Local foreign affairs experts agree Saturday’s capture of Venezuela’s president had little to do with a crackdown on illegal drug trafficking, and instead it was a show of power over trade.
The news that U.S. special operations forces seized President Nicholas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores and brought them to New York to face drug charges is leaving foreign policy experts to question the real reason for the stunning use of military force and what happens next to the government of the South American country.
In Western Massachusetts, meanwhile, a variety of activist groups joined together to organize “emergency protests” on Saturday and Sunday in Northampton and Greenfield. On Saturday, an estimated 100 people stood out to decry Trump’s actions against Venezuela, said Sasha Morsmith chairman of River Valley Democrat chair of River Valley Democratic Socialists of America.
“Maduro and his wife need to be returned to Venezuela and the United States needs to cease its illegal bombing campaign in the Caribbean,” she said. “Those oil resources are for the Venezuelan people to decide to do with them.”
Multiple elected officials including U.S. Reps. Richard E. Neal, D-Springfield, and James McGovern, D-Worcester, also condemned the operation, which was done without congressional approval.
A move aimed to intimidate
The Trump administration was escalating its military presence in the Caribbean and sinking Venezuelan boats, but the “kidnapping” was a surprise move, said John Feffer, of Amherst, director of Foreign Policy in Focus at the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, D.C.
Feffer argued if the action was designed to stop drug trafficking, then Trump wouldn’t have pardoned ex-Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez on his conviction to conspire with drug traffickers. Furthermore, fentanyl, one of the biggest killers of opioid users, is not coming from Venezuela.
“Maduro was weak in his own country, an easy target. It was not drugs, not oil,” he said.
Instead, Feffer cited a Chinese proverb: “Kill the chicken to scare the monkeys,” a move intended to intimidate other leaders.
“From a realpolitik view that is what dictators want to do. …This is our region and you should not think of expanding into our region,” Feffer said. “There are more powerful actors in the region that are going to take note in this, Brazil, Mexico, Columbia.”
He also questioned if it was about capturing control of Venezuela’s huge oil resources since Maduro was willing to sign a peace agreement that would provide the United States with oil at favorable prices.
Instead, Feffer said he sees it as a part of a complex move to access minerals valuable to manufacturing and to control trade, including slowing China’s growing push into Mexico, Canada — an issue past President Joe Biden was also concerned about.
“Venezuela is not exactly a pawn of China, but China is one of its few trade partners, and it is heavily in debt to China,” he said.
Oil reserves the largest in the world
Alejandro Velasco, associate professor of history at New York University who previously taught at Hampshire College in Amherst, agreed narcoterrorism has little to do with the operation.
“Not in the way the Trump administration has suggested,” he said. “If it was, we should see a tremendous drop in fentanyl use. There is no documented proof Venezuela is a distributor or manufacturer of the drugs.”
He does believe the four-month buildup in the Caribbean was not getting the results and attention Trump wanted, so it boxed him in and forced him into the massive operation.
But Velasco, who has written several books about the country and has relatives living in Venezuela, does believe part of the capture of Maduro is about getting more control of the country’s oil.
“The primary one at least for Trump, just President Trump, is securing access to oil reserves which are the vastest in the world,” he said. “Others in his administration are after different things, but they are not calling the shots.”
Valesco predicted Secretary of State Marco Rubio wants to see a similar action and regime change in Cuba while other cabinet members want to simply to flex America’s military muscle. Stephen Miller, homeland security advisor, wants to return more Venezuelan immigrants who say they are in danger in their own home.
While Trump has said the United States will “run” the country, a statement Rubio seemingly walked back on Sunday, Valesco and Feffer said they do not see huge changes in the regime so far.
Hours after Maduro was captured, Vice President Delcy Rodriguez was sworn in as interim president and the rest of the leadership remains in place.
Feffer said his guess is the issue will drop out of the news cycle, the government will simply remain in place, and the successors will negotiate some type of economic deal that will satisfy Trump.
Unlike the invasion in Iraq that resulted in a prolonged war, no infrastructure was destroyed and the opposition, for now, is not fighting to get into power, he said.
“They get rid of Maduro and leave everything in place. That has been a tremendous surprise,” Valesco said.
Valesco said he sees one of two scenarios. The “rosy one” would leave the existing leaders in place and a slight improvement for the people of Venezuela. The second will end up with a splintering with the military or a civilian side forcing a coup.
“Under the rosy scenario, the current authorities are able to consolidate control and are able to straddle a fine line of maintaining a public stance of defiance, but in terms of policy, opening the oil fields to U.S. companies and reversing nationalization of oil,” he said.
Valesco said he has been able to talk to family members in Venezuela and said they are keeping a low profile and preparing for the worst.
“Over the past they have had to learn how to hunker down in moments of crisis,” he said. “It is so much of a guessing game and that feeds anxiety.”
The current leaders have held press conferences and residents have access to media, but there are still major questions.
For now, most are stocking up on food, gas and other supplies and staying inside and waiting to figure out their situation, he said.
