COMMENTARY: Maduro Captured, Cuba in the Crosshairs — Latin America on the Brink of Interventionist Chaos

An extraordinary military operation disguised as a police operation

Senator Marco Rubio insisted on NBC’s “Meet the Press”: “This is not a war. It is a law enforcement operation.” ” But let’s look at the raw facts. According to several corroborating sources, the operation mobilized more than 150 aircraft, including F-35s and F-22s, to neutralize Venezuela’s Russian-made air defense systems. Anti-radiation missiles destroyed Caracas’s integrated S-300 systems. Strikes hit the port of La Guaira and infrastructure across the northern part of the country. Venezuelan Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino López confirmed that U.S. combat helicopters had fired rockets and missiles in urban areas. Nearly all of Maduro’s personal guard was killed during the assault on his fortified residence.

To describe all of this as a police arrest is to distort the meaning of words. The White House Office of Legal Counsel issued a memorandum arguing that the U.S. president has “inherent authority” under Article II of the Constitution to execute an arrest warrant abroad. Experts in international law, however, point out that international law strictly distinguishes between normative jurisdiction—the right to indict someone—and enforcement jurisdiction—the right to carry out an arrest on foreign territory. The latter is universally illegal without the consent of the country concerned.

The Victims No One Wants to Count

In the euphoria surrounding the capture of a dictator, civilian casualties take a back seat. It’s human nature. It’s also dangerous. The New York Times reported at least 80 deaths, including both civilians and military personnel. Among them were 32 Cuban soldiers who were part of Maduro’s personal security detail—confirmation that Havana had deeply integrated its security forces into the Venezuelan state apparatus. Trump himself acknowledged that the operation resulted in American casualties but no U.S. fatalities—which clearly implies that fighting took place. The rhetoric of an “arrest without war” clashes particularly sharply with these figures.

Delcy Rodríguez, the vice president who became interim president, demanded “the right to monitor the conditions of detention” of Maduro and called for his immediate release—while de facto accepting the new order. She released hundreds of political prisoners in the first weeks of her term, allowed pro-democracy rallies, and initiated the opening of Venezuela’s oil sector to U.S. investment. On June 22, 2026, she publicly declared that January 3, 2026, had been “a turning point” that had set Venezuela back on the “right path.” History is not written in black and white.

There is something unsettling about Rodríguez’s pragmatism. Yesterday she was Maduro; today she is the transition. I don’t blame her—politics is sometimes the art of the possible—but I think of all those who resisted Chavism for years in squalid prisons and who now watch the former accomplices of their tormentor take the helm. It’s bitter.

A Dangerous Precedent for International Law

Article 2(4) of the United Nations Charter is unambiguous: “All Members shall refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state.” ” The exception provided for in Article 51—self-defense—requires a prior armed attack by the targeted state. Venezuela had not attacked the United States. A drug trafficking indictment does not constitute an armed attack under international law. The UN has made this clear. Dozens of countries have made this clear. The United Kingdom refused to endorse the legality of the operation, even though Prime Minister Keir Starmer refrained from explicitly condemning it.

The International Court of Justice ruled in 2002, in the arrest warrant case (DRC v. Belgium), that sitting heads of state enjoy absolute personal immunity before foreign courts. The United States counters that it has not recognized Maduro as the legitimate president since 2019. But this non-recognition is not universally shared—the UN, for its part, still formally recognized his government. Maduro’s defense team, led by Barry Pollack, is raising precisely these arguments before the federal court in Manhattan: lack of jurisdiction, head-of-state immunity, and the right to a fair trial without access to Venezuelan state funds blocked by U.S. sanctions.

The Noriega Model Revisited—on an Unprecedented Scale

Several analysts immediately drew a parallel with the 1989 U.S. invasion of Panama to capture Manuel Noriega. Noriega, too, had been indicted in the United States on drug trafficking charges. The United States had also mobilized the military to extract him. And Noriega, too, had invoked head-of-state immunity—without success. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit had ruled at the time that the United States’ diplomatic non-recognition of the Noriega government deprived him of the right to claim that immunity in a U.S. court. It is likely that Maduro will face the same legal fate.

