00:00Welcome back to the committee.
00:01We'll hear what you have to say.
00:02Thank you.
00:03I'm just going to talk to you guys for a few minutes.
00:05All right, here we go.
00:10Suspend.
00:11You know the drill.
00:12Off to jail.
00:13That's a war crime.
00:14That's a one-year ban.
00:15From the committee.
00:17In your testimony, you reserved the right to use.
00:20Force again in the future if the Venezuelan government isn't.
00:25Complying with your requests.
00:28So if, for instance.
00:30They refused to give you access to the oil in the future.
00:33If they said we're just going to.
00:35Keep it for ourselves.
00:36Would this cause you to consider military action?
00:39And do you consider.
00:40That if you're using military action simply to try to compel cooperation?
00:45From the government.
00:46You absolutely need congressional authorization for that.
00:49So if you look.
00:50The president never rules out his options as commander-in-chief to protect the national interest of the United States.
00:55I can tell you right now with full certainty we are not postured to nor do we intend or expect.
01:00To have to take any military action in Venezuela at any time.
01:04The only military.
01:05Presidents you'll see in Venezuela is our marine guards at an embassy.
01:08Okay.
01:08That is our goal.
01:09That.
01:10That is our expectation.
01:11And that is what everything that outlines towards.
01:13But if.
01:13That said.
01:14If an Iranian drone.
01:15Factory pops up and threatens our forces in the region.
01:17The president retains the option to eliminate that threat.
01:20I'm at this operation on September 2nd with the attack on Venezuela.
01:25I want to be clear and I'll share with you.
01:30What I've shared publicly we made multiple attempts to get Maduro to leave voluntarily.
01:35And to avoid all of this because we understood that he was an impediment to progress.
01:40You couldn't make a deal with this guy.
01:41Okay.
01:41This guy has made multiple deals.
01:43He's broken every one of them.
01:44As a point of example.
01:45Four hours to take our president.
01:46It's very short.
01:47Nobody dies on the other side.
01:49Nobody dies on our side.
01:50It's perfect.
01:51Would it be an act of war?
01:53We just don't believe that this operation comes.
01:55Anywhere close to the constitutional definition of war.
01:57But would it be an act of war if someone did it to us?
01:59Nobody.
02:00Nobody dies.
02:00A few casualties.
02:01They're in and out.
02:02Boom.
02:03It's a perfect military operation.
02:05Would that be an act of war?
02:06Of course it would be an act of war.
02:08I'm probably the most anti-
02:10person in the Senate and I would vote to declare war if someone invaded our country.
02:15And took our president.
02:16So I think we need to at least acknowledge this is a-
02:20one-way argument.
02:21One-way arguments that don't rebound.
02:23The U.S. always has the right to-
02:25to act in its national interest and to protect itself.
02:27I don't know about this equivalency.
02:29Does this justify-
02:30them doing it.
02:30We're always going to do what's best for the United States and America.
02:33We're always going to protect our system.
02:34But the point-
02:35isn't-
02:35and you're exactly right.
02:36We will act in our national interest and we should.
02:38So I'm not disagreeing with you.
02:40What I'm saying is that our arguments are empty then.
02:43The drug bust isn't really-
02:45it's really an argument.
02:46It's a ruse.
02:47The war argument, not a war is a war, is a ruse.
02:50It's not a ruse.
02:50It's not a real argument.
02:52And we do what we do because we are-
02:55we have the force, we have the might.
02:57We do it because it's in our interest.
02:59So we wouldn't let anybody-
03:00come in, bomb us, blockade us, and take our president.
03:05We'll be right back.
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