Riccardo Perissich / Jan 2026
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Trump’s initiative in Venezuela provides a useful starting point for assessing the effective practical scope of the new National Security Strategy published by the U.S. administration. First of all, it concretely confirms that its main priority is strengthening American control over the Western Hemisphere, and Latin America in particular. The objective of this new “Monroe Doctrine” is twofold: on the one hand, to exclude potentially hostile foreign political and economic influences from the continent; on the other, to control and exploit natural resources, especially hydrocarbons. All of this is pursued with complete indifference to the democratic or non-democratic nature of the governments expected to comply with Washington’s wishes.
The imperial project and its contradictions
Stated in these terms, this amounts to a perfectly clear neo-colonial or imperial project. Experience teaches us, however, that imperial adventures do not bring only glory and advantages to their initiators; they also entail great risks and considerable sacrifices. They are collective endeavors that, to succeed, must rest on a shared national narrative. Virgil, the bard of Rome’s imperial destiny, was more popular than the anti-imperialist Tacitus. More recently, figures such as Kipling, Jules Ferry, or Carl Schmitt struck very sensitive chords in public opinion. The same applies to the ideologues surrounding Putin today, as well as to the “neoconservatives” who made the export of democracy America’s great mission.
Yet Trump was elected in part because he made himself the spokesman for an unreserved critique of the disastrous failure of the Afghan and Iraqi adventures. This shift in the vision of relations between America and the world had already begun under Obama, and today it brings together not only many of the tribes that make up the heterogeneous MAGA electorate, but also part of the Democratic electorate. It is hard to imagine a new Tennyson capable of captivating today’s Americans with the equivalent of “The Charge of the Light Brigade.”
For the new version of imperialism to be accepted by public opinion, it must therefore be “cost-free politically” and involve no lasting military commitment. The assumption is thus that the country being asked to behave in a certain way will submit to American demands in the face of the mere deployment of the immense power of the United States, or a minimal exercise of it. The problem is that the more extreme these demands become and the further they drift from accepted international norms, the less the United States will be able to avoid a new massive and lasting recourse to force.
The coming weeks will indicate what meaning Trump intends to give to the project of “running” Venezuela. The first indications show that his intention is to rely on elements of the Maduro regime. The operation is, however, very risky. The disastrous state in which Venezuela finds itself after decades of chavista dictatorship is well known, as is the condition of the oil industry. Such a project would have required months of meticulous preparation, which does not appear to have been the case. A miracle is possible, but it is difficult to imagine that Washington could, in a very short time, produce a convincing recovery and reform plan and, above all, that the remnants of the Maduro administration would be capable of implementing it. The same applies to the oil sector, where American companies will need substantial incentives and guarantees to return to a context from which they were brutally excluded several decades ago. If all this does not quickly produce visible beneficial effects for the population, there is reason to fear that social and political tensions will resume, rendering the situation ungovernable.
Responsibility would inevitably fall on the United States, which could then be forced into a new intervention, this time a lasting one. Yet this is the opposite of what Trump promises Americans.
Similar considerations apply to the rest of the continent, given that it is unlikely Trump’s action will be limited to Venezuela. It is true that in Latin America the wind is currently blowing in favour of governments more friendly to America—Argentina or Chile come to mind, even if Mexico and Brazil remind us that the trend is not uniform. This does not change the fact that the entire continent is prey to structural imbalances, traditional poor governance, and social tensions whose difficulties of management will directly spill over onto America. All of this takes place in a context of deep and historical anti-Americanism that pervades the continent, and which Russian and Chinese propaganda will not fail to actively encourage. For if Moscow and Beijing can do nothing to counter the new “Monroe Doctrine,” they can do much to sabotage its implementation.
A new global Yalta?
The difficulties associated with the hypothesis of a new imperial project encourage another thesis: that Trump’s objective would be to propose to China and Russia a new “global Yalta,” a division of spheres of influence. This very idea, however, requires a certain symmetry in a stabilized balance of power and mutual recognition. The Yalta that put an end to the world war was based on the situation created on the ground by the events of the war. Today, the situation is very different. Recognizing an American sphere of influence over the Western Hemisphere costs China and Russia very little, since they are in any case not in a position to counter Trump’s projects. Russia will be forced to endure the end of its political influence over certain countries, but this influence was already very compromised. China will have to limit its economic ambitions, while knowing that it cannot be completely excluded from the continent.
The situation in Asia and Europe is entirely different. America is perfectly capable of countering Russian and Chinese expansionism. The recognition of spheres of influence, whatever their scope, would therefore imply concessions on the part of the United States without any real counterpart. This would have the consequence not only of weakening its authority and credibility among its allies as well as among non-aligned countries, but also of doing so in a context in which the possibility of new conflicts and claims would remain high. Moreover, it is hard to see how this process could exclude Africa, a continent for which a new race for influence would then open up. A situation very far removed from the relative stability that was guaranteed by the Yalta we once knew. In essence, America would weaken its moral authority, renouncing a “soft power” it had successfully claimed in the past—even if it was not always exercised consistently—without obtaining in return any genuine security guarantees.
Europe in the crosshairs
This brings us to conclude this analysis by assessing the implications for Europe, which is subject to multiple pressures and perhaps facing the most difficult existential challenge of the past 80 years. First, the heavy blow dealt by Trump to the remnants of the multilateral system that the United States created with our help after the Second World War and that Europeans had turned into a quasi-identitarian cause. This forces us to rethink our vision of the world and of international relations. Second, the pressure to accept a conclusion to the war in Ukraine on terms that many judge too favourable to Putin—a pressure that Europeans have nevertheless managed to resist with some success so far, even if it is too early to draw definitive conclusions.
Third, strategic pressure is compounded by a confrontation that can only be described as ideological. Part of the Trumpian world, whose most visible representative is Vice President Vance, openly accuses Europe of political and moral decadence, even of betraying “Western values.” An accusation accompanied by open support for far-right movements. What is surprising about this position is not only its contradiction with the declared desire to exclude values from America’s strategic priorities, but above all its ideological similarity to that of Putin. The truth is that this double attack, beyond its identical content, probably also has the same motivation.
In essence, the European model of liberal democracy constitutes a dangerous risk for the ideological foundations of the Putin system, but also for the evolution that some describe as “post-liberal” or “Christian nationalist,” which is promoted by part of the MAGA movement. Its supporters in Washington may, however, be in for an unpleasant surprise.
In a context of growing anti-Americanism, also present in Europe, part of the extremist forces, both on the right and on the left, will in fact feel much closer to Putin than to Trump. Finally, there is the novelty constituted by the revival, in particularly violent terms, of the claim over Greenland.
It is too early to formulate a complete analysis on this subject. One can nonetheless observe that we are confronted with a perverse paradox. On the one hand, if there is a case where potential convergence is obvious, it is precisely this one. Given Greenland’s strategic importance and its immense, difficult-to-exploit raw material potential, common sense and shared interest would indeed suggest increased cooperation between Europe and the United States. On the contrary, framing the issue in terms of sovereignty, as Trump does, makes compromise impossible and leads directly to conflict. As the Danish Prime Minister rightly pointed out, Trump’s resort to force would have unpredictable and devastating effects on NATO and transatlantic relations. Under these conditions, Europeans, aware of the impossibility of resisting a military attack, have no choice but to seek by all available means to increase the internal and external political price Trump would have to pay if he wanted to resort to force—through diplomacy, but also by strengthening their presence on the territory. This is, moreover, what the first measures taken seem to indicate.
As Brecht wrote, “Happy are the peoples who have no need of heroes.”
The French text of this article can be found on the Telios website.