But the Noriega precedent involved an operation with approximately 25,000 soldiers and took place in Panama, a country under strong U.S. influence since the construction of the canal. Caracas is not Panama City. And above all, the 35 years that have passed since 1989 have seen the development of a much more explicit body of international law regarding state sovereignty, the prohibition of the use of force, and the immunity of leaders. Applying the logic of 1989 in 2026 means deliberately choosing to turn back the clock—and opening a Pandora’s box that other actors—Beijing, Moscow, Tehran—will undoubtedly exploit.

The argument that “but he was a narco-tyrant” does not fully convince me as a sufficient justification for an armed invasion of foreign territory. Not because Maduro deserved better, but because this logic could very well be used tomorrow to justify any military operation disguised as a police operation. If we accept this precedent, we are handing dangerous tools to hands we will not always be able to control.

The Western Hemisphere as a Claimed Backyard

Donald Trump has never hidden his vision for Latin America. By proclaiming himself “interim president of Venezuela” on social media on January 11, 2026, he formalized a stance that runs through his entire administration: the Western Hemisphere is the natural sphere of American influence, and any presence of rival powers—China, Russia, Iran—there is an existential threat. This doctrine is not without analytical basis. Maduro’s Venezuela had indeed become a hub for military cooperation, intelligence, and influence for Moscow, Beijing, and Tehran. Cuba served as a conduit between these powers and Caracas. Tren de Aragua was spreading terror as far as Denver and Chicago.

But there is a difference between correctly identifying a threat and responding to it wisely. Trump announced that he wanted the United States to “manage” Venezuela “until a safe, proper, and judicious transition can take place.” He spoke of U.S. interests in the country’s vast oil reserves—among the largest in the world—with a candor that made even some of Washington’s allies uncomfortable. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum traveled to Caracas in late June to explore mining opportunities. The United States has normalized diplomatic relations with the Rodríguez administration and lifted some of the oil sanctions. The scent of oil hangs over this entire operation.

Marco Rubio, the architect of a new hemispheric order

Marco Rubio, the son of Cuban exiles, is the driving force behind this policy. His anti-Castro and anti-Chávez obsession has been well known in the Senate for decades. His tenure as Secretary of State in the second Trump administration gave him the tools to transform this obsession into operational foreign policy. He was the one who spearheaded the designation of the Cartel de los Soles as a terrorist organization. He is the one Trump has put on the front lines for Cuba. He is the one coordinating the “Shield of the Americas,” the military coalition of right-wing leaders formed to combat drug trafficking in the region—now including de la Espriella’s Colombia, whose election in the second round on June 22, 2026, was hailed by Washington.

Under Rubio, U.S. policy in Latin America combines with brutal consistency: maximum economic sanctions to strangle opposing regimes, legal indictments to criminalize their leaders, visible military pressure as a deterrent, and, if necessary, direct intervention. This strategy worked in Venezuela. It is now attempting to replicate itself in Cuba. But the two countries are fundamentally different—and serious observers are beginning to express concern about this.

Rubio is brilliant and tenacious—and his hatred of the Castro-Chavista regimes is understandable to anyone familiar with the history of the Cuban diaspora. But I sometimes wonder if this personal obsession might cloud a strategic calculation that requires a cool head. Too much conviction can be just as blinding as too much indifference.

Cuba is not Venezuela—and that is where the risk increases

On June 19, 2026, in an interview with Axios, Trump replied, “It’s possible,” when asked whether an operation similar to the one in Venezuela could be carried out against Cuba. Six words that sent shivers through Havana. On May 20, U.S. authorities had already unsealed an indictment against Raúl Castro himself—94 years old, brother of Fidel, and former head of state—for murder and conspiracy in connection with the shooting down of two civilian aircraft belonging to the organization Hermanos al Rescate on February 24, 1996, which killed four people, including three U.S. citizens. On the same day, the USS Nimitz and its strike group entered the Caribbean Sea—a timing that was no coincidence.

