By Dr Sabooh S Mubbashar
In early January 2026, U.S. military forces carried out a dramatic operation in Venezuela that resulted in the capture of President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, who were subsequently brought to the United States to face federal charges. The move drew predictable condemnation from parts of the international community, with critics invoking sovereignty, international law, and regional stability — familiar language whenever raw power is exercised without prior choreography.
Soon after, Stephen Miller, President Trump’s deputy chief of staff for policy and homeland security adviser, appeared on CNN to discuss American foreign policy ambitions more broadly, including Greenland. Pressed by Jake Tapper, Miller dispensed with diplomatic cushioning. The world, he said, is “governed by strength, force, and power.” These, he added, are “the iron laws of the world since the beginning of time.”
The New York Times framed the moment as emblematic of a second-term shift: fewer internal restraints, fewer advisers inclined to soften impulses, and a governing style that treats brute force not as an unfortunate last resort but as a legitimate organizing principle of global affairs — even when applied to allies.
None of this is as novel as it sounds.
Since the Second World War, American power has rarely been exercised without an accompanying moral narrative. Wars were sold as necessary to stop weapons of mass destruction, to free oppressed people, to restore democracy, to stabilize regions, or to protect the world from looming catastrophe. Sometimes these claims were sincere, sometimes strategic, sometimes convenient. But the narrative was always there — a moral wrapper placed around an exercise of interest and dominance.
What distinguishes Miller’s remarks is not the logic they describe, but the refusal to perform that ritual. He says what is usually implied. He removes the language of liberation, stability, and humanitarian rescue, and speaks instead in terms of force and inevitability.
The outrage that follows is not evidence that something unprecedented has occurred. It is evidence of something equally old. From the beginning of time, power has operated according to iron laws. And from the beginning of time, openly acknowledging those laws — without invoking weapons of mass destruction, the freeing of people, or the saving of the world — has unsettled audiences accustomed to being reassured.
In that sense, both the statement and the reaction belong to the same ancient tradition. The iron laws endure. So does the discomfort that arises when someone states them plainly.
The writer is a known psychiatrist
