A Cynic’s Argument for Intervention in Venezuela
We have a moral imperative to help the people of Venezuela
I am a cynic about the Trump administration’s motives in Venezuela. In fact, I am a life-long cynic regarding American foreign interference in general. But the very real Venezuelan revolution currently engaged in an existential fight against the brutal regime of Nicolas Maduro will not succeed without international pressure and considerable support. We have a moral obligation to provide that support in a compassionate manner to a people who have suffered greatly.
John Bolton (whom has never met a regime change he didn’t like) hardly inspires confidence and point-man Elliot Abrams has spent more time destroying democracy than creating it, but we can not let the Trump team decide the fate of the Venezuelan people unilaterally nor leave them unaided. The world must act. Maduro is a dictator in the classic sense. From ruthlessly expunging his political enemies to robbing the oil-wealth of Venezuela in order to bribe his military officials, his government is best described as a murderous kleptocracy.
Some opponents of this idea argue that Maduro is a legitimately elected leader and thus should be left alone. He is not. Maduro banned leading opposition figures, including Henrique Capriles Radonski, from running in the 2018 elections, and simply incarcerated the majority of opposition leaders during the 2017 protests. Even under such favorable circumstances, multiple sources claim that Maduro had to resort to fraud to win a mandate for a second term.
What the Venezuelan people desperately need is coordinated action of the sort which brought South African Apartheid to its knees. The solution must be peaceful, coordinated by the international community and it must put maximum pressure on Maduro and minimum suffering on the Venezuelan people. This can be achieved through economic and diplomatic pressure while simultaneously calling for new elections.
Much like in South Africa in the 90’s, a protracted military struggle is not a possibility. Padraig O’Malley, a historian on the collapse of that immoral government writes “Once both sides came to realize that the one could not hold on to power through its repressive security policies and the other recognized that it could not seize power through an armed “liberation” struggle the options for both became more narrow and more importantly, more crystallized.” It’s almost as if he were speaking of contemporary Venezuela.
Multiple experts have pointed out that military intervention would grossly exacerbate the tensions in the region and galvanize support among Maduro’s die-hard supporters, particularly among his paramilitary groups. Civil war would help none of the parties involved, neither bringing relief to a horribly repressed and hungry people, nor stability to the region.
15 months ago, I came to the border of Venezuela to cover the mass-exodus of 3.5 million Venezuelans from their homeland. I spoke with hundreds of Venezuelans fleeing into Colombia about their opinions and their hopes.
And while I transcribed the stories of violence, of corruption, of widespread hunger, and government censorship, of forced disappearances and of political arrests, I began to realize that the scope of the oppression and suffering occurring within that blighted nation was widely unreported outside of Latin America. In US media we occasionally saw blips about corrupt elections or heard Venezuela mentioned by right-leaning economists as a Socialist boogey-man, but there was little real attention paid. Protests in 2014 and 2017 generated a few headlines due to their bloody outcomes, but that was about it.
That all changed on January 23rd. When the Trump administration recognized Juan Guiado as interim president of Venezuela, the story catapulted into international headlines. Since then a host of other countries have followed suit, with the majority of the European Union announcing support Monday.
And I find myself talking with Venezuelans who have hope for the first time in their lives that the tyrannical government of Maduro might finally fall.
This revolution is not a “US backed coup” as Maduro would have you believe. It is a revolution of the Venezuelan people against a government that has violently stamped them into the ground for years in a cynical effort to enrich themselves.
When the Venezuelan people took to the streets Jan 23rd, I could think only of the violent repression they faced when they attempted the same in 2014 and 2017. I saw a starving and courageous people taking a stand in a manner that Maduro would be unable to censor. And I saw a people who knew full well that the response from Maduro and his forces would be bloody.
Venezuela faces a multitude of complex problems that need to be resolved in order for a new government to be successful. The Venezuelan military is integral to propping up Maduro. Is it possible to convince them to form a new government that isn’t simply another sieve for Venezuelan oil-wealth into the hands of the elite? And is it possible to provide support in a manner that doesn’t escalate tensions into a full-blown civil war?
Yes. And the first step in that process is to continue to apply international pressure while providing avenues for foreign humanitarian aid in a manner that isn’t a cynical attempt to provoke a response from an increasingly cornered and desperate Maduro.
The Venezuelan opponents of intervention like to sarcastically joke that “Surely the gringos are only interested in the arepas.” They assume, quite rightfully, that the Trump administration has motives beyond simply promoting democracy. As we have seen, Trump has proven willing more than once to turn a blind eye to the horrific actions of regimes he finds convenient allies.
But the international community has a chance to demonstrate that it can act together in a way that allows the Venezuelan people to both achieve democracy and to benefit from their country’s vast oil wealth for the first time ever. Or we could validate the cynics of the world and display the self-interested imperialism that so many have grown tired of.
The choice rests in our hands. I for one believe that the Venezuelan people deserve the former. And I believe if we do it carefully, we can surprise even the cynics such as myself.
Muros Invisibles is a journalistic organization focused immigration and the situation in Venezuela. For more stories you can look here: www.murosinvisibles.com
