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What we learn from the capture of Nicolás Maduro.

The division of the world among great powers, the return of the Monroe Doctrine, and the imperialism of supply chains.

On January 3, 2026, the United States military attacked Venezuela, capturing its president, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores. Before analyzing these events, it is necessary to trace the thread of a larger history, fraught with repetition and inevitability: that of right-wing military coups in Latin America, patiently encouraged, supported, or sanctified by Washington.

Washington's relationship with the Latin American continent is not a dialogue between sovereign nations. It is a chronicle of imposed guardianships, broken wills, and methodically justified violence – a history written less in the ink of treaties than in the blood of peoples.

It can always be argued that Venezuela is a sovereign state and that Nicolás Maduro is a legitimate and democratically elected president. As if such a truth had ever deterred a major power embarked on its destabilization campaign. It should also be remembered that heads of state enjoy international protection, guaranteed by a 1973 UN convention, and that it is forbidden to attack them. Again, as if Washington had ever wavered before a single article of law.

It's even worth noting—and this is quite ironic—that the world's biggest drug trafficker isn't hiding in Caracas, Bogotá, or Mexico City, but rather thriving within the United States itself. It's common knowledge that, since its inception, the CIA has often found convenient resources in this trade to finance its covert operations. But America has always been comfortable with its contradictions, provided they serve its power.

Certainly, it would be permissible to examine the facts in light of international law, to point out the absence of any UN Security Council resolution, and to express outrage at the violation of the rules. But why feign surprise? International law is like those spiderwebs that trap the weak and allow the powerful to pass through. Iraq, Libya, and Afghanistan could put the respect for international norms on trial when they stand in the way of imperial ambitions.

In time, we will likely discover that the "narcotic threat" from Caracas was almost homeopathic in nature: no giant cocaine factories, no toxic invasion. And we will observe, not without irony, that after so many crusades against drugs, the number of drug addicts in America will have doubled.

The prophecy of Hugo Chávez.

Following the US military intervention in Venezuela, which ended on Saturday with the kidnapping of President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, an old document has resurfaced. It shows Hugo Chávez, then at the height of his power, calmly announcing a tragedy whose events Venezuela now seems to be repeating.

It is 2005. In front of the cameras of his show Aló Presidente, Chávez speaks about the United States with his characteristic bluntness. He describes them as the most aggressive nation in history:

“They dared to drop atomic bombs on defenseless cities. Hiroshima and Nagasaki are there to testify to that. What is this? They invaded Panama, bombed and killed thousands of people, burned down an entire neighborhood to seize [Manuel] Noriega, accusing him of drug trafficking, when he was the president of Panama at the time.” I'm receiving several warnings, including from circles that aren't exactly allies, but from serious people worried about the ongoing operation being planned at the Pentagon. It's getting closer, and it's an operation that's been in the works for several years. Years ago, someone told me about it. He said, "They'll end up accusing you of drug trafficking. [...] They're going to try to use the Noriega formula on you. It's one of the plans that's been developing for some time in the United States. They're trying to link Chávez directly to drug trafficking, and then anything goes against a president labeled a drug trafficker. A trip to any country in the world, a commando arrives and takes him away." When it comes to the United States, they invaded Iraq under the pretext that there were weapons of mass destruction. There weren't any, there never have been, but they still hanged the president, without a trial or anything. Fidel [Castro] told me one day: “Chávez, if this happens to you or me, if they invade us, the last thing to do is what Saddam did, hide in a hole somewhere. You have to die fighting, Chávez, right there on the front lines.” "And that's what I will do. I will not hide in the mountains. I will die on the front lines, with the dignity of a Venezuelan who loves this country."

Maduro's capture: military operation or imperial farce?

America likes simple, spectacular, and above all, definitive gestures. Donald Trump got what he wanted: an action presented as perfect, surgical, and efficient. The long-awaited ground operation in Venezuela culminated in the capture of Nicolás Maduro, displayed like a political trophy on the deck of the USS Iwo Jima. The picture was complete: symbolic images, martial rhetoric, and that old refrain that “America is back,” as if it had never left. The same power that proclaims itself the architect of “exemplary” operations—from the Gulf War to Libya—returns to the world stage with the confidence of an actor certain of its role.

On closer inspection, however, the American operation in Caracas does not represent any strategic innovation. It fits into the classic model of special operations: intelligence and logistics.

