After Trump’s Maduro raid, analysts expect a reckoning in the Western Hemisphere

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The new year began with a stark demonstration of U.S. power on Jan. 3 when American forces conducted a military raid in Caracas to seize Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro.

While many were shocked by the aggressive operation, the White House had already signalled its intentions for the Western Hemisphere. Late last year, the Trump administration issued its National Security Strategy (NSS), declaring a will to “reassert and enforce the Monroe Doctrine to restore American preeminence in the Western Hemisphere, and to protect our homeland and our access to key geographies throughout the region.”

It also vowed to “deny non-Hemispheric competitors the ability to position forces … or to own or control strategically vital assets, in our Hemisphere,” dubbing it the “Trump Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine and presenting it as a blueprint for restoring American power and security interests throughout the region.

The move on Maduro was apparently its first practical application, but was it setting a precedent for using military — alongside economic and legal — coercion against weaker states to secure what Washington deems to be key resources or chokepoints? With the U.S. now explicitly dedicated to dominating the Western Hemisphere, and in the wake of Trump’s threats about seizing the Panama Canal, taking Greenland, and making Canada the “51st state,” how far does the White House plan to push the “Trump Corollary”?

“It’s a policy now of might is right — not only tariff baton or tantrum diplomacy, but might is right,” said Michael Bociurkiw, a global affairs analyst and senior fellow at the Atlantic Council. “And Trump’s statements recently about Greenland, about ‘fixing’ Mexico, even about Colombia and Cuba should put Canada on alert footing … There’s a new sheriff in the hemisphere.”

So what could this mean for Ottawa in terms of economic or even military coercion from Washington?

Some analysts have suggested that the harnessing of Venezuelan oil was Trump’s goal – and that U.S. access to it could hurt Alberta oil exports to the United States. Canada is currently the largest oil exporter to the United States.

Bociurkiw, a native Albertan, warned that the move on Venezuela poses a long-term threat to Canadian oil exports, which he argued could fall by 25 per cent over the next four years — and as much as 50 per cent over the next six.

While acknowledging that getting Venezuelan oil production up to competitive levels would take “a long, long time and billions of dollars,” he warned that Canada should not be complacent. Trump, he said, could use the Venezuelan oil economy “as leverage against Canada” just as he has with tariffs. This, he added, “should set off alarm bells in Edmonton, Ottawa, and beyond.”

Others, however, see oil as the symptom, not the cause or main goal.

The oil could help pay for the operation, making it politically feasible, explained Landon Derentz, vice president of energy and infrastructure at the Atlantic Council.

He said a compelling policy argument for the move in Venezuela would’ve been pointing out the country’s energy resources to Trump as a way of paying for the operation, rather than saddling U.S. taxpayers with the cost. This, he said, would justify the institutionalization of a broader foreign policy of the United States as the dominating influence in the Western Hemisphere.

The other upside? U.S. companies can develop those resources and economically benefit, he said, while giving the Venezuelans more stability.

Jennifer Kavanagh, a senior fellow and director of military analysis at Defense Priorities and an adjunct professor at Georgetown University’s Center for Security Studies, also sees oil as a symptom, not the cause, but her outlook is more stark. She sees it as an example of Trump’s desire “to exert U.S. military, economic, and political will everywhere in the Western Hemisphere without impediment.”

Getting Venezuelan oil production online, in any case, would take up to a decade and cost billions, and U.S. oil firms are unlikely, the analysts said, to clamour for a chance to spend that in a high-risk environment like Venezuela.

But will military coercion in the Western Hemisphere stop with Maduro?

Many analysts think that Venezuela was simply the first stop, but they disagree on Trump’s most likely future targets.

Following the intervention in Venezuela, Chatham House analysts looked at the U.S. definition of hemispheric control in the NSS and wrote that “Canada, Panama, and Greenland, which fall within that geographical definition, have good cause for concern about the president’s intentions – and the lengths to which he may go in pursuing them.”

Bronwen Maddox, director and chief executive of Chatham House and one of the authors of the report, she said she doesn’t see imminent danger for Ottawa.

“I don’t think Canada is in his sights at the moment. Canada has done quite a good job of diffusing that … and is benefiting from the fact that Trump is looking elsewhere.”

Kavanagh also believes the Trump administration will now be emboldened to use military force against other countries, pointing to Cuba, Colombia, and Mexico.

