TK Arun
Washington’s intervention undermines sovereignty norms, destabilises Latin America, weakens Europe’s moral case on Ukraine; it’s high time India spoke up
Watch out, Denmark and Greenland! Imperialism rides again!
That might have sounded facetious or as an exaggeration till yesterday, when US forces attacked Venezuela, entered President Nicolas Maduro’s presidential home, kidnapped him and his wife, and flew them over to the US.
US President Donald Trump says the Nobel peace-prize-winning Venezuelan leader of the Opposition, Maria Corina Machado, does not have the people’s support or respect and that the US would run Venezuela till the time arrives for “a judicious transition”. American oil companies, he said, would run Venezuela’s oil economy — of course, for the benefit of the people of Venezuela.
Cause for concern
This amounts to conquest, not just a regime change by external force.
India must oppose the move in earnest, regardless of the offence Trump would take at such a move. India cannot normalise violation of another country’s sovereignty by imperial force.
This is a time to defend the principles that make coexistence of countries with military might with countries that lack such might possible, not to look at short-term gains to be had by taking the side of the hegemon.
Other countries of Latin America would be worried. Maduro had raised claims on Guyana’s oil riches.
The Cuba equation
Cuba figures on the list of nine pins to be bowled over by Trump’s current foray into the region, which the US has always considered its backyard. Trump might decide to disregard the agreement the US had reached with the Soviet Union, in the wake of the Cuban missile crisis — which ended with the Soviet Union withdrawing its missiles deployed on the island, in return for the US withdrawing its Jupiter missiles deployed in Turkey — to stay off that island nation, and expand his gunboat diplomacy to Cuba.
In any case, the crucial aid Venezuela has been sending to sustain Cuba, both money and oil, would cease to flow, and accelerate the fall of the fragile regime in place in Havana.
Cuba figures on the list of nine pins to be bowled over by Trump’s current foray into the region, which the US has always considered its backyard.
Other Latin American capitals have protested against the violation of Venezuela’s sovereignty, even as Venezuela’s Opposition welcomed the removal of Maduro. However, it might change its tune, now that Trump says the US, and not Venezuela’s Opposition, would run the country.
China and India
Now that the US has ripped the veneer of legitimacy from its claim to champion ‘the rules-based international order’, which has allowed many countries to rally behind US leadership, China stands to emerge as a rallying point for countries that seek both rules to govern relations between nations, and military might to stand up to a rogue regime that revels in the notion that might is right.
China stands to emerge as a rallying point for countries that seek both rules to govern relations between nations, and military might to stand up to a rogue regime that revels in the notion that might is right.
India’s basic framework of non-alignment with any major power centre still remains valid, provided New Delhi convincingly stands up for principle and takes stands that align with the powers standing up for principle at any point of time.
Some people wonder if China would see the current moment as opportune for annexing Taiwan by force. China is likely to see merit in playing the long game, and see advantage in emerging as the principal focus of opposition to rampant imperialism, instead of coming across as another imperial power.
Europe and the Ukraine crisis
The logic of the US move against Venezuela weakens the European case for continuing to support Ukraine. Russia, after all, is securing, by means of its invasion of Ukraine, its only warm-water naval base in Sevastopol, Crimea, and land access to the base from Russia via Eastern Ukraine’s Don Bas region.
The EU’s support for Ukraine is based on the premise that Russia cannot be allowed to breach Ukraine’s national sovereignty, whatever its justification.
With Europe’s chief ally, the US, breaching Venezuela’s national sovereignty, Europe’s self-professed fight for Ukraine’s sovereignty, with US support, loses any principled leg to stand on. It would do well to accelerate an end to the war, and enter into détente with Russia.
If Trump moves to take over Greenland, a protectorate of EU and NATO member Denmark, rapprochement with Russia would be a certainty.
Not Vietnam again
We are not yet back to the days of the Vietnam war. The American public, in particular, Trump’s MAGA base, has no appetite for losing American lives on foreign soil.
Most Hispanics in the US are likely to be upset about their President treating the region as one vast Banana plantation, for assorted United Fruit Companies to run and profit from.
If US soldiers start getting killed in the process of creating the conditions for the US to administer Venezuela and for US oil giants to take control of Venezuelan oil, things could change dramatically worse for the Trump administration.
Trump’s Venezuelan offensive’s internal dimension is to polarise the American public even more. There are 68 million Hispanics in the US population, 20 per cent of the total. Some might support blatant US intervention in Latin America. The majority are likely to be upset about their President treating the region as one vast Banana plantation, for assorted United Fruit Companies to run and profit from.
Whether this disenchantment will be tapped by extremist elements to create violent disruption in the US can only be a matter of speculation. But such speculation would be realistic, not alarmist.
About the Author
T.K. Arun, ex-Economic Times editor, is a columnist known for incisive analysis of economic and policy matters, based in Delhi.
The article was first published in TheFederal-Opinion as Trump’s Venezuela gambit revives naked American imperialism on 04th January 2026.
Disclaimer: All views expressed in the article belong solely to the author and not necessarily to the organization.
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Acknowledgement: This article was posted by Vatsala Sinha, Research Intern at IMPRI.