But Cuba is a fundamentally different case from Venezuela. Political scientist Javier Corrales of Amherst College analyzes this precisely in Lawfare: the Venezuelan regime was, above all, a transactional enterprise built on corruption and secret deals within its elite. That is why Delcy Rodríguez, a former ally of Maduro, was able to pivot so quickly toward Washington. The Cuban regime, on the other hand, is an institution founded on deep-seated anti-Americanism—an ideological, military, and security apparatus built over six decades to resist precisely this kind of American pressure. Cuba has lived with sanctions since 1960. The Venezuelan model does not automatically translate to Cuba.

Alarming Signs of a Cascading Escalation

Since January 2026, the Trump administration has imposed more than 240 sanctions against Cuba and enforced an oil embargo that has reduced fuel imports by 80 to 90 percent, causing power outages of more than 20 hours a day on the island. UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk warned that children were dying due to a lack of medicine. CIA Director John Ratcliffe traveled to Havana on May 15 to meet with Raúl Castro’s grandson and Cuban intelligence chiefs, urging them to “learn from Venezuela.” Meanwhile, Cuba is desperately trying to open up its economy—its National Assembly has just approved a package of emergency reforms—but without going so far as to accept the political conditions set by Washington.

The spiral is inevitable: maximum U.S. pressure, a Cuban response deemed insufficient by Washington, further escalation, and a barely veiled military threat. If Trump ever decides that the “timing is flexible but now” for Cuba, the consequences could be far more complex than in Venezuela. The island has a population of 9.6 million, an ideologically motivated—albeit aging—military, and a network of institutional resistance that Caracas lacked. Above all, a military intervention 150 kilometers off the coast of Florida without congressional authorization, in a country that has not attacked the United States, would trigger a constitutional and diplomatic crisis of considerable magnitude.

I’ll admit it frankly: I don’t know how to liberate Cuba. Nor do I know how to do so without turning it into a Caribbean Iraq. And this uncomfortable honesty seems to me more useful than militaristic certainty or pacifist naivety. Complexity is not a flaw in reasoning—it is the reality on the ground.

When Initial Successes Mask Delayed Disasters

The history of U.S. interventions in Latin America is a cautionary tale that Washington rarely revisits with sufficient care. In 1983, Reagan’s invasion of Grenada was hailed as a stunning triumph against a Cuban-Soviet threat—and it did indeed topple a Marxist regime in a matter of days. In 1989, the invasion of Panama to capture Noriega was a military success. In 2003, the fall of Saddam Hussein took three weeks. In each of these cases, the initial “success” of the military phase masked the scale of the post-intervention problems: political instability, armed resistance, colossal human and financial costs, and irreparable damage to U.S. credibility in the region and around the world.

In Venezuela, the first few months seem encouraging. Rodríguez releases prisoners, opens up the economy, and restores diplomatic relations with Washington. The United States and Caracas officially normalized relations in June 2026. But the vulnerabilities are real: a large part of the Chavista military elite has not yet been dismantled. Tren de Aragua is still active. The remaining Chavista factions are searching for a new leader following Maduro’s capture. The operation killed dozens of people and left deep scars. And the fundamental question—how to organize a credible democratic transition under U.S. supervision—has yet to find a convincing answer.

Latin America watches with concern

The regional reaction to the Venezuelan operation was significantly more divided than Washington had hoped. Brazil, Mexico, Gustavo Petro’s Colombia (before his announced replacement), and Milei’s Argentina—each reacted differently. Argentine President Milei celebrated: “Freedom is advancing.” ” Petro denounced it as an act of aggression. Brazil demanded an explanation. The African Union and several countries in the Global South voted at the UN in favor of a resolution condemning the operation. There was simply no Western consensus on the legitimacy of the operation—and this rift directly fuels the anti-American rhetoric of Moscow and Beijing, which are fully playing the double-standard card in the application of international law.

Russia denounced the U.S. “act of state terrorism.” China called for respect for sovereignty. Iran spoke of “gangsterism.” These reactions are predictable and largely hypocritical coming from regimes that themselves constantly violate international law. But they resonate, even in non-aligned countries that are neither pro-Maduro nor pro-Trump and that are legitimately questioning what this precedent means for their own sovereignty.

