The news from Venezuela this past weekend sent shockwaves across the globe, but for many, it wasn’t just another headline. The dramatic abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife by US agents, framed bizarrely as ‘law enforcement,’ laid bare a stark reality: in the Western Hemisphere, sovereignty is a fragile concept, and international law often seems reserved for the weak, not the powerful.
When ‘Law Enforcement’ Becomes a Military Raid
President Donald Trump’s immediate boasts about the ‘extremely successful’ operation, coupled with threats of ‘boots on the ground’ and promises to ‘run the country,’ peeled back any pretense of legality. This wasn’t a police action; it was an act of aggression, underscored by Trump’s audacious claim that Venezuela had ‘stolen’ its own oil from an industry the US had supposedly built. This isn’t the language of justice; it’s the arrogant vocabulary of conquest, reminiscent of colonial-era land grabs.
The Echoes of the Monroe Doctrine
To understand this brazen act, we must look back. The 1823 Monroe Doctrine established the Western Hemisphere as a US sphere of control, a doctrine that has since evolved into a justification for intervention. Governments deemed ‘illegitimate’ or ‘dangerous,’ and resources deemed ‘strategic,’ become targets. ‘Democracy,’ ‘anti-communism,’ or ‘the war on drugs’ – these are merely pretexts to compel coercion when a government obstructs US hegemony. What’s new in 2026 isn’t the intent, but the sheer brazenness. No more proxies or covert funding; just overt displays of brute power.
More Than Just Oil: A Resource-Rich Target
Venezuela isn’t just about its 300 billion barrels of oil, the world’s largest proven reserves. It’s also home to the Orinoco mining belt, rich in gold (over 8,000 tonnes), iron ore, rare earth elements, nickel, copper, and phosphates – critical inputs for modern technology, industry, and military hardware. Interventions sold as ‘anti-narcotics’ or ‘anti-corruption’ often carry a hidden agenda: controlling concessions, trade routes, and the monetization of precious resources. The naval blockade imposed last December, disrupting oil flows and seizing cargoes, was not merely punitive; it was preparatory fire for regime change.
Sanctions as a Weapon: Reversing Social Progress
The US target wasn’t just Venezuela’s oil flow but its domestic use. Following Hugo Chavez’s election in 1998, oil revenues fueled massive social programs, drastically cutting poverty and expanding access to healthcare, education, housing, and food. This model, which prioritized social welfare over corporate profits, was precisely what US policy sought to dismantle. Sanctions, escalating significantly after 2015, created humanitarian deterioration – a deliberate economic strangulation aimed at regime collapse, not reform.
Gaza, Ukraine, and the Hypocrisy of ‘Universal Law’
Venezuela’s abduction cannot be viewed in isolation. It’s inextricably linked to Gaza, a global litmus test for the rule of law. For two years, Washington has shielded Israel from accountability, even as the International Court of Justice issued provisional measures against it for genocide, and the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Prime Minister Netanyahu. Yet, the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza persists, and Netanyahu remains a ‘strategic partner.’ The contrast is stark: Maduro is abducted without trial, his country placed under foreign management, while Netanyahu operates with impunity.
And what about Ukraine? The West insists borders are inviolable and aggression criminal. But for Gaza and Venezuela, the opposite is justified. This selective application reveals a chilling truth: it is power, not principle, that determines when sovereignty matters. A system claiming universal legality is thus undermined by its own regime of exemptions.
The Nuclear Question: Deterrence in a World of Empire
Venezuela offers a grim, unmistakable lesson for the Global South: nuclear capabilities function as regime insurance. The US cannot do to North Korea what it did to Venezuela because Pyongyang possesses a credible nuclear deterrent. Trump’s own record confirms this logic; Washington is forced into negotiation with Pyongyang due to the existential costs of intervention. This isn’t a moral endorsement of proliferation but a realist reading of imperial behavior.
The same deterrence logic applies to Iran. Despite fantasies in Washington and Tel Aviv, a Venezuela-style operation there would likely fail. Iran’s retaliatory capacity, large missile and drone arsenal, hardened facilities, and ability to disrupt vital global trade routes like the Strait of Hormuz mean the costs of escalation would be immense and unpredictable. Furthermore, with a population of 92 million and vast territory, Iran is unmanageable as an occupation project, a lesson painfully learned in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Resistance Hardened by Siege
Regime-change operations often rely on intelligence penetration and internal betrayal. The Maduro abduction will likely intensify efforts within Venezuela to dismantle foreign intelligence networks. Washington repeatedly misreads societal responses; removing a leader does not extinguish resistance when intervention is widely understood as foreign domination tied to the seizure of national resources. A state may be weakened by sanctions, but society becomes politically hardened by siege. Coercion at the top entrenches opposition below.
The Unmistakable Lesson of Our Time
Gaza exposed the hollowness of Western universalism, liberalism, and globalization. Venezuela extends that painful lesson into the Western Hemisphere with a clarity that even allies cannot obscure. When legality is enforced only against opponents, it ceases to be law and becomes an instrument of power. When aggression is openly linked to oil, empire stops pretending to be anything else.
More than two millennia ago, Marcus Aurelius warned future rulers: ‘Look back over the past, with its changing empires that rose and fell, and you can foresee the future, too.’ Trump, it seems, remains deaf to such ancient wisdom, paving a path that promises only further instability and an increasingly clear division between those who wield power and those who endure its consequences.
Source: Original Article
