What drove Trump's outrageous Venezuela gamble?

LAHORE:

The US military's shocking seizure of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has landed across policy circles and regional capitals less as a shock than as a sombre reckoning - an overt exercise of "imperial" power carried out in violation of established legal, diplomatic and sovereignty norms, reopening the long-lamented "open veins of Latin America".

Observers warn that the dramatic capture has come as the clearest expression yet of a deeper shift in US conduct, indicating a move away from diplomacy, indirect influence and institutional cover toward overt coercion exercised with remarkable confidence and minimal restraint.

The measure, widely denounced as "kidnapping" of a sitting head of state, is a form of imperialism adapted to a moment of hegemonic decline, one in which sovereignty is increasingly conditional and force re-emerges as a primary tool of political ordering.

'Rebranded Monroe Doctrine'

Imdat Öner, senior policy analyst at the Jack D. Gordon Institute and a former diplomat in Caracas, situates the operation within a broader strategic doctrine rather than presidential impulse.

"What we're seeing is a rebranded and reinterpreted Monroe Doctrine," Öner told The Express Tribune. "For Trump, 'the Americas' means the entire Western Hemisphere."

He noted that Washington had tested the waters in Panama and Mexico before moving decisively against Venezuela, where Maduro represented "the weakest link in the chain".

Öner does not expect this approach to be mechanically replicated outside Latin America. However, he warned that it is unlikely to remain without consequence. "It will have repercussions in other spheres of influence," he said, particularly in China's and Russia's near abroad, where major powers may draw lessons about the permissibility of unilateral enforcement.

'China as main driver'

According to Öner, the American president would be more emboldened now and an emboldened Trump means showing diminishing patience for diplomacy and an increasing reliance on pressure.

"The US becomes louder, faster, and more transactional," he notes, describing a posture in which coercion replaces negotiation and blunt signals displace strategic ambiguity.

He notes that this shift has implications far beyond Latin America. In East Asia, particularly with regard to Taiwan, stronger and more explicit signalling may appear to enhance deterrence, but it also raises the risk of escalation. As ambiguity gives way to forceful declarations, diplomatic off-ramps narrow. "Blunt signals are harder to walk back," Öner warned, "for everyone".

At the structural level, he identified China as the central driver of Washington's behaviour.

As US soft power erodes, through the dismantling of development aid, the hollowing out of diplomatic credibility and the exhaustion of liberal legitimacy, Washington is doubling down on hard instruments, including sanctions, military deployments and control over strategic resources.

Energy, minerals and supply chains have become tools of geopolitical enforcement.

Venezuela's oil wealth sits squarely at the intersection of these pressures. With the world's largest proven reserves, the country represents both a material prize and a symbolic assertion of dominance. Control over Venezuelan energy resources serves US energy interests while simultaneously undermining China's long-standing economic engagement with Caracas.

Öner cautioned against expectations of rapid transformation inside Venezuela. While Maduro has been removed, chavismo remains embedded in key institutions.

He sees no abrupt rupture but a slow, managed transition shaped by the Trump administration, one that may stabilise the system in the short term while leaving the risk of renewed instability firmly intact.

Observers note that this pattern of forceful intervention followed by indefinite management is characteristic of neocolonial power. Control is asserted without responsibility while order is imposed without legitimacy and extraction proceeds without accountability.

Neocolonialism without restraint

For philosopher and professor emeritus at Dublin City University Helena Sheehan, the operation strips imperial power of even its rhetorical disguise.

She deplored it as "blatant and brutal", arguing that it represents a form of might-is-right politics "politics without even bothering to justify it by any other standards".

Sheehan characterised the raid as symptomatic of an empire in decline, warning that such a decline is unlikely to be swift or orderly. "Its decline will be long and protracted with much misery yet to come."

'A significant shift'

According to Renata Segura, director of the Latin America and Caribbean programme at the International Crisis Group, the raid reflects a substantial shift in how the Trump administration now approaches the region.

Segura said the national security strategy published weeks before the operation made explicit that Washington increasingly views Latin America as a defined area of influence rather than a zone of partnership.

Since the attack, declarations by Trump and senior officials such as Marco Rubio and Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth reflect a self-conception of the US as a policing power in the hemisphere, one guided primarily by American interests, rather than regional stability or international norms.

"And that they are willing to go out of their way to really get what they want done."

She noted that Venezuela is the most obvious target, but the anxiety is regional. Segura pointed to repeated threats directed at Colombia, Mexico and other countries, where the use of force has been floated should governments pursue policies that run counter to Washington's preferences. The message, in her assessment, is not limited to Caracas.

Latin America's history makes such fears legible. US-backed coups, invasions and military interventions have shaped the region for decades.

For Segura, what distinguishes the present moment is the break from the strategies of recent decades, when Washington relied more heavily on bilateral cooperation, diplomatic engagement and indirect pressure.

Equally significant is the collapse of US soft power. With development and assistance mechanisms such as USAID effectively dismantled and muscle increasingly replacing persuasion, Segura sees a return to interventionist practices associated with earlier eras.