Every time Washington says, “We were enforcing the law,” and the rest of the world watches footage of Caracas in flames and a president in handcuffs aboard a warship, the credibility gap widens a little more. Pointing this out is not anti-Americanism. It is strategy.

Oil as the Unspoken Driving Force Behind U.S. Policy

Trump made no attempt to hide U.S. interest in Venezuela’s energy resources. When asked about the country’s vast oil reserves—the largest in the world according to some estimates, particularly the heavy crude in the Orinoco Belt—he replied that the United States would be “very heavily involved” and that the future of Maduro’s remaining supporters was “bleak if they remained loyal.” As early as January 29, 2026, under direct U.S. pressure, President Rodríguez passed a new hydrocarbons law reducing royalties and transferring operational control to foreign companies.

Some analysts—and this is a theory that deserves to be taken seriously without being blindly endorsed—argue that the Venezuelan operation was part of a broader strategy aimed at securing alternative energy sources in the face of escalating tensions in the Middle East and with Iran. The Orinoco Belt produces heavy crude oil that can replace Middle Eastern crude in U.S. refineries. That this geoeconomic dimension weighed on Washington’s strategic calculations is not a conspiracy theory—it is a serious analytical hypothesis, and Trump himself has contributed to it through his statements.

China Lurking in the Wings

Lurking behind the Venezuelan operation is also the Sino-American rivalry. Beijing was the main buyer of Venezuelan oil under Maduro, helping to keep the regime afloat despite U.S. sanctions. From this perspective, Maduro’s capture and the opening of Venezuela’s oil sector to U.S. and Western companies represent a strategic blow to China’s access to energy in the immediate vicinity of the United States. Philippine experts in international law have also publicly noted that the operation could “be part of a broader geopolitical strategy aimed at restricting China’s access to energy rather than a strictly defined law enforcement action.”

This dimension makes the operation even more complex to assess from a moral standpoint. While Maduro’s capture simultaneously serves U.S. justice, U.S. oil interests, the strategy of containing China, and Rubio’s personal agenda, each of these objectives can be discussed separately. But their overlap in a single military operation on foreign soil creates a mix of motivations that clouds judgment and, above all, undermines the “purely judicial” narrative that Washington is striving to maintain.

I do not believe that any geopolitically advantageous action is inherently illegitimate. National interests are real. But when one claims to act in the name of international justice, the fact that one stands to gain economically and strategically creates an obligation of transparency that the Trump administration is failing to meet. And this lack of transparency fuels precisely the kind of narrative that Moscow and Beijing are exploiting to the fullest.

The Arguments of Hard-Line Supporters

Supporters of the operation put forward arguments that deserve to be taken seriously. Former State Department official Matthew Kroenig argued in Foreign Policy that the White House had made “the right choice” in capturing Maduro. The logic goes like this: decades of diplomatic pressure, sanctions, and condemnations had failed to shake the regime. The option of international legal action was blocked by Russian and Chinese vetoes in the Security Council. Economic pressure had only succeeded in further impoverishing the Venezuelan people without dislodging the Chavista elite. Faced with a regime that had demonstrated remarkable resilience to any short-term use of military force, the operation may have been the only remaining lever of influence.

The results on the ground are undeniable in the short term: hundreds of political prisoners released; an ongoing—albeit fragile—democratic opening; talks between the interim government and the opposition supervised by the United States on June 18, 2026; regional diplomatic normalization underway; and Delcy Rodríguez publicly declaring that January 3 put Venezuela “on the right track.” If we assess only the results in Venezuela after six months, the outcome is less catastrophic than some had feared.

The Critics’ Arguments—and Why They Matter

Critics, for their part, point to a list of serious strategic risks. First risk: the precedent. If the United States can invade a country to arrest a head of state under the guise of criminal charges, what rule prevents Russia from invoking a fictitious Ukrainian warrant tomorrow to “arrest” Zelensky? What rule prevents China from invoking a warrant to extract a Taiwanese or Kazakh leader? International law has value only if the major powers observe it—and if the largest Western democracy circumvents it at will, it strips the rule of its substance. Second risk: the blind replication of the model. Applying the “Venezuela logic” to Cuba without understanding the structural differences between the two regimes could lead to a quagmire.