Initially, the CIA provided a precise map of the weaknesses in the Venezuelan security apparatus: schedules, routes, and the location of the leader. Subsequently, the United States deployed nearly 150 aircraft in a confined area: F-35, F-18, and F-22 fighter jets, electronic warfare aircraft, surveillance aircraft, bombers, and drones. Even before the strikes were launched, a cyber offensive had begun to blind the enemy.

Everything was settled swiftly and, above all, with what matters most to Washington: an almost zero human cost to American forces. This is the ideal of a special operation in its most classic sense: minimal expenditure, maximum return.

The comparison with the Soviet operation Storm-333, which saw the elimination of Hafizullah Amin in Kabul, is inevitable. The reasoning was similar: to take down a leader deemed illegitimate. But the difference is significant. The Soviet intervention was brutal, bloody, and had far-reaching consequences. The American operation, clean and without incident, raises a more troubling question: was it a strategic masterpiece or a meticulously orchestrated performance?

Early on, behind-the-scenes reports suggested that this "capture" might have been negotiated. Had the aging but still shrewd American empire once again produced one of its carefully orchestrated displays, designed to mask the absence of a genuine strategy? The Iranian precedent—now recognized as a largely ritualized exchange of blows—calls for caution. Great powers, when they decline, often compensate with theater.

A question then arises, one of chilling simplicity: why would a head of state willingly relinquish power? History rarely answers with heroism. It is more likely that Maduro chose between several evils: a promise of amnesty, a sham trial, protection of his family, financial guarantees, or, more brutally, the classic choice between surrender and annihilation. Faced with overwhelming military superiority, capitulation can appear as a cold calculation, designed to save what is essential at the expense of symbolism.

However, one fact complicates this overly simplistic hypothesis. During the assault, thirty-two Cubans, engaged in official missions for their country's armed forces and Ministry of the Interior, were killed. This bloodshed seriously undermines the idea of a mere staged event orchestrated with Caracas. Even the most cynical staged events do not always require such sacrifices—unless one believes that these men were not killed and that what transpired in Caracas was nothing more than a nighttime paintball game.

That leaves the hypothesis of internal betrayal. Bought officers, bribed elites, structures undermined by years of sanctions and economic pressure: it's the old handbook of the American intelligence services, revisited with each generation. This idea is all the more credible given that the Venezuelan government has never been a homogeneous bloc. Behind the professed Bolivarian unity lie divergent interests and personal calculations, often indifferent to the state. As for the bourgeoisie and the middle classes, they have long looked to Washington as to a natural horizon.

Some analysts believed they discerned, in Delcy Rodríguez's first public statement—she having become interim president after Maduro's capture—a kind of unintentional admission. She asked Washington to provide proof that the Venezuelan head of state and his wife were still alive. This caution contrasted sharply with the firmness of Sergey Lavrov, who demanded the immediate release of the deposed president. From then on, the question arises, cruel in its simplicity: who, in reality, wants Maduro back in power? It must be noted that the most insistent pronouncements did not come from Caracas.

Former Colombian Vice President Francisco Santos didn't hesitate to accuse Delcy Rodríguez of having handed Nicolás Maduro over to the United States, already describing her as the eager architect of a transition. The accusation is serious, perhaps excessive. History will judge whether it stems from slander or sound intuition.

There is another, broader hypothesis, more troubling for the West: Venezuela may have been a bargaining chip in a wider geopolitical arrangement. In 2019, before the US Congress, Fiona Hill explicitly mentioned discussions concerning an implicit division of spheres of influence—Ukraine in exchange for Venezuela. In light of Trump’s gradual disengagement from Ukraine, this idea ceases to be fanciful. It fits all too well with the consistent logic of American realpolitik, where principles survive only as long as they serve a purpose.

Finally, we must consider another hypothesis, more discreet and perhaps more decisive. A few hours before the launch of the American operation in Caracas, a Chinese delegation met with President Nicolás Maduro. At the time of writing, nothing has leaked about the content of these discussions. The most immediate explanation would be to see it as an attempt to strengthen economic ties between Beijing and Caracas. But is this explanation sufficient?

Can we rule out the possibility that Chinese representatives sought to persuade Maduro to step down before the situation deteriorated irreparably? Was Beijing aware, if not of the details, at least of the imminence of the American operation? The question deserves to be asked, not out of a taste for suspicion, but simply out of respect for the customs of world politics.

