Operation “Absolute Resolve” is no more an invasion of Venezuela than the Russian special military operation would be an invasion of Ukraine. It is the normal game played by powers in the face of an existential threat.
Nicolás Maduro is the president of Venezuela, even if the United States and the EU do not recognize him. His status as president did not, therefore, protect him from the indictment he faced in the United States.
Washington had the right to stop Venezuela’s aid to Hezbollah, not because it dislikes the Lebanese Resistance, but because this involved the delivery of drugs to the United States and, therefore, threatened its security.
Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro Moros was abducted by the United States military on January 3, 2026, and transported to New York, where he was charged with narco-terrorism and cocaine importation into the United States.
To analyze this news, we must avoid the usual interpretations prevalent in Latin America. This abduction is not necessarily related to the traditional conflict between the children of indigenous peoples and those of colonizers, nor to Roosevelt’s corollary to the Monroe Doctrine, nor to the struggle for oil.
I will base my remarks on my knowledge of this country. I was a personal friend of President Hugo Chávez Frías (who died in 2013). Contrary to what is said, I don’t think Maduro is a “Chávez supporter,” even if he was in the past.
In 2017, Nicolás Maduro invited me to Caracas for a meeting of intellectuals, one of many he organized. I went, not for the meeting itself, but to give a lecture to the military high command. At the time, the Straussian Elliott Abrams was preparing an invasion of Venezuela. He had been tasked by President Donald Trump, then in his first term, with handling the Venezuelan issue. I wanted to organize a visit by senior officers from that country to Syria so they could see firsthand the methods used by the Pentagon with the jihadists. Within a few hours, I realized that the intellectuals invited by Nicolás Maduro understood absolutely nothing about the current geopolitical situation. President Maduro’s entourage then prevented me from speaking with the military leadership. I met with numerous diplomats and officers, all of whom struck me as highly competent and dissatisfied with the president. I met him and felt like I was speaking to an actor, not a politician. This visit led nowhere.
Who is Nicolás Maduro?
Nicolás Maduro is a union leader who fought alongside Hugo Chávez. He became president because Chávez’s Cuban doctors claimed that he had designated him as his successor on his deathbed. At the time, he was vice president, representing a faction within his party. There are no witnesses to this. But the “Chávez supporters” did not dare challenge Cuba, the revolutionaries’ point of reference. They obeyed and elected him. Although not a charismatic figure, he has proven effective in many areas, including law enforcement tactics.
Yet his country has sunk into crisis. He left the oil infrastructure in ruins and did nothing to rebuild it. Prices have continued to climb, with inflation reaching 130,000% in 2018. Feeding oneself has become difficult. Millions of Venezuelans have emigrated, or even fled, their country. Some have returned later, but the majority has remained abroad. He then liberalized the economy and established casinos. This country, where Hugo Chávez had fostered a sense of national identity, had taught literacy even in the most remote villages, had created a genuine healthcare system, and had established a level of equality that existed nowhere else in Latin America, has become, under his presidency, a haven for all kinds of traffickers and has experienced an explosion of social inequality. Many long-time Chávez supporters have gradually distanced themselves from Maduro.
Nicolás Maduro established a police state, issuing identity cards, the “Carnet de la Patria” (Fatherland Cards), and linking the granting of social assistance to political affiliation. The years 2017-2019 were marked by a brutal repression of domestic terrorism. Law enforcement agencies practiced torture, without it being clear whether this was on personal initiative or part of state policy. In 2020, during the first Trump presidency, Nicolás Maduro was indicted in the United States for narco-terrorism; a paradox, given that Chávez’s Venezuela had been declared by the United Nations a “drug-free state.”
What is Operation Absolute Resolve?
We don’t know much about the United States’ Operation Absolute Resolve. We only know what they choose to tell us, without any means of verification.
What we do know is that they orchestrated a massive power outage and the bombing of seven military facilities in or near the capital, while an airborne team infiltrated the presidential residence and arrested Nicolás Maduro and his wife, lawyer Cilia Flores, former president of the National Assembly, as they were getting out of bed.
The only reported gunfire was exchanged between the presidential guard and US commandos. This guard was composed entirely of Cubans. Venezuelan forces, for their part, offered no resistance, suggesting that the army was complicit in the US attack.
This was in no way an invasion of Venezuela, nor a regime change.
Did the United States violate international law?
