The U.S. military operation in Caracas and the seizure of Nicolás Maduro, the sitting President of Venezuela, is casting a long international shadow. We asked leading analysts in Washington, D.C. to assess the global implications. Central to their assessment is the emergence of a resurrected, more aggressive Monroe Doctrine—a policy some are now branding the “Donroe Doctrine.”
Spheres of Influence: The Kremlin’s “Green Light”
The Trump administration’s return to a world of explicit spheres of influence is being viewed in Moscow with a mixture of opportunistic glee and strategic caution.
Paul Goble, a veteran analyst of Eurasian affairs and former special adviser to the State Department, notes that the Kremlin is “delighted” by this shift. For decades, Russia has sought a “near abroad” where its authority is absolute. “The Kremlin is confident this will allow Russia to demand a similar carte blanche in Ukraine,” Goble says. However, he warns that the U.S. demand for exclusive regional control—effectively squeezing Russia out of the Western hemisphere—will still trigger defiance and pushback.
Angela Stent of the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) echoed this development in a recent brief on AEI.org. She argues that by reasserting U.S. dominance so aggressively, Trump has inadvertently strengthened Vladimir Putin’s hand. “It will reassert Russia’s right to dominate its sphere of influence… and it will have reduced incentives to make concessions on Ukraine,” she maintained.
Daniel Hamilton, a non-resident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State, points out a striking rhetorical irony: Trump’s “extraordinary military operation” in Caracas sounds uncomfortably similar to Putin’s “special military operation” in Kyiv. Hamilton suggests Moscow may quietly welcome the move, as it validates the premise that “big powers can intervene in the affairs of small powers.”
William LeoGrande, Professor of Government at American University, tells us that Russia has viewed Eastern Europe as its “near abroad” for nearly a century as a buffer against Western encroachment. “By President Trump embracing the idea of spheres of influence, it implicitly legitimizes the argument Russia has used to justify its invasion of Ukraine,” LeoGrande stresses.
The Shredding of International Norms
While Hamilton notes that “no one is shedding a tear for Maduro,” he argues the illegality of the seizure makes it nearly impossible for the U.S. to condemn Russian aggression on legal grounds. “Ignoring international law simply opens opportunities to those who have never believed in it anyway.”
Ignoring international law simply opens opportunities to those who have never believed in it anyway.”
Goble is even more blunt, suggesting the U.S. has taken a “final plunge” into a purely transactional world. “Trump doesn’t appear interested in condemning Moscow anytime soon,” Goble observes, leaving it to Congress to “take up the slack.”
Professor LeoGrande adds that the attack on Venezuela undercuts any future Washington critique of Russia on either “moral or legal grounds.”
NATO and the “Greenland Crisis”
Perhaps most alarming for European allies is how the intervention in Venezuela has bled into the Greenland Crisis. By framing Greenland as part of the Western hemisphere—and thus subject to U.S. “regional primacy”—the administration has pushed NATO to the brink of a terminal rift.
“I have concluded that Trump is using his Greenland aspirations to divide and destroy NATO,” Goble says, “something Moscow has always wanted.”
While Hamilton hopes that existing U.S.-Greenland-Denmark frameworks might provide a “sovereignty-sharing” exit ramp, the rhetoric from Mar-a-Lago suggests a more aggressive path. If the U.S. treats a Danish territory with the same “Absolute Resolve” shown in Caracas, the very concept of Article 5 collective defense may collapse.
No one can trust that the United States under Trump will abide by Article 5 guarantees.
LeoGrande is direct: the mere suggestion that the U.S. might use force to seize the territory of a NATO ally is a severe blow to the alliance. “No one can trust that the United States under Trump will abide by Article 5 guarantees. The blow would only be fatal if Trump were to actually attack Greenland.”
The Fate of the “Frontier States”
For non-NATO states like Georgia and Moldova, the Maduro raid signals a potential end to Western protection. In a 19th-century-style world of spheres of influence, these “frontier states” risk being traded away.
Goble observes that their situation is now “roughly comparable” to those already under the Russian shadow. By reclaiming the Western Hemisphere as a private U.S. playground, Washington has signaled to Putin that Eastern Europe is his for the taking—a “victory Russia doesn’t deserve,” but one the new Washington doctrine seems prepared to grant.
Stent wonders whether the Venezuela operation will usher in a new “Yalta system” of the kind Putin admires. She concludes, “The Kremlin is hoping that it will… and that Trump will accept its right to subjugate Ukraine as the administration continues to press for a quick end to that war.”