Before crying conspiracy, let's remember one fact. At the last BRICS meeting in Kazan, Venezuela's candidacy was rejected by a Brazilian veto. According to Spanish geopolitician Santiago Armesilla, this veto was coordinated with China and Russia. The reason was quite prosaic: Caracas owed Beijing considerable sums of money from loans the regime had never been able to repay. Chinese patience, renowned for its long-term commitment, is not infinite.

This single element speaks volumes about Maduro’s true situation. His downfall would then be less the product of an external or internal conspiracy than the result of his own imprudence. He must be given credit for one thing: he remained in power for a long time in a country ravaged by disastrous economic management, subjected to severe sanctions, and undermined by a confused ideology. But this very ideology—an unstable amalgam of Trotskyism, Bolivarian nationalism, Third-Worldism, and anti-imperialism—ultimately isolated his regime from everyone, including those who claimed to be its allies.

It is significant that Donald Trump was keen to reassure Beijing very early on. Just hours after Nicolás Maduro’s capture, he affirmed that Chinese investments in Venezuela would be respected. When questioned about the impact of the American offensive on relations with China, Russia, and Iran, he responded with brutal pragmatism: the United States would sell oil, including to China. “No one can stop us,” he concluded.

Therefore, one hypothesis is inescapable: what transpired in Caracas goes far beyond Maduro's personal fate. The event is part of a broader process of global reorganization among the major powers, each defining its spheres of influence and core interests. In this context, the individual head of state matters little. In geopolitics, there are no lasting friendships or sentimental loyalties, only interests.

At this stage, it is impossible to decide between these different hypotheses. While we can reasonably dismiss the idea of a staged event orchestrated by Maduro himself, it remains to be seen whether the success of the operation should be attributed solely to American expertise or whether it relied on more discreet complicity: internal cracks in the Caracas regime, or, even more silently, on the calculated laissez-faire of Beijing and Moscow.

But haven't these two countries abandoned a highly strategic ally too quickly? Even assuming this regime change was consensual, doesn't it risk backfiring on China and Russia in the long run?

The natural resources of Venezuela.

For several years, Washington has openly displayed its interest in Venezuelan oil. The Trump presidency only solidified this desire. However, the United States' immediate energy needs are largely met by Canada. In 2023, nearly 52% of American oil imports came from its northern neighbor. But its interest in Venezuelan oil is not driven by commercial considerations, but by a far-reaching geopolitical ambition. The goal is not consumption, but control of a strategic resource.

Venezuela's immense hydrocarbon potential could allow the United States to seize a significant share of the global market. By combining Venezuela's reserves with those of neighboring Guyana, Washington could control nearly 40% of global reserves. Such a position provides an unparalleled instrument of coercion: the ability to destabilize or threaten the heavy oil market, vital to its rivals. Such an operation would flood the global market with Venezuelan oil, causing prices to plummet and weakening the control system established by OPEC+. The goal, therefore, is not consumption but the control of a strategic resource.

But American interest is not limited to the mere possession of oil. It is also about restoring the dominance of the petrodollar and supporting demand for the American currency. In this context, the destabilization of the Venezuelan regime appears less as an internal conflict than as a strategic tool to reaffirm the United States' influence on global energy prices, at a time when the dollar-based monetary system is under intense pressure.

For Russia, the stakes are dramatic. This strategy is reminiscent, on a larger scale, of Reagan's maneuver in the 1980s to strangle the Soviet Union. Moscow risks losing its investments and sees its main sources of revenue exposed to foreign manipulation. The threat is not theoretical: regulating Venezuelan production to lower prices and destabilize the Russian economy is perfectly feasible. All of this is compounded by an arsenal of financial and logistical pressures, creating a veritable encirclement.

For China, the logic is different but just as compelling. Beijing's energy dependence is becoming a point of vulnerability. Washington can block direct exports or, more subtly, flood the Chinese market with subsidized Venezuelan oil. The goal is twofold: to make sourcing from Russia economically irrational and to place China in a position of dependence on Washington.

Control of Venezuelan oil is therefore a purely geopolitical act. It transforms a resource into a weapon capable of shaping global prices and fracturing alliances. For Russia, the era of hydrocarbons as a stable and predictable source of income is over. For the rest of the world, the message is clear: whoever controls energy dictates the limits of the sovereignty of others. The struggle for Venezuela is not about the price of a barrel of oil: it is about the multipolar order of tomorrow.

