“We seek good relations and peaceful commercial relations with the nations of the world without imposing on them democratic or other social change.” This is what is written in the recent U.S. National Security Strategy (NSS), in Chapter IV (“The Strategy”), subchapter I (“Principles”).

The events of January 3 in Venezuela confirm what was already evident: the United States no longer has either strategy or principles. At the very least, they demonstrate that this document, already riddled with irreconcilable internal contradictions, has become obsolete with remarkable speed, having been published less than a month earlier, on December 4.
Apart from his clients, a handful of regime apparatchiks, and Miguel Díaz-Canel, the Cuban caudillo, few will mourn Nicolás Maduro. For now, then, we can leave Maduro to his fate (still more enviable than that of Muammar Gaddafi or Saddam Hussein) and turn instead to what truly matters: the geopolitical consequences of the U.S. military intervention in Venezuela.

In the NSS document, the phrase “Western Hemisphere” appears thirteen times over twenty-nine pages, whereas “European Union” appears only once, and then only to accuse it, among other things, of “undermining political freedoms and sovereignty.” This disparity alone would suffice to reveal, if the document were not already so incoherent and outdated, where the priorities of the Trump administration lie.

The document states in particular that “after years of neglect, the United States will reassert and enforce the Monroe Doctrine to restore American preeminence in the Western Hemisphere.” In an effort to lend substance to this absurd claim—or, more simply, to indulge the president’s chronic need for validation—the authors even went so far as to coin the expression “the Trump corollary to the Monroe Doctrine.”

At the beginning of The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte (1852), Marx wrote: “Hegel remarks somewhere that all great world-historic facts and personages appear, so to speak, twice. He forgot to add: the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce.” Twenty years later, in another text devoted to France, Marx observed how the farce of the Second Empire had in turn given rise to what was arguably the greatest tragedy of modern French history: defeat in the war against Prussia and the subsequent unification of Germany.

To describe Donald Trump’s presidency as farcical is not merely an understatement, but nearly redundant. Yet most commentators appear to underestimate the extent to which this farce could devolve into tragedy, not only for the United States but for the world at large.

Just as Louis Bonaparte’s coup d’état was a farce—because France in 1851 was no longer France of 1799, and Louis himself was only a pale shadow of his uncle Napoleon—so too is the so-called “Trump corollary” a farce. We are no longer in 1904, and Trump lacks even the stature to qualify as a pale shadow of President Theodore Roosevelt.

In 1904, Roosevelt appended his corollary to the Monroe Doctrine, asserting the right of the United States to intervene throughout the Western Hemisphere in cases of “flagrant and chronic wrongdoing by a Latin American country.” At that time, however, the United States was, as Secretary of State Richard Olney had declared a few years earlier (in 1895), “practically sovereign on this continent.”

Today, of course, the situation is radically different. In 1904, the United States was an emerging power, at a stage of expansion that today’s China can only dream of, having asserted its hegemony over the entire continent and launched a hostile takeover of the two oceans thanks to its victorious war against Spain in 1898. More than 120 years later, by contrast, it has been a power in relative decline for several decades, in the context of an increasingly multipolar world that has gradually but steadily eroded its room for maneuver.

For those who never believed in the legend of the “unipolar moment,” this comes as no surprise. As early as 1986, the historian Paul Kennedy observed that “decision-makers in Washington must face the awkward and enduring fact that the sum total of the United States’ global interests and obligations is nowadays far larger than the country’s power to defend them all simultaneously.” At the time, the United States attempted in every possible way to limit Japanese and European access to the Latin American subcontinent—but without success.

It was precisely during this so-called “unipolar” moment that the “pink tide” swept across Latin America: a succession of “left-wing” governments, where “left-wing” primarily signified the determination of these countries to choose their own economic and political partners without having to kneel before Washington. Emerging China was particularly well-equipped to exploit these new opportunities, becoming South America’s largest trading partner and the second largest across Latin America as a whole. The European Union also benefited from this context, launching negotiations with Mercosur in 1999 with the objective of gradually reducing import duties on more than 90 percent of goods.

It is true that the United States was complacently resting on its “unipolar” laurels, but to claim, as the NSS document does, that it “neglected” to respond is inaccurate. After establishing the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) with Canada and Mexico in 1994, the Clinton administration launched the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) project—essentially an extension of NAFTA to the entire Western Hemisphere, with the exception of Cuba. Washington’s attempt to use economic integration as a substitute for political influence ultimately collapsed in 2003, as South American countries increasingly asserted their determination to chart their own course.

Today, the Trump administration seeks, by sheer act of will, to restore the status quo ante—that is, the situation prior to the onset of the United States’ relative decline, which is “relative” precisely because it stems not from a slowdown in American growth, but from faster growth among its competitors.

