“I told him when I spoke to him a week ago that he must surrender. We will be involved in determining who takes control in Venezuela, and we will be deeply involved in Venezuela’s oil sector.” This was the comment made by US President Donald Trump on the incident in which the American army abducted the elected leftist Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro from the heart of the Venezuelan capital, Caracas, on 3 January of the current month.
Trump’s bluntness clearly defined the motives and objectives of the American operation. Investment in, or control over, Venezuelan oil is a vital goal for the United States and its major oil corporations. This goal is unattainable while Nicolás Maduro remains in power, as he is the political heir to the policies of former Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez, who was openly hostile to Washington and its traditional imperial dominance in Latin America.
Maduro’s Defiance in the Face of American Ambitions
President Maduro maintained Venezuela’s anti-United States and anti-hegemony political stance following his victory in the early Venezuelan elections in April 2013, after the death of President Hugo Chávez, despite political pressure and economic blockade.
In this context, Maduro confronted Washington-aligned opposition figures such as Juan Guaidó, who in 2019 attempted to install himself as president with American backing. Washington itself failed to persuade the Venezuelan military to stage a coup against the elected president, Maduro.
Maduro later renewed his electoral success in the most recent elections in July 2024, defeating opposition candidate Edmundo González, after opposition figure María Corina Machado was excluded. She later received the Nobel Peace Prize and dedicated it to President Donald Trump.
The latest elections generated intense reactions, with challenges to their integrity despite the court ruling in Maduro’s favour. Countries were divided over the results. The United States and several European and Latin American states refused to recognise his victory, while Caracas’s allies, including Cuba, Nicaragua, Iran, Russia, and China, quickly congratulated President Nicolás Maduro.
In this manner, the map of states competing with Washington and opposing its dominance in its own backyard was reinforced, within the southern strategic sphere it has defined for itself since imposing its “guardianship” over Latin America. This was based on the “Monroe Doctrine” announced by US President James Monroe in 1823, which justified intervention in the internal affairs of the region’s states under the pretext of protecting American interests, preventing potential threats to national security, and preserving regional stability.
Even if this logic, rooted in American superiority, led to the occupation and annexation of neighbouring territories, as occurred when the United States seized 55% of Mexican territory between 1846 and 1848. This land later became around seven US states, including California, Nevada, Utah, most of Arizona, New Mexico, and parts of Colorado and Wyoming, in addition to Texas, which had already fallen under American control in 1845.
This nineteenth-century historical pattern was reaffirmed by the US National Security Strategy document issued in December 2025, which referred to President Trump’s “America First” policy and the restoration of American influence in Latin America as a priority and exclusive objective of foreign policy, alongside confronting China’s rise and other issues.
Accordingly, restoring American influence and controlling resources in Venezuela and Latin America cannot occur without removing leaders who oppose American hegemony, foremost among them Nicolás Maduro, the successor to Hugo Chávez.
As part of the pretext used to justify intervention in Venezuela’s internal affairs, Washington accused President Maduro of leading a terrorist organisation and trafficking drugs into the United States. Yet the 2023 report of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, based on data from the US Drug Enforcement Administration, indicated that the primary route for cocaine trafficking northward passes through the Pacific Ocean at a rate of approximately 74%, with smugglers also using aircraft to send some shipments via the Caribbean.
According to the 2025 report of the US Drug Enforcement Administration, 84% of cocaine seized in the United States originates from Colombia, with reference to other countries involved in transport and transit, without mentioning Venezuela in the section dedicated to cocaine.
It thus becomes clear that Maduro is a victim of American ambitions in his oil-rich country. Reports indicate that Venezuela possesses the largest proven oil reserves in the world, estimated at around 303 billion barrels. At the same time, China, America’s principal competitor, is the world’s largest importer of Venezuelan oil. Its imports exceeded 600,000 barrels per day in December 2025, accounting for 60% of Venezuela’s oil exports and around 4% of China’s total crude oil imports.
China’s advance into Venezuela and its filling of gaps created by the American blockade, combined with its economic, military, and technological capabilities, has heightened Washington’s anxiety. Rather than containing China in Asia, China has moved into Latin America, America’s traditional backyard, alongside Russia and Iran, both of which maintain close relations with Venezuela.
The Global Order Is Collapsing
The abduction of President Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores, in addition to creating a potential vacuum, may lead to chaos as a result of political and possibly security confrontation between the opposition aligned with the United States and supporters of Maduro and the Hugo Chávez line opposing Western capitalist imperialism. The American step, therefore, drives the world toward dangerous consequences at both the Latin American and international levels.
First, the destabilisation of Latin America. Venezuela has now entered a transitional phase whose outcome is uncertain, with one possible scenario being the chaos of a power vacuum that would spill over into neighbouring states.
Countries opposed to American policy, such as Cuba and Colombia, which have deep disputes with Washington, as well as Mexico and Brazil under the leadership of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who criticises American behaviour and hegemonic foreign policy, will develop fears of internal coups or external interventions. This will strengthen internal security measures and reduce cooperation among Latin American states that either supported or opposed what happened to President Maduro.
States anxious about American policy will seek coordination among themselves to oppose American dominance. This will reinforce a culture of blocs in Latin America connected to China, Russia, and Iran, pushing the region toward competition that casts heavy shadows over public freedoms and economic stability, which is already sensitive to political fluctuations.
