cross-posted from: https://sh.itjust.works/post/52511055
The escalation of threats to Venezuela by United States President Donald Trump may be easy to dismiss as one of his random whims, but it is too closely linked to major confrontations to be seen as a regional affair with limited impact on the rest of the world.
Venezuela is turning into a bargaining chip in the game of global superpowers, along with Ukraine.
Not a major power at all, Venezuela still matters globally – not only as a country with the world’s largest proven oil reserves, but also as a political ally of China, Iran and Russia – countries the US-led West sees as its archrivals. Of these three, Russia is the one which finds itself in the most delicate position when it comes to Venezuela. The US-driven escalation poses risks for the Kremlin, but there are also potential gains to be made.
The main factor is the unexpected thaw which happened in relations between the US and Russia during Trump’s second term as president.
Since Putin’s ascent to power in 2000, the Kremlin has seen the US first as an unreliable partner, then as a full-fledged adversary with an ambition to divide and rule in the ex-Soviet neighbourhood.
But it all suddenly went back to a partnership of sorts when Trump returned to the White House at the beginning of 2025. The US all but terminated its financial aid to Ukraine and adopted the posture of near-neutrality, though it still supplies crucial intelligence to the Ukrainian army. In the latest iteration of its National Security Strategy, the US even dropped Russia from the list of “direct threats”.
There is also the aspect of cynical political calculation. The geopolitical gains from the US launching a military attack on Venezuela potentially exceed the losses.
That is because it would put Russia and the US on an equal moral footing with regard to the war in Ukraine. If the US can dictate its will by means of military aggression in what Americans call “their backyard”, then why can Russia not do the same in its own? The US aggression in Venezuela would justify Russian aggression in Ukraine in the eyes of many, especially in the Global South. Handily for the Kremlin, it would also sow further divisions between the US and Europe as well as feed polarisation within the US itself.
If, in addition to Venezuela, the Trump administration presses forward with its irrational desire to occupy Greenland, the situation would be ideal for the Kremlin. It may even open avenues for post-Ukraine rapprochement with the EU-led part of Europe, currently its main global nemesis.
Generally, the Russians see themselves as the keepers of the old order, ultimate foreign policy conservatives. They see the US-led West as a revisionist force responsible for undoing the post-World War II order and see the war in Ukraine as a way of countering that revision.
But, as their thinking goes, if there is no return to the old order, for which the West is to blame, let us negotiate a new one: an order in which the US does as it pleases in its Western hemisphere, and Russia retains influence over the ex-Soviet neighbourhood.
Of course they will. Our Orange Shitpile Russian President only helps his Mother Russia second to himself.