Era of 'Putinisation' Trump is no longer bending rules, he is demolishing them

Hardly anyone expected 2026 to be a year of peace, and it was barely two days old when the worst fears were confirmed.

- Julian Borger

The overnight strikes on Venezuela, the abduction of its leader, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife, and Donald Trump's declaration that the US would "run" the country and sell its oil have driven another truck through international law and global norms. But that is not even the most concerning thing about it.

Trump has been driving convoys of bulldozers through that increasingly fragile edifice since taking office nearly a year ago, and now it is mostly wreckage. The events overnight were preceded by airstrikes on small boats in the seas off Central America and the killing of their crews based on unproven allegations of drug trafficking and the armed seizure of Venezuelan oil tankers on the high seas. It is not yet known how many people were killed in the seizure of Maduro in the early hours of Saturday.

In terms of global stability, the worst thing about the Maduro rendition is that it worked.

Trump's belief in his own global omnipotence, and his desire to grab the territory and natural resources of other countries, has been held in check until now by his fear of entanglement in foreign wars. He claimed (falsely) to have ended eight wars, and his greatest ambition in 2025 seemed to be winning the Nobel peace prize. Less than a month ago he was brandishing a hastily confected substitute, the Fifa peace prize. That act of self-abasement by world football's governing body looks even more absurd now than it did when Trump grabbed the medal and put it around his own neck.