Trump took the risk of wielding force, and his decision paid off in military terms. Like Barack Obama, who ordered the Navy SEAL strike in Pakistan in 2011 that killed Osama Bin Laden, he gained the outcome he wanted.
One sign of this success is the way US officials are briefing the media on how they ran the operation so well – for instance, by disclosing that a CIA source was helping from within the Venezuelan government. There is no doubt that the success highlights the US military capacity, with 150 aircraft and thousands of personnel deployed.
And some of the criticism of Trump is grimly laughable. The Kremlin condemned the “unacceptable violation of the sovereignty of an independent state” – as if Russia had merely sent its tourists into Ukraine over the past dozen years.
Trump claimed the US operation was unlike anything seen since World War II.Credit: AP
With Trump, however, it always pays to look past the hype. His opening claim to a press conference on Saturday in Washington (about 3.30am on Sunday, AEDT) was that the Venezuelan assault was unlike anything seen since the Second World War. The supporters behind him nodded proudly as he glossed over the wars in South Korea and Vietnam.
The real test for Trump is what comes next. He has been rightly critical of the US invasion of Iraq, and his MAGA movement favours “America First” rather than “regime change” overseas, but now he pursues a regime change of his own, with only a vague assurance that he and his lieutenants will run Venezuela for an unspecified time.
The objective has a strategic element, in trying to slow the flow of drugs into America, but most of it is nakedly commercial. While other presidents might not have said this out loud, Trump is direct: he wants US control of the Venezuelan oil fields, with US oil companies investing and making money, so that oil production will increase.
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It sounded easy at his press conference. But what if some of the Maduro forces do not want to play along? Rebel leftist groups lasted for five decades in regional Colombia, partly financed by drug money. How often is Trump willing to send troops into Venezuela to assert US power? This undertaking is bigger and riskier than Grenada or Panama.
The Trump administration pitches this as a “law enforcement” operation, but several Latin American leaders are calling it a breach of international law. There is no such criticism from NATO allies; leaders will probably dance around this question to avoid offending Trump.
The broader problem is in the use of American force to control a neighbour. Why should Russian President Vladimir Putin pay any heed to Western complaints about his invasion of Ukraine? Why should Chinese President Xi Jinping listen to criticism of his policy of leaving military options on the table in a takeover of Taiwan.
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Trump looks like he has signed up to the Xi and Putin view of the world: that might is right.
Some of the spin about the Venezuelan operation suggests it will act as a warning to China and Russia – that Trump is showing he is a man of action and is willing to use overwhelming force that others cannot match.
That might even be a good outcome in deterring Xi – if it worked. But why should China shrink at the idea that an American president requires 150 aircraft, several ships and thousands of personnel to extract an unpopular dictator from a poor country next door?
If anything, the lesson for China will be to ignore American rhetoric about sovereignty and increase military capacity so it can be on guard against the use of US force.
This is not an argument for interpreting the military operation in Caracas as a sign that Trump is willing to heighten friction with Beijing or Moscow. In fact, everything Trump does suggests he wants to avoid those tensions.
While he complains about Putin, he cannot find a way to curb the Russian attacks on Ukraine. While he has a tariff war with Xi, he has yet to show he can reverse years of decline in US industrial capacity. Nothing, so far, changes the trajectories of a rising China and a fading America. To be fair, these challenges are so daunting that they might confound any US president.
In his most recent foreign policy forays, Trump has fired missiles into Nigeria and sent special forces into Venezuela. He cannot wield enough influence to get his way with major powers, so he targets smaller ones. The White House spins this as a demonstration of American strength, but those who rule in Moscow and Beijing will not be fooled. Nor should anyone else.
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