in a sense that going through the Iraq war, participating in that crime, right, taking part in that war that was based upon lies, you know, the lies that I had to tell myself to keep that going, to sustain that. You know, and as one lie was exposed, you then tell yourself another lie or you give yourself another excuse you make up another apology and so i think these this this this need to have a moral narrative some type of construct on which to frame your war frame your regime change it's not necessary again

for to try and convince you and i and the folks watching here but it's necessary to ensure that those who are carrying out the policies believe in what they're doing or at least are giving the ability to lie to themselves about it so it's not necessary that the moral be based on truth and in fact it is never based on truth right i mean morality may be some the most uh i guess depending upon what you come from how you were raised what you believe in morality can be incredibly subjective uh you know certainly when you have a government composed of the sadist that we have you know uh you look at the way tom cotton responds to watching the video of those two men Well, Cotton referred to the three attacks on the two survivors.

So there's four attacks. We're talking about the first boat in September 2025. The first attack pretty much destroys the boat and kills nine of the 11. Then takes three more attacks to kill the remainder of the boat and the two survivors. Senator Cotton, I guess he's one of these fundamentalist Protestant Christian nationalists, referred to the second, third, and fourth attacks as tell me if you've ever heard the killing of innocence referred to this way. Righteous. Well, that's what Mark Millie. Judge described the drone strike that killed that family in the last days of the American occupation

in Afghanistan. So if people remember when the United States were retreating from Afghanistan in 2021, when you had that horrible departure from Kabul International Airport, and there is a suicide bomber that killed scores and scores of people, including 13 Marines, sailors and soldiers, you then had an American drone strike that the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Mark Millie, declared as righteous. And then, of course, it turns out that it wasn't righteous at all. It was the murder of almost an entire family, including at least seven or eight children. I mean, so the idea that what they are doing is, the self-righteousness, right, the degree in which they believe themselves to be possessed

of a virtue in their actions. I'm reminded of what Senator William Fulbright said about power and virtue. That power confuses itself for virtue. And so I think that you have men like Tom Cotton, you have men and women like the Attorney General Pam Bondi or the Secretary of Defense, Pete Higgseth, and so forth, who have found that. themselves in positions where their self-righteousness is imbued, is strengthened, is built upon the power that they possess. And so that no amount of facts, no amount of clear details, no amount of truth or honesty is going to change that view because their righteousness doesn't come from any type of

objective morality, certainly doesn't come from objective facts, but rather it comes from their own sense of self-importance, right? Their own, you know, that again, as Fulbright said, power mistaking itself for virtue. Here's someone who does have virtue and does have a profound, albeit minority understanding of all of this. Chris, cut number 10.

We've been doing this for 30 years when the Coast Guard picks up boats off of Venezuela, which we have done historically, about one in four of the boats, maybe one in five, don't have drugs. So we make mistakes. Are we willing to execute people with a 20% error rate? This is an insane policy. It's inconsistent. It's not war and it's not the way we've ever done this. Think about it. If we can blow up a boat in the ocean that is at war with us because of the drugs, what about when they get to Miami and they put it in a truck and the truck's going from Miami to Orlando? Can you shoot a grenade launcher at the truck? No, we arrest people because sometimes we're wrong. You know, the making the model of the truck is this and oh, oh, we made a mistake. That was somebody on vacation. We don't blow up people without first arresting them.

And this is the way it's been done on the high seas for 100 years or more. And what we're doing now is just plain wrong. Is he the only one in the Congress saying that? Well, maybe there's a few others, Thomas Massey and Jim Himes and Senator Coons. I'm forgetting his first name. But so few people are making that argument. Well, you know, and particularly, Judge, so few are making the argument that Paul is making that this whole thing is illegal. Yes, it's when I'm just talking about killing the two survivors. We're talking about killing all 81 people.

As well as a fact that men like Tom, you know, members of Congress like Thomas Massey, who've been arguing against these types of strikes, whether it be carried out by Democrats or Republicans, have been the few who have been in trying to ensure that oppressive. that was set that begins under George W. Bush with mass violations of civil liberties, then extends it under Barack Obama with the drone campaign expanded to include, you know, murdering first responders, include murdering American citizens with drones. The fact that nothing was ever done about that, that sets the precedent for us today. That's why the Trump administration is allowed to carry out these attacks with such a degree of impunity. Why they

feel no they will never be held to account why they feel the laws don't apply to them is because the laws never applied to any of their predecessors and this idea paul is senator paul is getting at where like you know why there's a drug dealer in miami or in st louis or chicago let's shoot their truck with a grenade or more likely with a drone why won't that happen look how we've advanced how the precedent allows for greater uh degrees of of of murder greater degrees of military violence against civilians, greater degrees for disregard of the law. If you have the Joe Biden administration saying that it's okay to violate six American laws against genocide and atrocities and war crimes in order to enable the Israeli genocide of the

Palestinian people, then why can't the Trump administration get away with killing 87 people in the Caribbean and the Pacific? The Biden administration essentially got away with murdering 70,000 people in Gaza. How come the Trump administration can't get away with this? I mean, so you see that. And I think that's what's really dangerous about the arguments that Jim Hines and others in the Congress are advancing because it doesn't at all touch on the larger conversation about the infrastructure and the policies that allow for these murders to take place, how this violates not just international law,

but American law. And so I think anything that comes out of these congressional investigations, is going to focus solely on those two men who were murdered after their nine colleagues were murdered and that that investigation will be done in such a narrow way as to protect the overall infrastructure and policies of the U.S. government with regards to foreign affairs, but also increasingly as we see our foreign affairs connected with our domestic policy, you know, Judge Guy like Stephen Miller, the Homeland Security Advisor, he sees no daylight. between foreign policy and domestic policy.

And a guy like Stephen Miller will say to the president, these types of attacks, these murders, right? These, this killing of these narco-terrorists, as they would call them, is necessary. It's integral for our success here with our domestic policies. So for Miller, like these mass immigration raids, these insanely, insane violation of civil liberties we have occurring here in the U.S., that needs to go hand in hand with these insane violations.

of civil liberties by murdering people in international waters there is a former president of the Philippines who sits in a jail at the international criminal court for executing drug dealers same thing same principle right man thank you very much i love when you're passionate thank you very much for the the depth into which we dwelt on this particularly the moral arguments it's very important that those arguments be aired all the best you will look forward seeing you next week. Thanks, Judge. Thank you. Coming up at 3 o'clock on all of this,

failure of the American Empire, Colonel Karen Krakowski, Judge Napolitano for judging freedom. Thank you.