Maduro & the Monroe Doctrine Redux

The US operation in Venezuela underscores doctrine-backed regime change without prolonged military entanglement.

- Wajahat Qazi

Three themes coalesce in the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. One is the Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA).

This pertains to the remarkable and efficient reserve of hard power that the United States possesses. Because of RMA, the US military was able to ‘take out’ Maduro without resistance.

To employ a boxing metaphor, a ‘knockout’ blow was delivered that incapacitated Venezuela’s military capabilities.

Two, the ‘takeover’ of Venezuela appears to be a corollary or a clear instance of the US National Security document.

The document made it clear that the US, under Trump, would orient itself toward Latin America through the grid of the ‘Monroe Doctrine’.

Three, power is the ultima ratio of world politics and international relations.

International law, no matter its philosophical and jurisprudential elan, remains a weak scaffolding for either. This is to state the obvious.

The ‘how’ of Maduro’s capture raises an important set of questions.

No matter a given country’s hard power capabilities, its technological sophistication, and elan, Human Intelligence (HUMINT) is the sine qua non of a successful operation.

While The New York Times claims that a CIA team had been clandestinely operating in Venezuela since August 2025, mostly to track Maduro’s movements, this alone cannot be enough.