Most commentators claim that the United States violated international law. This is a misuse of language. International law is not a legal code. It has no universal rules. It has no police force, no courts, no prisons. It is a series of commitments that are binding only on those who subscribe to them.
However, for the United States—as for the European Union—it was Edmundo González Urrutia, not Nicolás Maduro Moros, who was elected in 2024. This election was highly contested, and not without reason. Nevertheless, it is undeniable that Maduro has a majority in his country [1].
While from a Venezuelan perspective, the United States removed their elected president, from an American perspective, Washington merely removed a drug trafficker who was also a usurper of the presidency.
Therefore, there is no violation of international law, but rather a conflict between two points of view.
Who is Delcy Rodríguez?
Vice President Delcy Rodríguez Gómez is the daughter of revolutionary leader Jorge Antonio Rodríguez, who was tortured to death by Venezuelan police in 1976. Very close to Hugo Chávez, she worked with him in his government, holding positions in the Intelligence Service and the government secretariat. In 2002, President Hugo Chávez sent her to Europe, specifically to meet me. It was at that time that I got to know her and came to appreciate her.
Her brother, Jorge Rodríguez Gómez, was vice president under Chávez and is currently president of the National Assembly.
In the 2020s, Delcy Rodríguez clashed with the Syrian-Venezuelan Vice President Tareck el-Aissami, who had been indicted by the United States at the same time as Nicolás Maduro. El-Aissami was accused of corruption by the United States for providing passports to militants of the Lebanese Hezbollah and to Syrian figures, including President Bashar al-Assad and members of his family. He ultimately resigned in 2023 and was arrested in 2024 by prosecutor Tarek William Saab, brother of the Venezuelan ambassador to Damascus. Venezuelan authorities accused him of organizing a network of officials to embezzle public funds to finance election campaigns. Personal enrichment was never alleged.
Although she greeted me kindly during my 2017 trip, she did not grant me a private audience, likely due to the conflict with Tareck el-Aissami.
During Nicolás Maduro’s kidnapping, Delcy Rodríguez was immediately considered the likely interim president.
During the crisis with Tareck el-Aissami, she clashed with Diosdado Cabello, who was also indicted in the United States in 2020, along with Nicolás Maduro. Cabello is the strongman of Chavismo. He would have succeeded Hugo Chávez had it not been for the testimony of his Cuban doctors.
Does the “Los Soles” cartel exist?
On July 25, the United States designated the “Los Soles” cartel as responsible for drug trafficking and accused Nicolás Maduro of being its leader.
Drug market experts unanimously agree that this cartel does not exist. The term refers to a group of high-ranking officers known by the stars (los soles) on their uniforms.
These officers allegedly established a drug trafficking network to finance the Lebanese Resistance. In fact, in Lebanon, Hezbollah does not cultivate drugs but collects zakat from local drug lords. Zakat is the equivalent of a tax that Muslims give to charities of their choosing.
It is important to understand that the majority of Latin American governments are involved in drug trafficking. It is the primary source of illicit income. Until now, the United States chose the cartels it worked with and waged a ruthless war against the others. For example, the Colombian Pablo Escobar initially worked with them before allying himself with left-wing revolutionaries and becoming the DEA’s Public Enemy Number One.
In 2000, I was Secretary General of the World Anti-Prohibition League, an organization comprised of, among others, more than 500 parliamentarians and over 20 Nobel laureates. I assessed the scourge that creates narco-states and the ineffectiveness of the wars on drugs. The only way to rebuild healthy societies is to educate populations to control their addictions. President Trump’s efforts will therefore amount to very little, even if he succeeds in improving political relations between Latin America and the Middle East.
Are We Witnessing the Return of Empires?
Most commentators are speculating about a possible return of empires. According to them, Donald Trump has just invaded Venezuela, just as Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine, and Xi Jinping is about to do the same to Taiwan. This shows a complete misunderstanding of what is happening: President Trump did not invade Venezuela, but extracted a drug trafficker; President Putin did not invade Ukraine, but implemented the Minsk agreements and UN Security Council Resolution 2202; as for President Xi, he has pledged never to invade Taiwan unless it declares its independence.
This is indeed a new historical period, the creation of a multipolar world, not a resurgence of empires. Multipolarity, however, presupposes the restoration of international law and therefore the abolition of the international rules imposed during the Cold War and after the dissolution of the USSR by the United States and the G7.
Source: Voltaire Network
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