Beyond oil, Venezuela possesses natural resources of considerable strategic value to major powers. Its gold reserves are among the largest in South America, with over 1,500 tons certified in the Orinoco mining arc. Its rare earth elements, essential for new technologies and renewable energies, remain largely untapped. Its coltan, known as "blue gold," crucial for smartphones, batteries, and high-tech devices, is estimated to be worth over one hundred billion dollars. The country also has substantial iron reserves, estimated at 1.5 million tons, as well as uranium deposits with a potential exceeding several thousand tons.

In truth, Venezuela is not just a land of oil. It is a key player in the global game, a territory whose riches, if fully exploited, would inevitably attract the covetousness of the great powers.

Return of the Monroe Doctrine.

In November 2025, the White House published a document entitled National Security Strategy of the United States of America. This text clearly outlined the American vision for the Western Hemisphere:

“We want the Western Hemisphere to remain sufficiently stable and well-governed to prevent and discourage mass immigration to the United States; we want governments cooperating with us against narco-terrorists, cartels, and other transnational criminal organizations; we want a hemisphere free from hostile foreign incursion or foreign control over strategic assets; and we want to guarantee continued access to key positions. In other words, we will implement and enforce a ‘Trump Corollary’ to the Monroe Doctrine.”

In other words, the United States expects countries in the Americas to subordinate their policies to their national interests in order to ensure that the Western Hemisphere is "free from hostile foreign incursion."

Some countries already seem to be complying, like Argentina with Milei or Chile with Katz. But other states, such as Venezuela, Cuba, and Nicaragua, represent rebellious examples: they maintain close ties with China or the BRICS. Washington intends to exert pressure to break these alliances and exclude any continental actor that is not American. The objective is not only access to strategic resources, but the reconstruction of an industrial and protectionist power capable of reducing its dependence on Beijing.

The White House makes no secret of the fact that this strategy implies a hierarchy of legitimacy: a state is recognized only if it aligns itself with the continental projection of the United States, that is, if it accepts its subordinate position. As the document further specifies: “We will deny non-hemispheric competitors the ability to deploy forces or possess strategic assets in our hemisphere.” In other words, the entire continent is perceived as an exclusive American sphere of influence, conceived as a vast island under their control.

This logic also applies to foreign companies: “We must do everything in our power to expel foreign companies that are building infrastructure in the region.” The implication is clear: China and its companies are the direct targets. The message is crystal clear: Latin America can only be an extension of American interests, and any autonomy or partnership with a rival power is considered a threat to be contained.

The capture of Maduro by the Americans does not mark the end, but the beginning of a new order. Washington was quick to openly claim total control of the Western Hemisphere.

After the operation against Caracas, Trump directed his threats toward several Latin American capitals. He advised Colombian President Petro to choose his words carefully. Regarding Cuba, he announced that the United States would soon examine the situation on the island, which he considered “a failure” and whose system, in his view, was no longer functioning. As for Mexico, he warned that governance was illusory: “The cartels run the country,” he asserted, emphasizing that intervention was inevitable.

But the threat is not limited to Latin America. An image published by Katie Miller, wife of a national security advisor, shows Greenland painted in American colors with the words "SOON".

Isolated conflicts no longer exist. We live in a system of interconnected vessels where each crisis influences the others – Ukraine, Gaza, Iran, the Asia-Pacific region, Africa, and now Venezuela. The American attack on Caracas is part of this global logic, linked to the ambition of seizing Greenland. Washington intends to make it a strategic point, comparable to Taiwan, for controlling Russia's access to the Atlantic.

Trump's strategy is thus revealed in its pragmatic brutality: transforming the American continent into an island under Washington's control, plundering Europeans through tariffs, selling weapons to fuel the war in Ukraine, all while threatening external territories like Greenland, a Danish territory. This policy is not improvised: it is a continuation of the Monroe Doctrine and the historical American imperative to dominate its immediate neighborhood.

Supply imperialism.

An empire is not defined solely by its military strength or economic wealth. To endure, it requires an ideological and legal framework, a narrative, and a structure. This is what the United States so admirably managed to build after 1945. Germany and Japan were in ruins, France and England weakened, and the Soviet Union exhausted. America, alone in possessing the atomic bomb, emerged as the central power of the new world order.

