The toppling and alleged seizure by invading American military units of Nicolas Maduro will send a shiver of dread and alarm across the globe. This coup is illegal, without justification, and destabilizing for the region and the world. It overturns global standards, ignores national territorial sovereignty, and risks creating an state of anarchy within the country.
It is policy crafted from chaos. But this is the world we now live in – the universe as defined by Donald Trump.
An Extraordinary and Perilous Declaration of Unfettered US Power
The overt assault on Venezuela signifies an remarkable, hazardous assertion of unchecked American might and arrives the same week that the President menaced armed attacks against a further disliked anti-western regime: the one in Tehran. It follows many months of escalating US pressure through military, economic, and political means on Maduro, including deadly naval strikes on vessels suspected of drug smuggling.
Trump claims to be acting to prevent illegal narcotics entering the US through Venezuelan routes and to cease an purported flood of “criminal” migrants. In an repetition of the American incursion into Iraq in 2003, he is also charged with desiring Venezuela’s vast oil and gas resources – suspicions reinforced by frequent, unlawful US confiscations of Venezuelan oil tankers.
But Trump’s chief motivations seem to be personal animosity directed at Maduro, and a wish to resurrect the historical Monroe Doctrine by establishing a US sphere of influence and dominance across the Western Hemisphere.
Hemispheric Alarm and Worldwide Consequences
Hemispheric heads of state, including Colombia’s president, who has clashed with Trump in recent months, greeted the coup with fury and concern; in part, possibly, because they fear they too could become victims of Washington’s newly aggressive dominance. Cuba’s leftwing government has special reason for worry. It depends significantly on Venezuela’s regime for low-cost fuel and political and economic support.
The US top diplomat has made no secret of his wish to see regime change in Havana. In Panama, too, anxiety levels will be elevated. Trump has in the past menaced military action there, over authority over the Panama Canal. Indeed, the alleged apprehension of Maduro brings to mind the 1989 US invasion of Panama and the toppling and arrest of its then dictator.
Autocratic, undemocratic governments globally will be closely observing Trump’s subsequent moves, as will Washington’s allies in democracy. Iran condemned the coup. It has good reason to be apprehensive. But Russia’s president may not be totally displeased by the removal of his Venezuelan ally.
A Perilous Benchmark for International Disputes
Trump’s unprovoked resort to violence is not so very different from actions in invading Ukraine. Both have unlawfully assaulted a neighbouring country and sought to remove its government. For China’s leader, whose forces were recently conducting military exercises against the “separatists” of Taiwan, Trump has just established a benchmark he may eventually happily emulate.
Trump’s coup is of great concern to Britain, the EU and democratic Western nations. They ought to, and have to, unequivocally condemn it. It openly confronts the laws and tenets of the global system they cherish. The US has yet again ignored the UN and conventional approaches of addressing inter-state grievances. And it is acting with apparently scant regard for what happens next in Venezuela.
Uncertain Aftermath and Potential for Chaos
The Caracas government has been decapitated, but remaining high-ranking figures of the regime seem to remain at their posts. They are urging resistance and, potentially, retaliation against the US. There are unverified accounts of civilian casualties. If a leadership void develops, civil stability might disintegrate, sparking civil war or a possible military coup. And it is unclear whether the most recent American armed intervention has concluded, or may intensify more.
The notion that exiled opposition leaders will swiftly return and that full democracy will now be restored is naive. The next few days will be decisive. And the responsibility lies entirely with Trump.
The Myth of the Peacemaker
Trump’s imprudent move should finally lay to rest his perpetually deceptive characterisation of himself as a “world peacemaker”. It’s high time that European leaders publicly recognise him for who he is – a global warmaker, a universal menace.
Each time he blunders noisily into areas of dispute, setting deadlines, delivering final demands, choosing sides and monetising misery, the pursuit of fair and enduring peace is set back.
No surprise peace remains distant. And bizarrely, even while presenting himself as a neutral peace broker and one who avoids intervention, Trump concurrently conducts warfare on the world. The US conducted unprecedented levels of air strikes in the Middle East and Africa the previous year, surveys show.
A Heritage Built on Violence
Since resuming the presidency a year ago, the ostensibly peace-seeking President has bombed Yemen, carelessly killing numerous civilians after relaxing combat protocols; bombed Nigeria, to counter-productive effect; bombed Somalia, Iraq and Syria; and targeted Iranian sites, where he mendaciously exaggerated the success of US strikes on atomic energy sites. He even will not exclude attacking Greenland, a independent land of a NATO partner.
What is occurring in the President's mind? A benign interpretation is that in matters of war and peace, he has no conception what he is doing – no plan, no understanding – and invents strategy as he goes, depending on how he feels.
The more ominous reading says he is fully aware what he is doing, that more and worse is to come. Like previous second-term presidents who ran out of road domestically, Trump finds the global platform provides more opportunities for the application of authority and ego. He is building a legacy in blood.
Trump’s irresponsible, dangerously erratic behaviour is getting noticeably more severe. His Venezuela “triumph” may encourage him to try further and larger, irrational atrocities. He parades and postures, cries havoc! and unleashes the hounds of conflict.