The third risk, and the most immediate one: Trump himself. The Venezuela operation may have been justifiable in its underlying motivations—to oust a drug-trafficking tyrant backed by hostile powers. But Trump handled it with the subtlety of a real estate developer: by declaring that he wanted to “manage” Venezuela, by immediately bringing up oil reserves, and by proclaiming himself “interim president” on social media, he provided the West’s adversaries with exactly the propaganda material they had been dreaming of. A necessary evil, perhaps. A well-communicated evil, certainly not.

I am pro-West in my deepest convictions. But being pro-West doesn’t mean sweeping the West’s mistakes under the rug—it means calling them out so that the West remains worthy of what it claims to defend. Trump overthrew a tyrant. He did so in a way that gave ammunition to all those who hate the West. It’s possible to hold both opinions at the same time.

Four charges, a combative defense

Nicolás Maduro is now being held at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn—the same facility that has housed other high-profile inmates before him. He faces four federal charges in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York: conspiracy to commit narco-terrorism (mandatory minimum sentence of 20 years, maximum life in prison), conspiracy to import cocaine, and two weapons-related charges (possession of machine guns and destructive devices). Cilia Flores is charged with the latter three counts. Both have pleaded not guilty. Maduro declared in court that he is “the legitimate president of Venezuela,” that he had been “kidnapped,” and that he considers himself a “prisoner of war.”

His defense team, led by Barry Pollack (who has represented Assange and handled other sensitive cases), filed a motion to dismiss, challenging the court’s jurisdiction and arguing that U.S. sanctions prevent the defendants from using Venezuelan state funds to finance their defense. U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton countered that Maduro can use his personal funds. Federal Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein denied the motion to dismiss and adjourned the next hearing to July 22, 2026. The trial is shaping up to be one of the most significant in American legal history, comparable to the Noriega and Escobar cases.

Head-of-State Immunity: The Central Legal Minefield

The issue of head-of-state immunity lies at the legal heart of this case. The United States has not recognized Maduro as the legitimate president since 2019, recognizing Juan Guaidó instead. But this U.S. non-recognition is not universal. Argentina, under its February 2026 arrest warrant for crimes against humanity, has taken a similar stance. But several countries continued to maintain relations with Caracas. Customary international law, for its part, has never made the personal immunity of a head of state contingent on diplomatic recognition—as the ICJ reiterated in 2002.

The comparison with Noriega will be at the heart of the debates. In 1993, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit had rejected his immunity arguments, citing Washington’s non-recognition of his government. But since 1993, international law has evolved significantly. The ICJ’s 2002 ruling came after this U.S. case law. Maduro’s lawyers will argue that U.S. courts must take this evolution into account. It is unlikely that they will prevail. But the debate will considerably enrich international case law on these issues—amid extremely tense political conditions.

I view this trial with intellectual fascination mixed with unease. I want Maduro’s crimes to be judged—the torture, the arbitrary detentions, the disappearances, the deliberate starvation of a people. But I want this judgment to be sound, legally unassailable, so that the entire world cannot dismiss it as a political charade. For now, I have my doubts.

Latin America’s Shift to the Right and Its Limits

Maduro’s capture coincided with—and undoubtedly contributed in part to—a remarkable political shift in Latin America. On June 22, 2026, the conservative Abelardo de la Espriella won Colombia’s presidential election against the left-wing candidate—a victory immediately hailed by Trump. Milei’s Argentina, Paraguay, Ecuador, Peru: the right-wing axis taking shape in the region is the most cohesive since the 1990s. Combined with Rubio’s “Shield of the Americas,” it signals a profound strategic realignment that structurally weakens the influence of Cuba, what remains of Venezuela, and their regional allies.

