The story of international law was once told as a hopeful one. After two world wars that destroyed cities and lives, the world promised itself that power alone would no longer decide fate. Borders would matter. Sovereignty would matter. Force would be restrained. The United Nations Charter was written not as poetry but as a shield for the weak. It said clearly that no country has the right to invade another just because it is stronger. It was never a perfect system, but it carried a basic moral idea.
That even the powerful must pause. Today that promise feels thin. What has happened in Venezuela forces us to confront an uncomfortable truth. International law does not fail because dictators break it. It fails because powerful democracies bend it when it becomes inconvenient.
The removal of a sitting president from a sovereign country by foreign forces is not a complicated legal puzzle. It is a violation of the most basic rule that international law rests on. That rule says that political independence cannot be taken by force. When that line is crossed openly, the message sent to the world is dangerous. It tells us that law survives only when power allows it to survive. Supporters of such actions often ask us to focus on the character of the leader involved. They speak of corruption repression or lack of democratic legitimacy. These are real issues. Venezuela has suffered deeply under misrule. People are poor. Many have fled. Rights have been violated. None of this should be denied or excused. But international law was never built to reward good governments and punish bad ones. It was built to prevent chaos. If sovereignty becomes conditional on moral approval, then no country is safe. If illegitimacy justifies invasion, then the map of the world becomes a battlefield.
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The law collapses into selective enforcement. Friends are protected. Disobedient states are punished. History shows us where this logic leads. Colonial empires always claimed moral purpose. They spoke of civilization order and progress. They removed local rulers in the name of reform. Railways were built. Resources were extracted. Violence was justified as responsibility. Today the words have changed, but the structure remains familiar. Democracy replaces civilization. Stability replaces order. But the outcome is the same. Power decides first. Law explains later.
The liberal international order liked to imagine itself as different from empire. It spoke the language of rules. It promised multilateralism. Yet its strength depended on restraint by those at the top. Once restraint disappears, the system reveals its weakness. Rules without enforcement for the powerful are not rules at all. They are performance. This moment marks not just a legal breach but a moral turning point. The idea that force can be repackaged as law enforcement is especially troubling. Sending troops across borders to seize a head of state cannot be reduced to policing. The scale the intent and the symbolism make that impossible. It is an act of force. Calling it something else does not change its nature. Words matter because they define responsibility. When words are softened, violence becomes easier to repeat. Western reactions expose the double standard clearly. When Russia entered Ukraine, the language was firm. It was called invasion. Aggression. A crime. No one asked whether Russia felt threatened or misunderstood. No one suggested managing Ukraine until a better leadership emerged. Sovereignty was treated as absolute.
When a powerful Western state acts similarly in the Global South, the language shifts. Suddenly there are operations. Strikes. Extractions. Journalists ask how people feel rather than whether the law has been broken. This difference is not accidental. It reflects an old hierarchy where some sovereignties are sacred and others are flexible.
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This hypocrisy is not lost on much of the world. Asia, Africa and Latin America remember Iraq, Vietnam, Panama, Iran and many smaller interventions that never carried consequences. They have seen international law used as a weapon rather than a principle. When asked why they do not rally behind Western calls for legality, the answer is simple. The law has rarely protected them. Supporters of intervention often argue that removing a bad leader may improve lives. This belief ignores history. Regime change has memory. Iran’s elected leader was overthrown in the 1950s. Decades later, the consequences still shape global politics. Iraq was promised democracy and stability. What followed was fragmentation and suffering. Violence does not vanish after the cameras leave. It sinks into societies and returns in new forms. There is also a strategic blindness at work. Bullying weaker states does not create security. It creates resentment. It pushes people toward resistance. It invites rivals to step in. A power that relies only on fear loses attraction. Respect erodes. Influence shrinks. History shows that empires collapse not when they face enemies but when they forget limits. What makes this moment even more dangerous is its openness. Earlier interventions were at least wrapped in denial. Today, there is little shame. Resources are mentioned openly. Control is promised openly. This honesty does not make the act better. It makes the system more fragile. When lawlessness becomes normal, others will copy it. Russia will point to it. China will study it. Norms do not die quietly. They unravel loudly. The tragedy is that international law was never meant to be perfect. It was meant to be a restraint. It assumed violations would occur. But it also assumed that violations would be named and resisted collectively. Silence is not neutrality. Silence is permission.
This brings us to India. A country that once spoke strongly against colonialism. A country whose moral voice mattered because it was grounded in principle rather than power. As India rises economically and strategically, its choices carry weight.
Will it defend sovereignty consistently or only when convenient?
Will it speak carefully to avoid discomfort or speak clearly to defend rules?
Moral influence is not inherited. It is practised. International law is not dead. But it is wounded. It will survive only if states choose to protect it even when doing so is uncomfortable. The future order will not be shaped by speeches alone. It will be shaped by moments when power could act without consequence and chose not to.
Venezuela is not just a country in crisis. It is a mirror. What we see in it is the fragility of a system that promised equality but practiced hierarchy. Whether that promise survives depends on whether the world still believes that law should restrain power rather than serve it. The question is no longer whether international law is flawed. It always was. The question is whether we are willing to live in a world where flaw becomes abandonment and abandonment becomes normal.
And whether we are ready to admit that this future is not inevitable. It is chosen.
About the author
Atendriya Dana, Research Scholar, Department of International Relations, Jadavpur University
