From the final minutes of Friday night’s “Washington Week in Review” broadcast and podcast on PBS, with host Jeffrey Goldberg, editor of “The Atlantic” magazine, and Thomas Friedman, “New York Times” columnist for global affairs.
Goldberg: “Do you think Trump would actually go to war with Venezuela in 2026?”
Friedman: “I would rule out nothing, Jeff.”
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From Friedman’s column in the “Times” mere hours later, after United States forces had captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife in a 2 a.m. raid and flown them to New York, where they will likely stand trial on “narco terrorism conspiracy” charges sometime in the coming months.
‘The Trump administration just broke the leadership of Venezuela; Trump now owns responsibility for what comes next there. If it leads to a new and better government for the people of Venezuela, great. Trump will be remembered for setting that process in motion. But if it leads to Venezuela becoming a bigger boiling pot of instability, well, Trump, who likes to put his name on things, will have his name on that instability for a long time.
“I like how Quico Toro, the founder of Caracas Chronicles, who was forced to flee Venezuela’s dictatorship, put it in an essay on Saturday. ‘Donald Trump and Marco Rubio will take a victory lap today. They deserve it. They’ve struck an enormous blow against a genuinely evil regime. But they’ve not overthrown it. ‘Chavismo’ is very much still in control of Venezuela. Venezuelans all around the world are celebrating the fall of a vicious tyrant. But if the regime manages to ride out this storm, we won’t be celebrating for long.”
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Many Venezuelans, including the nearly 8 million who have fled the country under the iron grip of Maduro and his mentor/predeccesor Hugo Chavez since 1999, are overjoyed today, now that their vile dictator has been removed. No one can argue that point.
What awaits them under an American occupation led by the mercurial, purely transactional Donald Trump and his band of amateur foreign policy strategists remains to be seen.
That’s six countries in this hemisphere the president thinks should come under United States control, and in the case of Canada and Greenland, become the 51st and 52nd states.
It is not an encouraging sign, however, that Trump has not recognized the legitimate winners of last year’s election—President Edmundo González and his Vice President and Nobel Peace Prize winner María Corina Machado—which Maduro stole in a blatant dictatorial move condemned from all corners of the free world. (Of the kind, we should note, that Trump was unable to see through in his own attempt to stay in power in 2020.)
Instead, Trump has stated that the U.S. will run the country for the time being. Not the country’s democratically elected slate of candidates and the government they were prepared to form—they will not be allowed to govern because Trump has declared them “not ready.”
Which begs the question: Trump is?
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Last January, the “New York Post” ran the cover story you see on the top of this page. The typically cheeky headline played off of the (James) “Monroe Doctrine” of 1823 that warned European countries to butt out of all colonization efforts through the entire Western Hemisphere, including Central- and South America.
Not so fast, it turns out. The “Donroe Doctrine” headline depicted Trump and his backers’ Project 2025 “vision” for the hemisphere as including near total hegemony over all comings and goings that might impinge on American interests. Yesterday, Trump added this in his address to the nation after the military operation:
“…the Monroe Doctrine is a big deal, but we’ve superceded it by a lot, by a real lot. They now call it the ‘Don-roe Doctrine’…American dominance in the Western Hemisphere will never be questioned again.”
The “they” in that sentence was typical Trump, seizing on one reference from one media source to suggest widespread usage of a now buzzy term and adopting it as his own. Multiple media sources (“The Hill,” “USA Today”) took the bait, and suggested Trump himself had coined the term.
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Commentators around the world have noted that Trump’s purported reason for invading Venezuela was to stanch the alleged flow of drugs, chiefly fentanyl, that its Maduro-led cartel was sending to kill off “hundreds of thousands” of Americans. In truth, Venezuela’s chief drug export is cocaine, most of which goes to Europe.
That incongruity is dwarfed, however, by the cold, harrowing fact that Trump recently fully pardoned a known drug lord in the person of former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández, who was convicted in 2024 in an American court on multiple drug and weapons charges. His offenses included accepting a $1 million bribe from former Mexican drug cartel kingpin Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán in 2013 while campaigning for the Honduran presidency (which he won).
On December 2, he walked out of federal prison in West Virginia a free man, having served just under 18 months of the 45 years he had been sentenced to, and with the $8 million fine he was obligated to repay dismissed.