But this pivot has its limits and vulnerabilities. Colombia has just experienced an extremely close election—a margin of fewer than 250,000 votes out of a electorate of tens of millions—revealing a deeply divided society. Lula’s Brazil maintains a critical stance toward U.S. interventionism. Mexico remains wary. And in all these countries, tens of millions of people saw the operation in Venezuela not as the liberation of a people but as a demonstration of U.S. imperial power. This perception matters politically in the long term—even if, morally speaking, Maduro richly deserved to be overthrown.

Russia’s Role and Moscow’s Geopolitical Calculations

Russia lost a major strategic ally on January 3, 2026. The Russian S-300 air defense systems were destroyed in a matter of minutes. Cuban soldiers—the conduit for Soviet-Russian military influence in the region—were killed. Moscow’s access to Venezuelan oil resources and Caribbean ports has been severely compromised. Analysts who argue that Russia’s betrayal of Maduro—its refusal to defend its ally militarily—is one of the key factors in the regime’s collapse may be right. Moscow may have calculated that sacrificing Caracas was less costly than a direct confrontation with U.S. forces.

This calculation by Moscow, if proven true, reveals a fundamental limitation of the protection Russia offers its autocratic allies: when the risk becomes too high, Putin abandons his own. This is a lesson that regimes relying on Moscow—Belarus, what remains of Syria, and Iran—should ponder. The alliance with Russia is an insurance policy with an unwritten exclusion clause: it does not cover cases where Washington actually decides to strike.

Moscow’s betrayal of Maduro is one of the least-covered angles of this story. Putin abandons his allies when the cost becomes too high. This is a lesson that nations relying on him for their security should carefully consider. Many still depend on this phantom guarantee.

1898 and 2026: History Repeating Itself in Disguise

Javier Corrales of Amherst College concludes his analysis in Lawfare with a chilling historical warning: “In 1898, the United States intervened militarily in Cuba to oust a brutal regime, but was reluctant to grant full political rights. We may be on the cusp of a repeat.” This comparison is powerful. In 1898, the U.S. intervention against colonial Spain had liberated Cuba from cruel domination—but the United States then imposed the Platt Amendment, reserving for itself a permanent right to intervene in Cuban affairs and denying the island the full sovereignty it had just won at the cost of bloodshed. It is this historical wound, more than any other factor, that explains the enduring nature of Cuban anti-Americanism.

If Washington applies the same logic to Cuba in 2026 as it did to Venezuela—capturing or neutralizing the leadership, installing a compliant representative, opening the economy to American interests—without simultaneously creating the conditions for a truly sovereign Cuban democracy, it will repeat the mistakes of 1898 exactly. And the Cuban collective memory, unlike the Venezuelan one, is deeply rooted in this legacy. The risk of a boomerang effect, of sustained resistance, and of prolonged instability is real—regardless of how despicable the Castro regime may be.

The chasm between Cuban aspirations and U.S. interests

The Cuban people are suffering. Power outages lasting more than 20 hours a day, medicine shortages that are killing children according to the UN, the brain drain, the mass exile of an entire generation—all of this is real and devastating. And according to many observers, the Cuban people aspire far less to superficial anti-Americanism than to a normal life, to electricity, to healthcare, and to freedom of speech. Polls conducted on the island (with all the necessary methodological precautions) suggest that a large majority would like to see profound changes.

But there is a difference between what the Cuban people want and what Washington wants. Cubans want democracy, economic freedom, and pluralistic institutions. Trump wants, at the very least, a Cuba that poses no geostrategic threat, a Cuba without Russian or Chinese intelligence bases, and a Cuba open to American investment. These interests overlap partially but not entirely. And if an intervention in Cuba gives rise to a Cuban “Delcy Rodríguez” regime—one that is compliant with Washington, releases a few prisoners, and opens the beaches to American investors—without producing true democracy, the Cuban people will have traded one cage for another.

What haunts me about the Cuban scenario is the image of those protesters in Havana who would brave repression for their freedom, only to end up in a country run like a Miami special economic zone rather than as a sovereign democracy. Latin America deserves better than having to choose between Castro and the Trump administration. It deserves institutions of its own.

