After Maduro’s takeover, Trump’s tough talk signals a return to the days of US imperialism

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is not mincing words about the big message he’s trying to send to the world by launching a U.S. military raid to capture Nicolas Maduro and embolden the ousted Venezuelan leader and his wife to face federal drug-trafficking charges.

“American dominance in the Western Hemisphere,” Trump declared after Maduro’s capture, “will never be questioned again.”

In the days since the audacious attack, Trump and his team have doubled down on the notion that a new focus on American primacy in the hemisphere is here to stay. He also blocked Maduro’s takeover to make a case for neighbors to fall in line or face potential consequences.

Trump’s rhetoric harkens back to the muscular negotiations of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, when US presidents mobilized troops for territorial and resource conquests including Cuba, Puerto Rico, Hawaii, Honduras, Panama, Nicaragua, Mexico, Haiti and the Dominican Republic.

“Vietnam and Iraq were times that raised questions about the return of US imperialism, but the messages from US leaders during those periods were cloaked in democracy. We haven’t seen Trump talk about it in a long time.” University of Indianapolis historian Edward Franz said.

Since the operation, Trump’s tough talk has been directed at titular allies in Greenland — where he called on the U.S. to seize the Danish territory for national security reasons — and Mexico. Trump says America’s southern neighbor needs to “get its act together” to fight drug cartels.

Trump has warned that long-time rival Cuba is now “collapsing” after ousting Maduro, who provides deeply discounted oil to the economically isolated government in Havana. And the president has raised concerns with Venezuela’s neighbor, telling reporters that the military operation in Colombia — the epicenter of global cocaine production — “feels good to me.”

The Republican president has also said his administration will “run” Venezuela policy and threatened the country’s new leader, interim President Delsy Rodriguez, with worse outcomes than Maduro’s if he “does OK.” He has made it clear that he expects Caracas to open up its vast oil reserves to US energy companies, further igniting speculation about US overreach.

“We’re going to have our very large United States oil companies, some of the largest anywhere in the world, go in, spend billions of dollars, fix a badly broken infrastructure — the oil infrastructure — and start making money for the country,” Trump said over the weekend.

Venezuela’s encroachment has divided Latin America, with Trump-aligned leaders mostly on the right hailing the ouster, and non-aligned leaders condemning it on sovereignty grounds. There are sharp concerns that Trump may actually be serious about his desire to annex Greenland as well.

Leaning on the Monroe Doctrine, Trump keeps neighbors on edge

Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen warned on Monday that Trump would mark the undoing of the transatlantic military alliance, NATO, if he tries to follow through on his assertion that the US needs to seize Greenland for national security reasons. The alliance, which includes the US and Denmark, has been a linchpin of post-World War II security.

“If the United States chooses to attack another NATO country militarily, then everything stops,” Frederiksen told Danish broadcaster TV2.

In the early part of the 20th century, American leaders repeatedly returned to the Monroe Doctrine, the foundational document of American foreign policy written by the nation’s fifth president, aimed at opposing European interference in the Western Hemisphere.

Now, Trump is also leaning on the doctrine of justifying US intervention in Venezuela and threatening action around the hemisphere in the name of the security and well-being of Americans.

“Trump’s rhetoric conjures up images of Teddy Roosevelt and gunboat diplomacy. This rhetoric harkens back to the pre-World War II era,” Frantz said, referring to the 26th president’s intervention in unstable Caribbean and Central American economies as well as his support of Colombe’s national interests in Panama.

Just weeks before Maduro’s ouster, Trump rolled out a long-awaited national security strategy that had some disparate elements that appeared to be at odds with each other.

On the one hand, Trump, who has long shunned America’s role in foreign wars, claimed the administration would have a “non-interventionist predilection.” But the strategy document also made clear that the administration would push to “restore American primacy in the Western Hemisphere.”

With Maduro’s ouster, the administration has apparently doubled down.

“This is the Western Hemisphere,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Sunday in an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “This is where we live – and we will not allow the Western Hemisphere to become a base of operations for the United States’ adversaries, adversaries and rivals.”

UN Security Council outrage

Maduro and Trump’s rhetorical takeover could certainly be a standard-setting moment for global leaders as they consider what might happen in the final three years of Trump’s second term.

At an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council on Monday, Colombian Ambassador Leonor Zalabata Torres said the attack on Venezuela was reminiscent of “the worst interventions in our region in the past”.

“Democracy cannot be defended or promoted through violence and coercion, and it cannot be overturned by economic interests,” said Jalabata Torres, whose country requested the meeting.

At the same time, Democrats are questioning whether Trump’s actions have created a concession structure for Russian President Vladimir Putin, who plans to seize more territory from neighboring Ukraine, and Chinese President Xi Jinping, who has vowed to annex the self-governing island of Taiwan.

“The president’s actions on this matter have essentially given Putin and Xi Jinping a hall pass,” Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, said in an appearance on CNN.

The Russians have condemned Trump’s actions in Venezuela. UN Ambassador Vasily Nebenzia said the world body “cannot allow the United States to declare itself as some kind of supreme judge in the world”.

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AP writers Jennifer Peltz and Farnoush Amiri at the United Nations contributed to this report.