As part of Spectre’s ongoing discussion regarding how the Left can think the conjuncture in Venezuela given recent US intervention and the dynamics of the Venezuelan state, here Spectre editors Shireen Akram-Boshar and Charlie Post interview Federico Fuentes. Federico is a longtime Venezuela solidarity activist who lived in Caracas for several years during the Hugo Chávez government as a correspondent for Green Left and investigator at the Centro Internacional Miranda. He is co-author of Latin America’s Turbulent Transitions: The Future of Twenty-First Century Socialism and editor of LINKS International Journal of Socialist Renewal, which has hosted a discussion on Maduro’s Venezuela primarily with articles by and interviews with Venezuelan leftists. For our earlier coverage see Spectre editor Maga Miranda’s interview with Geo Maher, “The US Kidnapping of Nicolás Maduro,” and Manuel Cassique Herrera’s response, “Communes and Crises.”
*On January 3, 2026, the US military kidnapped Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores in a raid at his compound, while bombing military sites across northern Venezuela. They were flown to a detention center in New York, and charged with “narco-terrorism” and drug trafficking. Can you start with how you would characterize this current moment and the dangers posed to Venezuela by the Trump administration?* The January 3 US military assault, which also led to the deaths of more than one hundred Venezuelan and Cuban civilians and security personnel, represents a grave attack on sovereignty, peace and democratic rights—and not just for Venezuela. The events since have only confirmed these actions had nothing to do with narcotrafficking or democracy and everything to do with reasserting US dominance in Venezuela and Latin America more broadly. Six months on, Venezuela is essentially a twenty-first century US protectorate in the heart of Latin America. Today, the United States economically and politically controls Venezuela, having placed the country under coercive tutelage and neocolonial administration. The United States has seized control of the country’s oil exports and revenue, opened other strategic sectors (such as mining and electricity) to US corporations, carried out a geopolitical realignment (or “outward regime change”) of the country’s foreign policy, and enacted a further military strike on Venezuelan soil, this time with support from Venezuela’s government. It is difficult to understate the gravity of what is occurring right now in Venezuela or the chilling precedent it sets for the region. Therefore, it is important not just to characterize the current moment but understand why and how this came about. This requires situating January 3 both within the broader context of more than two decades of US imperialist hostility towards the Venezuelan government as well as more recent developments; namely, the US foreign policy shift under Trump, and the collapse in support for the Maduro government. US foreign policy has undergone a profound shift under Trump. As outlined in the White House’s National Security Strategy, Trump seeks “to restore American preeminence in the Western Hemisphere” by securing control over key territories and vital resources. The Trump administration aims to impose full spectrum dominance across the region via military means (as seen in Venezuela), economic means (tariffs, naval blockades, and so on) and political means (open intervention in elections, support for far right parties, and so on). After initially negotiating with the Maduro government, Trump assessed that removing him from power offered a perfect platform from which to launch his new security strategy. Venezuelan sociologist Malfred Gerig explains: Ideologically, it offer[ed] the defeat of socialism, notwithstanding Maduro’s regime being socialist in name only. Militarily, it offer[ed] a demonstration of firepower and persuasion. Geopolitically, it [wa]s a power move at the table of great powers, something Washington was eager for. Economically, it offer[ed] a substantial oil windfall for the US state and the corporations that financed Trump’s campaigns. Having removed Maduro, Trump plans to use Venezuela as a pivot from which to expand this policy across the region. That’s the why behind January 3. As for how this was possible, we have to understand that the Maduro government was extremely fragile, offering Trump an easy victory at little cost. The Maduro government was heavily weakened by the 2024 presidential elections, when it refused to publish results verifying its asserted victory—strongly indicating that fraud had been committed. This, combined with the harsh repression meted out against traditionally pro Chavista working class neighborhoods, dramatically exposed the government’s loss of support and lack of legitimacy, domestically and internationally. The 2024 elections and its aftermath showed the lengths to which the Maduro regime was willing to go to maintain control, choosing to crush its own support base rather than relinquish power. At the same time, it also demonstrated the weakness of the traditional right-wing opposition, which was unable to turn its electoral majority into a movement that could truly challenge the government. As a result, the Trump administration concluded that any new government—whoever led it—would be highly dependent on the United States and more than willing to go along with its plans in return for maintaining power. US imperialism today deals with the new Delcy Rodríguez government on a fundamentally new footing: one in which all the cards are in Trump’s hands. Trump uses this to humiliate the government by forcing it to administer the protectorate and carry out policies that the US has for a long time envisaged for Venezuela, in the process crushing what remains of the government’s social base. Continue reading at https://spectrejournal.com/on-us-intervention-and-the-venezuelan-state/ -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Groups.io Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. View/Reply Online (#42540): https://groups.io/g/marxmail/message/42540 Mute This Topic: https://groups.io/mt/120341041/21656 -=-=- POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. #4 Do not exceed five posts a day. -=-=- Group Owner: [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://groups.io/g/marxmail/leave/13617172/21656/1316126222/xyzzy [[email protected]] -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