Aware of its position, it took care to cloak its domination in a universal legal order. The United Nations—an improved version of the League of Nations—was designed to organize a world centered on Washington, while giving this centrality the appearance of law, rules, and consensus. Non-intervention in the internal affairs of states became one of the cardinal principles of this edifice, a principle unanimously proclaimed, rarely respected. For violations were numerous, especially by those who had drafted the rules themselves. But these violations had to be masked, justified, and ennobled by a moral or humanitarian pretext.

Whether in the Balkans, Iraq, or Libya, Western powers have always managed, with unfailing ingenuity, to find the necessary pretext for their interference. Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction, now relegated to the realm of diplomatic fiction, have become a textbook example. Venezuela is no exception to this tradition: accusations of genocide have given way to those of drug trafficking, depending on the needs of the moment and the prevailing climate.

But the real novelty lies elsewhere. For the first time, to my knowledge, true interests are no longer concealed beneath the veil of universal morality. The President of the United States has stated unequivocally that his country intends to take control of this South American nation of thirty million people, rich in the world's largest oil reserves. Marco Rubio was careful to specify that Washington would not directly govern Caracas, but would maintain an oil blockade in order to force the regime to comply with American demands: an elegant way of exercising control without explicitly calling it so. Pete Hegseth, for his part, explained that American companies would be established there to ensure the United States greater access to wealth and resources.

Such remarks, evoking the leadership of a foreign state, the control of its resources, and economic pressure as a tool of governance, surprised even the most discerning minds. It's hard to imagine George W. Bush or Barack Obama displaying such candor during the interventions in Afghanistan, Iraq, or Libya.

What happened in Caracas on January 3rd marks a profound break. By acting openly, the United States has blown up the legal order it had itself established. We have entered a new phase of capitalism, which we can call – with Marcello Gullo – the imperialism of supply.

Because America is no longer the rising power of 1945. It has lost its most important asset: economic competition with Asia. China, India, and others have surpassed it in the productive sectors. Washington remains truly competitive in only one area: arms. And when force becomes a power's sole resource, it ceases to be hegemony and becomes a constraint—ever more brutal, ever more naked.

The Argentinian professor and geopolitician Marcello Gullo had foreseen this moment as early as 2008, in the first edition of La insubordinación fundante, a work devoted to the slow and relentless construction of the power of nations:

“Market mechanisms will steer scientific research towards the development of substitute materials and the creation of new energy sources. However, it is logical to assume that between the emergence of a new energy model and the disappearance of the old one, there will occur a ‘transition crisis’ of indefinite duration. The same reasoning can be applied to the emergence of substitute materials. It will then be highly probable that, during this ‘transition crisis,’ dominant states will be driven to ‘supply imperialism,’ in order to seize scarce resource sources by force.”

Recent history sadly confirms this intuition. In the 1960s, who could compete with the major American corporations? No one. This technical, financial, and organizational superiority guaranteed the United States easy, almost natural, access to the planet's strategic resources. It was simply a matter of negotiating, influencing, sometimes bribing, rarely coercion.

When America was truly hegemonic, it could afford the luxury of indirect control. It dominated without appearing to, influenced without occupying, and led without governing. Brute force was only a last resort, rarely necessary. But as hegemony erodes, subtlety disappears. What was once influence now falls under coercion.

But the world has changed. The legal and economic instruments that Washington had patiently crafted to govern the international order no longer afford it the same advantage. Now unable to secure access to raw materials within the very framework of the rules they had imposed, the United States has found only one solution: to overturn the established order. Venezuelan oil has thus become a vital issue, not for the market, but for the survival of a declining power, anxious to ensure that its own companies remain in control.

Make no mistake: this recourse to force is by no means a demonstration of power. On the contrary, it is an admission of it. Strikes are only used when persuasion has failed. Invasions are launched when seduction has ceased. In the past, the United States advanced its businesses, co-opted local elites, and rallied populations behind a conquering ideology. Today, these mechanisms are worn out.

When a state that was once a political, economic, and ideological hegemon resorts to brute force instead of influence, it is not a sign of its renewed strength, but rather of its growing impotence. Once elegant and effective, domination becomes cumbersome, brutal, and clumsy. This is how empires become when they cease to govern the world through order and begin to try to control it by force.

Fernand le Béréen

Egalite & Reconciliation

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