American voluntarism consists of acting without regard for the interests, desires, or sensitivities of other actors in international politics—or in the belief that any resistance can be overcome by twisting the arm of those who dare to oppose it. This is not merely about Venezuela, which at most serves as a mafia-style warning, nor about Cuba, Nicaragua, or even Colombia. It is about the entire American periphery: Mexico, Canada, Greenland, and the rest of Latin America. While these countries recognize that they cannot do without their relationship with the United States, they are certainly not willing to revert to the status quo ante—not only to maintain trade with China or agreements with the European Union, but above all to preserve the political alternatives that Asia and Europe provide as a counterbalance to their cumbersome neighbor.

Not to mention Latin American public opinion, which, however satisfied it may be with the inglorious end of the Venezuelan caudillo, cannot overlook the humiliation inflicted by el imperialismo yanqui, whose contempt has shaped generations.

Then there are the other players, which is where the picture becomes more revealing. As of January 4, Tokyo’s sole response has been to establish a task force to evacuate its 160 citizens in Venezuela. Seoul did the same for its 70 nationals. Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese resorted to the usual bland formula, expressing “support for dialogue between the parties and diplomacy,” while adding, for good measure, his backing for “a democratic transition” in Venezuela. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney went further still, declaring that his government “welcomes [my emphasis] the opportunity for freedom, democracy, peace, and prosperity for the Venezuelan people.”

The EU’s High Representative for Foreign Policy, Kaja Kallas—already known for her impassive response to the subversive impulses toward Europe contained in the NSS document—followed the same path of her Canadian and Australian colleagues, first asserting that “Maduro lacks legitimacy” and then expressing support for a “peaceful transition” and respect for “the principles of international law and the UN Charter.” A little too late, one might say. Keir Starmer struck a similarly cautious note.

A pattern thus emerges among Washington’s so-called “allies”: after a year of erratic attempts to navigate the post-American world, they now find themselves parroting empty diplomatic formulas, careful not to unsettle the unpredictable American driver. The timid caution displayed in response to Washington’s “special military operation” shows that Europeans remain stuck midstream, searching for alternatives while intimidated by the explicit threats in the NSS and, even more, by the action taken against the caudillo of Caracas. In short, the first real test of the so-called coalition of the willing has revealed that their will does not extend very far.

Like all weak people seeking to evade the blows of the bully they face, European leaders try to convince themselves that they are nothing like Maduro and therefore have nothing to fear, conveniently ignoring that the Trump administration has made it clear it wants to replace Starmer with Farage, Macron with Le Pen, and Merz with  the leader of Alternative für Deutschland Alice Weidel.

On the other side, the condemnation from China and Russia has been firm and unequivocal; Beijing and Moscow have acted exactly as everyone could and should have expected. They will undoubtedly reiterate their stern censure if the usual, pointless vote takes place in the Security Council. Yet beyond this predictable diplomatic and rhetorical posturing, it is far from certain that they are as displeased as their words suggest.

To claim that the attack on Venezuela is an indirect attack on China may be true, partially true, or not true at all. The NSS document explicitly states that Washington “will deny non-Hemispheric competitors the ability to position forces or other threatening capabilities, or to own or control strategically vital assets, in our Hemisphere.” Most observers assumed this referred only to China, overlooking the fact that Europe also seeks a privileged relationship with South America. It is worth noting, incidentally, that the actions against Venezuela—and the broader insistence on the “Western Hemisphere” as Washington’s backyard—coincidentally align with the interests of Macron and Meloni, both opponents of the Mercosur agreement.
 
Of course, the main target remains China. Yet this does not necessarily mean that Beijing’s leaders are entirely dissatisfied: the increasingly explicit references to continental spheres of influence could, in fact, represent an acceptable bargain for Xi Jinping and his associates. Relinquishing commercial presence in Latin America in exchange for concessions on Taiwan, the South China Sea, and perhaps more would not, after all, be an unattractive deal. While the NSS document formally rejects such a trade-off, it is a text so full of contradictions that it simultaneously affirms and denies every possibility, leaving the door open to multiple options.

The same logic applies, even more clearly, to Moscow, which, incidentally, has nothing to lose on the American continent. Trading its fragile influence over Cuba and Nicaragua for gains in Ukraine, and perhaps elsewhere, could be a terrific deal for Putin and his associates.

It is far from certain that events will unfold in this way. This is partly because the United States, in addition to lacking principles, no longer has a strategy—or rather, suffers from an excess of poorly aligned strategies. Still, anyone who believes they have nothing to fear simply because they are not like Maduro would be wise to think twice.