Machado, Trump and the contradictions of removing Maduro by force

Venezuela is once again on the brink of a fall of the Bolivarian regime that has driven an oil-rich nation to become a failed state. And while that’s a good thing, there are multiple warning signs about ongoing developments that could set dangerous precedents for the region and the world more generally. 

María Corina Machado, the opposition leader who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, has been clear that she and her allies pursue a peaceful transition of power, one which Nicolás Maduro has rejected. From Oslo – where Machado arrived after 16 months in hiding in Venezuela – she indicated this week that the Maduro regime must not be treated like traditional dictatorships, but as a criminal organisation that relies on drug-trafficking, oil and gold dealings and even human-trafficking to finance its ambition to remain in power. She deflected answers regarding whether a military intervention by the administration of US President Donald Trump would be acceptable to the Venezuelan opposition, tacitly giving her approval. Asked what would be appropriate conditions for a negotiation with Maduro, she explained that the socialist leader had been given multiple opportunities to secure an exit but was either unwilling or unable. Conceptually, the winner of the Nobel Peace Prize is consenting to some sort of military operation by an outside force to remove Maduro and his chain of command, in a move that isn’t without controversy or precedent: Barack Obama, Yasser Arafat, and Henry Kissinger are three clear examples.

The situation of Venezuela under Hugo Chávez, and then Nicolás Maduro, is extraordinary in 21st century South America. While there have been different levels of adherence to democratic values, the continent has generally embraced multi-party political systems that lead to alternative socio-political groups coming to power. This took place, of course, after most of the continent was subjugated by brutal military dictatorships which were directly propped up by the United States as part of Washington’s attempt to keep the Soviet Union out of its “backyard” during the second half of the 20th century. With the exception of Venezuela, a model democracy until the 1990s that turned into a corrupt and murderous dictatorship as it took an opposite turn to the rest of the continent.

The continued decline of Venezuela, which seems to have kicked up a gear during the Maduro years, has created a massive migration and refugee crisis. Around 7.9 million Venezuelans have left the country, according to the UNHCR, the United Nations’ refugee agency. Some 6.7 million of those have made their way to other Latin American and Caribbean nations, including Argentina where the latest figures indicate some 220,000 have found a new home. At the same time, the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela (as the nation was renamed by Chávez) has become a safe haven for drug-traffickers and other criminal organisations. These have infected the military and the state apparatus all the way to its highest echelons, including Maduro and the factotum of power, powerful Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello. Drug-trafficking through Venezuela was historically tied to Colombian and other cartels, but throughout the 2000s it came to be controlled by members of the military and the state more broadly. This has led the US to designate the so-called “Cártel de los Soles” as a terrorist organisation, giving it a legal framework to pursue the Maduro regime’s top-ranking officials, despite no real group existing under that specific banner.

Shut out of the US-dominated Western World, Bolivarian Venezuela under Chávez and Maduro has become a key ally of the United States’ traditional enemies. Deep ties with Cuba, military and energy dealings with Russia and Iran and a commercial relationship with China are among the major offences Washington isn’t willing to tolerate. Much more so under President Trump, whose recently released National Security Strategy points to an increased presence in Latin America in order to guarantee US economic growth and in strategic alignment with its interests. “This National Security Strategy marks an ideological and substantive shift in US foreign policy,” wrote Emily Harding for the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a bipartisan US think tank in Washington DC. “The administration is attempting to define a new ‘America First’ foreign policy doctrine that is deeply pragmatic, and perhaps short-sighted,” she adds. “The democracy agenda is clearly over [and] foreign policy choices will be made based on what makes the United States more powerful and prosperous.”

This geopolitical shift, together with a redefinition of the competition between the world’s current superpowers, China and the US, is directly tied to the Trump administration’s actions in Venezuela; its ripple effects remain unknown. Having deployed massive military force in the Caribbean Sea, the US has launched a crescendo of military operations that began with unilateral strikes against purported drug-trafficking boats, progressed to an aerial intrusion of Venezuelan airspace (as Machado was fleeing to Norway) and the seizing of an oil tanker. Trump has threatened Maduro publicly and appears set on regime change. He has the implicit support of the Venezuelan opposition – and, of course, from Javier Milei, Argentina’s president who has sworn total allegiance to The Donald.

Argentina specifically and South America more broadly has been a peaceful continent with a general agreement on non-intervention this century. Washington’s decision to militarise the Caribbean, engage in military strikes against alleged drug-traffickers and ultimately to pursue regime change in Venezuela changes the whole rulebook. Trump has directly stated that he will favour his political allies and has demonstrated this time and time again, such as in the massive financial bailout he gave Milei, or in his battles with Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes over the conviction handed down to Trump ally, former president Jair Bolsonaro, for attempting a coup d’état. 

The message is loud and clear, align strategically with the US or suffer the consequences. According to Harding, the NSS document shows the Trump administration “lean[ing] hard” into the talking-points of European “far-right-wing political parties.” What kind of guarantees can a region with a history of far-right military dictatorships get from a United States that has shelved the democracy agenda in favour of throwing around its economic and geopolitical might? That is why the Venezuelan situation forces the wider region into a conundrum. The opposition has proven itself to be powerless in its efforts to topple the Maduro regime, even with strong international support and massive popular unrest, as the 2024 presidential elections showed. For multiple reasons, Maduro manages to retain the support of the Armed Forces and a hard core of the population. He has been unwilling to pursue a peaceful transition, instead hardening his stance. Yet unilateral action from the United States under Trump would be in line with the darkest precedents of the superpower’s interventions in the region, eliminating multiple safeguards, not least the central role of democracy as a political organiser.

Machado and the Venezuelan opposition must be directly involved in whatever decisions are taken, even if that includes military action, so that they are also responsible for the way the situation evolves. There are no guarantees that removing Maduro, Cabello, and the military top brass will lead to a democratic consolidation under opposition rule, particularly given the prevalence of the drug trade throughout the country and its reach and power across the region. The priority should still be diplomatic negotiations, even if Maduro pretends not to care and they should include the military more generally. 

María Corina Machado may bring and deliver hope, but unilateral military interventions by the United States also brings to the fore some very recent memories of truly failed states.