The gloves are off. The seizure of Venezuela’s president Nicolás Maduro removes any remaining illusion that the post-Cold War order is merely under strain. It is over.
In its place is something older and cruder, in which power matters more than rules and the great powers do as they please. We are back to a mid-19th century world of imperialism, where might makes right and weaker states exist at the behest of the strong.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine signalled that Vladimir Putin no longer felt bound by international norms, if indeed he ever did. Donald Trump’s return to the White House has shown that America does not either.
Venezuela is the clearest evidence yet. The operation to remove Maduro was seamless, but its implications are far less straightforward. Within hours US President Donald Trump announced that the United States would “run” Venezuela until a “safe” transition could be arranged. That is regime change, openly declared and unapologetically embraced.
This settles a long-running debate about Trump. The belief that he is all bark and no bite, that “Trump always Chickens Out” (Taco), has not survived the opening weeks of 2026. Trump is not merely a reckless talker. His threats are being acted upon.
It was widely argued that Trump’s ideological and strategic commitments were shallow and would give way under economic, political or market pressure. Venezuela has disproved that assumption. By intervening directly, Trump has deliberately put himself on the hook for what happens next. America’s 21st experience with regime change did not end well. He is risking his legacy on a strategic gamble that could become deeply unpopular because he believes in it.
Effects on the oil price
Three consequences are immediately evident.
First is the effect on the oil price.
The market is weighing the short-term consequences of disruption on exports with the longer-term increase in production if – as signalled – US oil majors are given carte blanche to invest and pump Venezuelan crude.
Venezuela currently produces less than 1% of global output, with exports constrained by US sanctions and a naval blockade. But the country holds about 17% of the world’s proven crude reserves, according to the US Energy Information Administration, giving it the potential to increase supply. This should, in the medium term, mean more global oil output and lower prices.
That potential should not be overstated. Venezuelan crude is sour, extra heavy, high asphaltene, and high sulphur – meaning that not only are the costs of refining it much higher, but there are also a limited number of refineries in the world that can process it. Most of them are, unsurprisingly, located in the US. Even so, over time Venezuela could still weaken Opec’s grip on the market and further squeeze Russia’s war economy, which is almost entirely dependent on oil and gas exports already squeezed by sanctions.
The Monroe Doctrine
Secondly, and more generally, this latest development in Latin America is proof that Trump’s National Security Strategy, released last month, is not mere bluster. It lays out a world divided into spheres of influence and policed with force. The organising idea is explicitly stated as a revived Monroe Doctrine.
As Trump and his advisers see it, the US “hemisphere” now stretches from Greenland through Canada and entails the whole of central and southern America.
Leftist leaders and regimes in this part of the world, be it Cuba, Colombia or Bolivia, have been taught a very clear lesson by what transpired in Venezuela. Sovereignty is conditional.
Elsewhere, the logic is equally stark. The US’ withdrawal of support for Ukraine amounts to the effective concession of Europe to Putin. Trump has made it clear that he sees a unified and more capable EU as being a threat to US dominance. Nato, already hollowed out, is being allowed to die quietly. European leaders should stop pretending otherwise.
Africa, too, is seemingly drifting towards partition. Russia is expanding its influence north of the Sahel. China continues its steady advance across sub-Saharan Africa and Asia. The great powers are dividing territory, markets and influence with little reference to the states affected. The only exceptions are strategic; US involvement in the DRC, for example, where its rare earths and other resources are irresistible.
Of course, these arrangements recall an earlier age. In the late 19th century, European powers carved up the world in the belief that balance-of-power politics would preserve stability. It did not. The result was catastrophe.
Where to next?
The third and most dangerous question is how far Trump’s appetite for military adventurism will continue to spread. He has spoken openly about Canada, Panama, Greenland and the Gaza Strip. Now Mexico is being openly threatened.
“She’s a good woman,” Trump said of Mexico’s president Claudia Sheinbaum. “But the cartels are running Mexico. She’s not running Mexico... Something is going to have to be done with Mexico.”
Mexico, not Venezuela, supplies almost all of America’s fentanyl.
Trump on Saturday also warned Gustavo Petro, Colombia’s left-wing president, to “watch his ass”. Colombia, not Venezuela, supplies most of America’s cocaine.
Greenland has re-emerged as a fixation. Trump insists that the US “needs” it for national security and that Denmark is incapable of defending it. Over the weekend he repeated that the US required control of the territory, saying that Danish efforts to boost security amounted to “one more dog sled”. He added that “the European Union needs us to have it”.
The administration frames all this as “hemispheric defence”. In practice, it is imperial policing. Once sovereignty is treated as conditional, there are no limiting principles. Furthermore, the US’ conduct creates a terrifying precedent. If Washington can kidnap foreign leaders and impose regime change, it becomes harder to argue that China lacks precedent for coercive action against Taiwan, or that Russia’s territorial ambitions should stop at Ukraine.
For now, the greatest threat to Trump lies not in geopolitics but in economics. Trump’s authority and legitimacy at home rests on economic performance. Inflation and the stock market matter more to voters than foreign adventures in pursuit of oil.
His policies – trade disruption, mass deportations, forced reshoring – push prices up, not down. Markets inflated by enthusiasm for artificial intelligence are unlikely to tolerate further economic weakening and geopolitical uncertainty.
Despots like Trump rarely fall because they hesitate. They fall because they over-reach.
Venezuela may not be Trump’s undoing. It may actually encourage him to venture into ever riskier gambits. The danger lies in the moves that follow, and in how far he goes before the costs of this new imperialism overwhelm its economic benefits.
That point always arrives. History is clear on that. The only uncertainty is how much damage is done before it does. DM