Reuters Exclusive: US Coast Guard lacks forces to seize Venezuela-linked tanker for now, sources say

https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/us-eyes-additional-coast-guard-assets-seize-fleeing-tanker-sources-say-2025-12-24/

33 Comments

  1. TheRealPancetta on

    Soon we will realize that the USA is just like Ruzzia. The world thought Ruzzia was a super power but quickly realized it was not when they invaded Ukraine.

  2. adthrowaway2020 on

    Yea, I was wondering how we were planning on the logistics of this. Our military hasn’t been preparing for this war and Trump’s been taking a baseball bat to our readiness via his culture wars and massive brain drain in the upper echelons of our military. We don’t even have a coast guard leader since he fired the admiral for being a woman, do we?

  3. ugottabekiddingmee on

    Translation, they are armed now. We won’t attack anyone that could fight back. We only attack the helpless. We are weak and will do anything so that you don’t realize that.

  4. MixtureSpecial8951 on

    Hmm, almost like decades of underfunding is a problem. Who knew.

    Everyone. Everyone knew.

    Also… can’t they put a few shots across the bow and force them to stop and then board via RHIBs?

  5. I’m sorry, Reuters is paywalled now??

    edit: h/t u/thescorch below: it’s only an issue if you open it directly in the Reddit app

  6. PraysLikeARoman on

    Why would this be a Coast Guard responsibility? This is WAY outside of US territorial waters? Isn’t this a job for the Navy?

  7. That’s about what I’d expect from this cobbled together administration. Levels of incompetence unseen ever before!

  8. Not_Sure__Camacho on

    Man I hope this means that a military draft is coming and I call on all people drafted to list bone spurs as reason for turning down the draft.  

  9. Translation – they’re going to let the China-bound tanker go after there probably was massive diplomatic pressure not to commit more acts of piracy. This way they can save face

  10. MixtureSpecial8951 on

    If they are evading sanctions it kinda doesn’t matter what flag they are under.

  11. I swear to fucking god if I get drafted into the fucking coast guard to go be a LITERAL FUCKING PIRATE I’m shooting myself and sending them an invoice for the fucking bullet

  12. How the fuck does the US military not have enough money for a mission? They have all the money

  13. This is all fascinating. I guess it’s a reminder that the ocean is a vast expanse and ships like Coast Guard cutters are relatively slow-moving. The oil tanker probably deliberately took a route that was as far away as possible from every known large U.S. vessel. The boarding team will eventually assemble nearby, so I think this delay is just delaying the inevitable.

  14. Separate-Park8184 on

    They should have just enough resources to 1. Guard 2. the U.S. Coast. It’s literally in their name. They are not guarding anything, and they are no where near the U.S. Coast therefore they are outside their resource obligations by pirating boats.

  15. Well, we don’t have a Coast Guard big enough to get into Piracy.

    Since our servicemen and women are too fucking cowardly to refuse committing crimes, being logistically incapable of perpetuating crimes seems like a silver lining?