Defending Human Rights and Violating Sovereignty: The Perpetual Dilemma

Since 1945, the West has been built on two seemingly contradictory pillars: respect for state sovereignty (the principle of non-interference) and the universal defense of human rights (the right to humanitarian intervention). These two pillars regularly come into conflict. In Kosovo in 1999, NATO’s intervention to stop the Serbian massacres also lacked a UN mandate—and most Western democrats supported it. Libya in 2011 had a UN mandate, but the post-intervention damage was considerable. Iraq in 2003 was based on fabricated justifications and resulted in a lasting regional catastrophe.

Venezuela falls somewhere along this spectrum—between Kosovo (intervention in the context of actual crimes) and Iraq (intervention with mixed motivations and an unplanned exit). The fundamental difference is that in 2026, the multipolar context is radically different from that of 1999 or 2003. China and Russia are active global powers that use every American misstep as an argument to legitimize their own violations. The West can no longer afford the luxury of clumsy interventions—not because tyrants deserve to be spared, but because the geopolitical consequences of every action are amplified in a world where American hegemony is being challenged.

What the Venezuela Affair Reveals About the Health of American Democracy

There is one final question this article cannot avoid: the Venezuela operation was decided, planned, and executed by the Trump administration without a congressional vote, without prior public debate, without a UN mandate, and based on a legal justification constructed after the fact. Trump announced the capture on social media, proclaimed himself “interim president of Venezuela,” and immediately brought up oil reserves. This is not how a mature democracy normally handles this type of major military operation abroad.

The divisions in the U.S. Congress over the operation were deep and revealing. Republicans celebrated. Democrats demanded accountability regarding the operation’s legality and constitutional authorization. Even some of the United States’ traditional allies in Europe expressed deep unease. The Venezuela operation reveals that U.S. institutional safeguards—the War Powers Act, consultation with Congress, and transparency in the decision-making process—have been largely bypassed. And if this precedent takes hold, if U.S. presidents can wage wars by labeling them “arrests,” then American democracy itself has a problem to address.

I always come back to this question: Would I support this operation if it had been led by a Democratic president, with a debate in Congress, an international coalition, and a clearly defined exit strategy? Perhaps. What bothers me isn’t necessarily the outcome—it’s the process. A democracy that does the right things well is better than a democracy that does the right things haphazardly.

The Six-Month Assessment: Tangible Results, Lingering Risks

Six months after Operation Absolute Resolve, the assessment is so complex that neither Trump’s supporters nor his opponents are willing to fully acknowledge it. On the positive side: a brutal tyrant is behind bars in Brooklyn, awaiting trial. Hundreds of political prisoners have been released in Venezuela. A fragile but real transition is underway under U.S. supervision. Diplomatic relations between Washington and Caracas have been normalized. The Russian and Cuban presence within Venezuela’s security structures has been severely compromised. These are tangible results, and it would be dishonest to deny them.

On the downside: a dangerous legal and military precedent has been set. The UN and a majority of countries have condemned the operation as illegal. The Cuba strategy, if pursued indiscriminately, could create a quagmire far more difficult to manage. The mixed motivations—justice, oil, anti-China strategy—undermine the operation’s moral legitimacy. And the impulsiveness of Trump’s rhetoric has provided Moscow and Beijing with exactly the rhetorical ammunition they needed to discredit the West. Saying that “it was still useful” is not enough for a power that sees itself as the arbiter of the world order.

What We Must Demand—and From Whom

The West needs clear rules and red lines that are consistently upheld. This means that overthrowing tyrants is sometimes necessary—but that how it is done matters. It means that Trump may have been right about the target and wrong about the method. It means that criticizing a clumsy U.S. intervention is not anti-Americanism—it is defending the consistency of the values the West claims to embody. And it means, above all, that Latin America cannot remain indefinitely the backyard of the great powers—whether Washington, Moscow, or Beijing. The peoples of Latin America deserve sovereign democracies, not regimes approved by the White House or the Kremlin.

Signed, Maxime Marquette, columnist