Why Did Trump Send his Warships to Venezuela?

Trump aboard the aircraft carrier USS George H.W. Bush, October 5, 2025 -- public domain image

By Vijay Prashad

Ever since Hugo Chávez came to power in 1998, the United States has attempted  to overthrow the Bolivarian Revolution. They have tried everything short of a full-scale military invasion: a military coup, selecting a substitute president, cutting off access to the global financial system, imposing layers of sanctions, sabotaging the electricity grid, sending in mercenaries, and attempting to assassinate  its leaders. If you can think of a method  to overthrow a government, the United States has likely tried it against Venezuela.

However, in 2025, the escalation became unmistakable. The U.S. sent its warships to patrol Venezuela’s coast, began sinking small boats and killing those on board as they left the South American mainland, and seized an oil tanker bound for Cuba. The quantity of attacks on Venezuela has increased, suggesting the quality of the threats has now reached a different magnitude. It feels as if the United States is preparing for a full-blown invasion of the country.

Donald Trump came to office saying that he was opposed to military interventions that did not further U.S. interests, which is why he called the illegal U.S. war on Iraq a waste of  “blood and treasure”. This does not mean Trump is against the use of the U.S. military —he deployed it in Afghanistan (remember the “Mother of all Bombs”) and Yemen, and has fully backed the U.S./Israeli genocide against the Palestinians. His formula is not for or against war categorically, but about what the U.S. would gain from it. With Iraq, he stated  that the problem was not the war itself, but the failure to seize Iraqi oil. Had the U.S. taken Iraq’s oil, Trump would likely have been in Baghdad, ready to build —with Iraqi treasure— a Trump hotel on one of the former presidential properties.

Naturally, the U.S. military buildup in the Caribbean is about Venezuelan oil —the largest known reserves in the world. The U.S.-backed politician, Maria Corina Machado —awarded  the Nobel Peace Prize in 2025 after supporting the Israeli genocide and calling for a U.S. invasion of her own country—, is on record promising to open up her country’s resources to foreign capital. She would welcome the extraction of Venezuela’s wealth rather than allow its social wealth to better the lives of its own people, as is the goal of the Bolivarian Revolution started by Hugo Chávez. A President Machado would immediately surrender any claim to the Essequibo region and grant ExxonMobil full command of Venezuela’s oil reserves. This is certainly the prize.

But it is not the immediate spur. A close reading of the 2025 National Security Strategy of the United States shows that there is a renewed emphasis on the Western Hemisphere. The Trump Corollary to the 1823 Monroe Doctrine is clear: the Western Hemisphere must be under U.S. control, and the United States will do what it takes to ensure that only pro-U.S. politicians hold power. It is worth reading that section of the National Security Strategy:

“After years of neglect, the United States will reassert and enforce the Monroe Doctrine to restore American pre-eminence in the Western Hemisphere, and to protect our homeland and our access to key geographies throughout the region. We 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. This ‘Trump Corollary’ to the Monroe Doctrine is a common-sense and potent restoration of American power and priorities, consistent with American security interests.”

When Argentina faced local elections, Trump warned that the U.S. would cut off external financing if candidates opposing pro-U.S. President Javier Milei lost. In Honduras, Trump intervened directly to oppose the Libre Party, even offering to release a convicted drug trafficker (and former President). The United States is moving aggressively because it has accurately assessed the weakness of the Pink Tide and the strength of a new, far-right “Angry Tide.” The emergence of right-wing governments across South America, Central America, and the Caribbean has emboldened the U.S. to squeeze Venezuela and thereby weaken Cuba —the two major poles of the Latin American left. Overturning these revolutionary processes would allow a full-scale Monroe Doctrine domination of  Latin America and the Caribbean.

Since the 1990s, the United States began to speak of Latin America as a partner for shared prosperity, emphasizing globalisation over direct control. Now, the language has changed. As the Trump Corollary asserts: “We want a Hemisphere that remains free of hostile foreign incursion or ownership of key assets and that supports critical supply chains…We want to ensure our continued access to key strategic locations.” Latin America is seen as a battlefield for geopolitical competition against China and a source of threats like immigration and drug trafficking. The attack on Venezuela and Cuba is not merely an assault on these two countries; it is the opening salvo of direct U.S. intervention on behalf of the Angry Tide. This will not deliver better lives for the population, but greater wealth for U.S. corporations and the oligarchies of Latin America.

Trump is ready to revive the belief that any problem can be solved by military force, even when other tools exist. The Trump Corollary promises to use its “military system superior to any country in the world” to steal the hemisphere’s resources.

The aggression against Venezuela is not a war against Venezuela alone. It is a war against all of Latin America.

Vijay Prashad is an Indian historian, editor, and journalist. He is a writing fellow and chief correspondent at Globetrotter. He is an editor of LeftWord Books and the director of Tricontinental: Institute for Social Research. He has written more than 20 books, including The Darker Nations and The Poorer Nations. His latest books are On Cuba: Reflections on 70 Years of Revolution and Struggle (with Noam Chomsky), Struggle Makes Us Human: Learning from Movements for Socialism, and (also with Noam Chomsky) The Withdrawal: Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan, and the Fragility of US Power. Chelwa and Prashad will publish How the International Monetary Fund is Suffocating Africa later this year with Inkani Books.

This article was produced by Globetrotter.