In addition to Venezuela’s vast oil reserves, which Washington seeks to control, Brazil ranks among the world’s top ten economies, with a gross domestic product estimated at two trillion dollars, representing 2% of global GDP. Any geopolitical disruption will have repercussions for the fragile international economy amid Trump’s volatility.
This comes at a time when migration from poorer to wealthier countries may increase due to instability, an issue President Trump frequently highlights. The number of Venezuelan migrants or refugees has reached approximately 7.8 million, 85% of whom are distributed across Latin America and the Caribbean, including Colombia, Peru, Brazil, Chile, and Ecuador.
Relatedly, political instability may open greater space for drug cartels in Latin America, which could exploit security breakdowns and the weakening grip of central governments. These groups may shift from illicit trade networks to actors in internal conflicts to secure their geographic environment and alliances with regional armies and local political brokers. The United States, focused on change and dominance, cannot deploy ground forces in Latin America due to logistical impossibility and domestic opposition, and will therefore rely on allies and proxies within those states.
Second, the collapse of international reference frameworks and the summoning of chaos. Many ask the following question. If the United States, which claims the role of guardian of international law, abducted President Maduro and violated the sovereignty of Venezuela, a United Nations member state, what would Washington’s position be if Russia abducted Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, or if China abducted Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te and restored sovereignty over the island in line with its policy that Taiwan is an inseparable part of China?
The United States has effectively taken a step toward destroying the international system embodied in the United Nations and its institutions. It has shattered the framework of international law governing relations between states, transforming it into a deity made of dates that the United States consumes when hungry and worships when full. This selectivity represents the destruction of the system that governed the world after the Second World War until now.
The return of the world to the logic of force and interests built at the expense of other nations draws the contours of chaos that will sweep the globe. Many states, especially large or powerful ones, will find justification to intervene in the affairs of smaller or weaker states under historical pretexts, such as claims that a smaller state was once part of their territory or sovereignty.
This is evident, for example, in the relationships between Russia and Ukraine, and China and Taiwan, or in claims that a particular regime poses a threat to another state’s security or interests, or assertions that a people belongs ethnically to a “mother state”, as Adolf Hitler did with Austria and the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia.
American behaviour in Venezuela constitutes a formula for redrawing the maps of global geopolitics based on national interests and unethical power standards of major states, at the expense of international law, state sovereignty, non-interference in internal affairs, and recourse to the International Court of Justice, the International Criminal Court, and special tribunals in cases of dispute.
This behaviour will accelerate the redrawing of alliances and blocs east and west, pushing many states into arms races and defensive entrenchment to protect themselves, their identities, and their national sovereignty.
When standards become blurred and lose the compass established after the Second World War, the world enters an era of uncertainty whose cost is immense until nations settle into a new order after exhausting themselves in open conflicts that redraw power structures and geopolitical realities, producing new standards forged in the arena of international struggle according to the logic of the victor and the supremacy of force, whether ethical or not.
Third, the Middle East ignites. The genocide in the Gaza Strip has revealed the extent of the erosion of international law and justice, and the inability of the international community in the face of American power and its alignment with the brutal Israeli occupation.
Trust in the United States has declined, and it is now viewed as a partner in occupation and as an organiser of criminal conduct against the Palestinian people. This perception extends across the Arab region, including Lebanon, Syria, Iran, Yemen, and the wider Arab world, which is suffering under severe economic and security crises.
The blatant and illegal American intervention in Venezuela will encourage Israel, governed by a theological right wing, to escalate its methods of resolving conflicts in the Arab region under the banner of “redrawing the new Middle East”, including the revival of the “Greater Israel” project.
In this context, it is not known with certainty what was discussed or agreed upon between Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House during the latter’s visit at the end of December 2025 regarding Iran’s nuclear project and ballistic missiles, Hezbollah’s weapons in Lebanon, Hamas and the resistance in Gaza, the position of minorities in Syria, Turkey’s positioning in Syria, the eastern Mediterranean, Libya, and Israel’s attempt to establish a presence in the separatist Somaliland region.
Major unresolved issues remain in the region with Israel as a central party. This may drive it to take military steps against its adversaries in pursuit of decisive outcomes, beginning potentially with Iran, exploiting last year’s twelve-day war and Iran’s economic decline and protests driven by inflation. Israel has encouraged protesters to stand against the regime, a point referenced by President Trump when he suggested the possibility of American intervention in support of demonstrators if the Iranian government were to “kill protesters”. This practically reinforces a policy of intervention in the internal affairs of states.
What happened in Venezuela is connected to what may occur in Iran and the Arab region. Israel is no more than an American aircraft carrier or an American state in the Middle East, operating in accordance with the American rhythm. If Washington is eager to intervene militarily in Latin America, Israel is even more eager to intervene militarily in the Middle East.
As the world moves to redraw the boundaries of power and geopolitics, Israel also seeks to redraw the Middle East according to the limits of its power derived from the United States.
This raises fundamental questions about the position of Arab and Islamic states amid regional and international transformations, and about their political project to protect themselves from the American earthquake that began in Venezuela and may pass through the Middle East.
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