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The country that is really sending the vast bulk of fentanyl to the U.S. is our neighbor Mexico, with its legitimately elected democratic president Claudia Sheinbaum. Trump disputed that she is the actual leader of her country in comments to “Fox & Friends” on Saturday, even as smoke was still rising in Carácas:
“We could be politically correct and be nice and say, ‘Oh yeah she is.’ She is very frightened of the cartels. They’re running Mexico. I’ve asked her numerous times would you like us to take out the cartels. ‘No, no, no, Mr. President, no, no, no, please.’ So we have to do something.”
So: he “has to do something.”
The statement should come as a none-too-subtle warning for Mexico to be alert for an invasion by its northern neighbor similar to what befell Venezuela. It would be foolish not to be concerned, particularly given that the “Donroe Doctrine” now appears to be a guiding principle of our hemispheric relations.
Trump on Columbian President Gustavo Petro: “He’s making cocaine. They’re sending it into the United States. So he does have to watch his ass.”
And on Cuba: “I think Cuba is going to be something we’ll end up talking about, because Cuba is a failing nation right now.”
Secretary of State Marco Rubio, expanding upon Trump’s comments on Cuba: “Yeah, look, if I lived in Havana and I was in the government, I’d be concerned at least a little bit.”
And after Venezuela, Mexico, Columbia, and Cuba? Trump has long coveted another hemispheric neighbor a little farther to the north of the countries mentioned above, which he has stated publicly he would like to make the 51st state: Canada.
The idea sounded partly shocking and another part ludicrous when he first floated it early last year.
But what other ventures and plans of the president have been regarded initially as ludicrous before they became a very serious matter indeed? For one, his very candidacy in 2016 for most politically inclined onlookers, including this one.
Another doozie: his Nixonesque claim of absolute immunity from criminal prosecution simply because he’s the president. Then the Supreme Court agreed with what struck most observers at the time as a Trump pipe dream.
And beyond Canada, Greenland?
While I was typing that last sentence, this came in from “The Atlantic,” whose reporter found Trump buoyant and chatty on his golf course at Mar-A-Lago today (Sunday) and took his phone call. After issuing dark warnings that currently serving Venezuelan Vice-President Delcy Rodriguez had better do his bidding while leadership of the country is sorted out or “she is going to pay a very big price, probably bigger than Maduro,” he turned to the large island much farther north: “We do need Greenland, absolutely.”
That’s six countries in this hemisphere the president, judging by his own words, thinks should come under United States control, and in the case of Canada and Greenland, become the 51st and 52nd states.
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This was Trump at a speech in Fayetteville, North Carolina in December, 2016, among the first of many times ever since that he has returned to the identical theme: the pitfalls of foreign interventionism.
“From now, on it’s going to be America first, America first. We will stop racing to topple foreign—and you understand this, foreign regimes that we know nothing about, that we shouldn’t be involved with…We seek harmony and goodwill among the nations of the world, and we believe that respect from mutual sovereignty helps form the basis of trust and understanding, but we don’t want people taking advantage of us anymore. We don’t want countries taking advantage of us anymore. We don’t want that. We don’t want that.”
Now, seemingly drunk on power and hell-bent on accumulating countries he can control as he would a personal asset, the president’s vision is more Napoleonic than isolationist or “harmonious.” No matter that none of the countries he covets wants to forsake its sovereignty, a word that 2026 Trump seems to view as applicable only to himself and the country he claims to represent.
Sure, Venezuela is today out from under a vicious dictator. But what have they gotten themselves into? What have we all?
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Not among my typical music genres here, but pretty hard to argue with the message…
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Donroe Doctrine from the New York Post, January 5, 2025 https://nypost.com/
Protestors by Venezuela Libre https://www.flickr.com/photos/120353305@N07/
Sling shot protestors by Alexandra Cegarra, Strasbourg, France https://www.flickr.com/photos/netelyx/
Danger zone by Bernt Dittrich, Germany https://unsplash.com/@hdbernd
Perfectly articulated. Horrifically true.
Yes, it’s hard to know where this is going to end, Jamie, and how much of it may be a classic maneuver to divert attention from all the other atrocities of his reign, including the Epstein files. Playing with the fate of nations for his own personal ends would be absolutely keeping in character (or his lack thereof), seems to me.
Thanks for dropping in and don’t forget the music and poetry and other artsy material we traffic in here—essential for my own survival, for certain!
