President Donald Trump had a clear goal for U.S. power expansion in his operation to arrest the Venezuelan dictator, Anne Applebaum wrote for The Atlantic in an analysis published Monday — but it is likely to have the exact opposite effect, eroding that very power instead.
"In some ways, the military raid that took the Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro into custody does resemble past American actions, especially the ouster of the Panamanian leader Manuel Noriega in 1989–90," wrote Applebaum. However, when Trump held a news conference, he "did not use the word democracy. He did not refer to international law. Instead, he presented a garbled version of the 1823 Monroe Doctrine, a policy originally designed to keep foreign imperial powers out of the Americas, calling it something that sounded like the 'Donroe Document': 'Under our new National Security Strategy,' he said, reading from prepared remarks, 'American dominance in the Western Hemisphere will never be questioned again.'"
In essence, Applebaum argued, Trump thinks like Russia's Vladimir Putin or China's Xi Jinping: he wants the world to be divided into empires that control all surrounding nations through their "sphere of influence." It's the motivation for the invasion of Ukraine, and for China's repeated threats to invade Taiwan — and for America, it would be the Western Hemisphere generally.
But, she continued, the way Trump is going about all this — snubbing the legitimately elected Venezuelan president in favor of letting Maduro's regime cronies continue to run things — actually hurts American influence.
"The regime has not been removed," she wrote. "The military and various paramilitaries are all still in place, and although some might cooperate with the Trump administration, others might not. With no U.S. troops in Venezuela, will Americans “run” Venezuela by issuing loud statements and threats? By ordering periodic military interventions? Perhaps the administration has made a deal with some members of the regime — that would explain why the American raid met so little opposition — but there is no guarantee that such a deal will produce the kinds of benefits Trump expects."
Worse still, she added, "The division of the world into spheres of influence implies that smaller countries cannot influence events, and it’s a grave mistake to imagine Venezuelans won’t try." Venezuelans largely wanted Maduro gone, she said, but "the people who fought for years for justice, freedom, and self-determination aren’t going to want to live in a Trump-backed dictatorship staffed with Maduro’s cronies," and already Venezuelan expats are horrified at the idea America could just legitimize a continuation of the old regime with new leaders.
"If America is just a regional bully, after all, then our former allies in Europe and Asia will close their doors and their markets to us," Applebaum concluded. "Sooner or later, 'our' Western Hemisphere will organize against us and fight back. Far from making us more powerful, the pursuit of American dominance will make us weaker, eventually leaving us with no sphere, and no influence, at all."