“I think Canada’s sort of at the bottom of the list … but not out of the woods,” she said.

Most analysts tend to agree, but when it comes to Greenland, it’s a different story.

Over the past few days, rhetoric from top Trump aide Stephen Miller has raised concern that Greenland could indeed be next. His wife, Katie Miller, posted on X an image of the American flag superimposed over a map of Greenland, with the single word “SOON” shortly after the intervention in Venezuela.

On Monday, Stephen Miller told CNN that Greenland “should be part of the United States,” adding that “nobody’s going to fight the United States militarily over the future of Greenland.”

According t o press reports, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has told lawmakers that Trump wants to buy Greenland, downplaying any talk of military action.

Maddox believes Greenland could face a real risk, whereas the threat to Canada is more hypothetical, she said.

When asked what targets could be next for Trump, Maddox pointed to the countries that “don’t have much ability at this point to push back on the U.S., like Greenland or Cuba.”

Yet, despite Miller’s rhetoric, others doubt that there would be any appetite in Washington for a military takeover of Greenland. Kavanagh is skeptical that the U.S. would use force in the Danish territory.

The administration is talking about wanting to take it over, she acknowledged, “but let’s think seriously about what that means. It doesn’t mean kidnapping the leader. It doesn’t mean putting a thousand forces on the ground and planting a flag.”

To really take control of Greenland’s government, she said, would require a massive ground presence. “I don’t think that’s the type of thing the administration is willing to do. They don’t want to do anything hard. They just want to do big, flashy things.”

Alexander Gray, the former chief of staff of the U.S. National Security Council and a current nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, agrees that Trump is unlikely to move militarily against Greenland, but noted that Trump has other tools he can use there.

“The president’s been very clear. He wants Greenland to be part of the United States,” Gray said. “There are a lot of things [Trump] can do to bring Greenland closer to the U.S.”

“Venezuela is a unique situation,” he said. “I think what is likely to happen, what I hope will happen, is that the United States pays more attention to destabilizing regimes in the hemisphere like Cuba. Like Nicaragua.”

Trump’s desire to control part of the Arctic via Greenland, however, raises security questions for Canada by proxy. When pushed on whether Washington’s desire to bolster its Arctic sphere of influence could spell trouble for Canada, Gray flipped the script and pointed to the need to meet the capabilities of rivals like China and Russia in the region.

“I think it’s a great thing for Canada to have America focused on the Arctic,” Gray said, describing how Canada would benefit from U.S. investment in more icebreakers.

Gray recommended that Prime Minister Mark Carney use the ramped-up defence spending he has promised to do more in the high North “to free the U.S. up to handle other things.”

“I think that would be a tremendous boon for both countries,” adding that “as kind of the NATO anchor in the high North, Canada should want a Western hemisphere-focused United States.”

The other reason analysts think Greenland will be spared from military intervention is the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Military intervention in Greenland would blow up NATO because Denmark, the sovereign power over the island and NATO member, would invoke Article 5, calling for collective defence. This would force European allies to decide whether to take on Trump — or watch the alliance disintegrate.

While Kavanagh doesn’t think an invasion is coming, she disagreed with others on Trump’s regard for NATO.

“Trump doesn’t respect NATO and wouldn’t care if it collapsed,” she said.

Others disagree.

“I do not see [Trump] invading Greenland and blowing up NATO,” said Derentz.

Gray went so far as to say that Trump was the best thing to happen to the alliance.

“NATO was a declining alliance with military capabilities that were atrophying until Donald Trump started pressuring it to increase its defence spending,” Gray said.

Other international organizations, however, may soon be targeted.

Derentz said there are rumours in Washington that an executive order will soon drop about U.S. participation in multinational and international organizations “that will contract the United States from those institutions.”

Most of that is pointed at the United Nations, but NATO “remains in a pretty strong place,” he said, noting how there is strong Republican support for the alliance.

NATO allies kowtowing to Trump, however, could set a dangerous precedent and open them up to even more forms of coercion.

Both Maddox and Kavanagh believe European allies should have been more vocal in condemning Trump’s intervention method in Venezuela. While none were fans of Maduro, most have failed to strongly condemn the aggressive intervention in a sovereign country.

“They’ve accepted a precedent now that opens the door for Trump to do the same thing towards them or towards Greenland and to coerce them even more,” said Kavanagh.

“I think it’s a mistake.”

National Post

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