The Venezuela invasion is a clear violation of U.S. and international law, not that Trump gives a fig about either, but will there be any attempt to hold him accountable – by Congress, the United Nations, the International Court?
And then there’s Canada, a member of NATO, whose treaty says an attack against one is an attack against all. So the U.S. goes to war against Canada AND Europe. Does Russia then come to the defense of the U.S. to finish the realization of Putin’s idea of a world divided into spheres of influence, an idea that Trump has clearly adopted heart and soul (as if he had any).
Unlikely, I know, but as you say, Andrew, so much of the unlikely in Trump’s world is all too real today.
And even if Trump keeps his hands off Canada, there is, of course, the collateral damage of the Venezuela invasion and the Donroe Doctrine to Ukraine and Taiwan. So much for their sovereignty.
All great points, David, thanks much for helping to fill out more of the picture. At this point, I feel my fingers growing weary from all the times I have typed the words, “We are in uncharted waters” over the past decade, but I am also sensing deep unease, not only among Trump’s usual opposition, but all across the political spectrum, after this latest outrage. All the more with the larger world chiming in with such great urgency, given the truly international implications of this blatantly illegal and unwise action.
Drew, your analysis was thorough and succinct. However, you omitted salient statements made during his address two days ago. Let me begin with a brief summary, adorned with a few personal comments:
“Captured Maduro in the dead of night. It was dark. (NIGHT IS USUALLY DARK) We have the best equipment anywhere in the world. And you see that, even if you just look at the boats. (LIKE PLAYING BATTLESHIP) We used to have two (murders), on average, two a week in Washington, our capital, we don’t have that anymore. The restaurants are opening. Everyone’s happy. They’re going and they’re walking their daughters, they’re walking their children, their wives. (BUT NOT THEIR DOGS?) And, uh, they came from mental institutions and insane asylums. They came from prisons and jails. The reason I say both, they sound similar. Actually, prisons, uh, a little bit more, a little bit more hostile, a little bit tougher. A mental institution isn’t as tough as an insane asylum. (THIS IS A FREUDIAN EXPLANATION) Monroe Doctrine is a, a big deal, but we’ve superseded it by a lot. By a real lot. They now call it the “Donroe” Document. (SOUNDS MORE LIKE A DUMBROE DOCTRINE) A year and a half ago, we were a dead country. Now, we’re the hottest country anywhere in the world. (STORMY DANIELS HOT?) Congress will leak, and we don’t want leakers. (POISE MIGHT WORK) We would have had the door blown up in about 47, I think 47 seconds. (DAMN! I’M GLAD OUR PREZ IS A MUNITIONS EXPERT) Well, eventually, ultimately, in the near future. (WHAT?) Oil is very dangerous. (LIKE A BLACK MAMBA) We’re gonna be Venezuela on steroids (LIKE BARRY BONDS). Uh, but we’re going to be, uh, rebuilding and, and we’re, we’re not spending money. (ECONOMICS 101) Thailand and Cambodia, I did it again. They were, they broke out, and I did it in about five hours and I settled it. I’m giving myself one quarter, so I’m up to now eight and one quarter. In other words, I settled the war, but then, they broke out. (WTF!)”
I can sleep better tonight knowing this man is in control of…what is he in control of?
Robert, given he has zero control of his own emotional states or what is left of his intelligence after a lifetime of stewing in anger and revenge fantasies, I daresay he doesn’t control much, but here he is anyway, now truly embracing fantasies of Napoleon (in a red tie, but much, much taller, taller than anyone has ever seen before…), a world ruler for the ages, King Kong on the Empire State Building, railing at all who don’t recognize his absolute power.
Thanks for filling in more of the story, which I truly do depend on my readers to manage for me. Yesterday, when I just started doodling some notes on this matter to see whether they wanted to go anywhere, I had to laugh as one bit of new info or perspective after another kept rolling into my notifications to render what I had doodled either obsolete or else goaded me to contend with another piece of the prism that this prismatic story represents. Hard to keep up with its flow, that is for sure, especially as its implications for the wider world shake out in coming days and weeks, and as the shambolic nature of the Trump regime is writ large yet again as it contends with the nation-building it is now stuck with in Venezuela. The idea that they want to pile another half-dozen countries on top of that is the stuff of absolute fever dreams, like toddlers in a jump house, delirious with every tumble and fall…
Exactly, which is why I try to read blogs to avoid the news.
I wonder if psychologists will officially rename “Narcissism” TRUMPISM?