Latin America is the region of open veins. Everything, from the discovery
until our times, has always been transmuted into European— or later United
States— capital, and as such has accumulated in distant centers of power.
Everything: the soil, its fruits and its mineral-rich depths, the people and their
capacity to work and to consume, natural resources and human resources.
Production methods and class structure have been successively determined
from outside for each area by meshing it into the universal gearbox of
capitalism…For those who see history as a competition, Latin America’s backwardness
and poverty are merely the result of its failure. We lost; others won. But the
winners happen to have won thanks to our losing: the history of Latin
America’s underdevelopment is, as someone has said, an integral part of the
history of world capitalism’s development. Our defeat was always implicit in
the victory of others; our wealth has always generated our poverty by
nourishing the prosperity of others — the empires and their native overseers.Eduardo Galeano, The Open Veins of Latin America
These two paragraphs, taken from page two of Galeano’s 1971 classic, pretty much sum up the basic argument of The Open Veins of Latin America: what should have been a source of great strength for the region — its vast wealth of natural, mineral and energy resources — became its greatest curse.
It is an argument that is hard to argue with: as Galeano asserts, since Columbus’ first voyage over 500 years ago, Latin America has always served the economic interests of an imperial metropole — first Madrid and Lisbon, then Paris and London, and finally Washington.
By contrast, the 13 colonies to the far north had been blessed with “no gold or silver, no Indian civilizations with dense concentrations of people already organized for work, no fabulously fertile tropical soil on the coastal fringe. It was an area where both nature and history had been miserly: both metals and the slave labor to wrest it from the ground were missing. These colonists were lucky.” (p.133)
In April 2009, during the Fifth Summit of the Americas held in Port of Spain, Venezuela’s former President Hugo Chávez gave President Barrack Obama a copy of the book. Obama had only been president for about 100 days and perhaps Chávez had hoped that Obama actually meant what he said about hope and change.
Presumably, Obama didn’t read the book. If he had, he probably wouldn’t have issued a presidential order in 2015 declaring the situation in Venezuela an “unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States” and ordering sanctions against seven Venezuelan officials. In the years to follow, particularly after Trump’s election in 2018, escalating US sanctions would cripple Venezuela’s economy.
However, in the past two and a half decades, something else has happened: China went global. At the turn of the century, as Washington was shifting its attention and resources away from its immediate neighbourhood to the Middle East, where it squandered trillions spreading mayhem and death, China began snapping up Latin American resources.
Governments across the region, from Brazil to Venezuela, to Ecuador and Argentina, took a leftward turn and began working together across various fora. The commodity supercycle was born. Unlike the US, China generally does not try to dictate how its trading partners should behave and what sorts of rules, norms, principles and ideology they should adhere to.
In Latin America and the Caribbean it has worked a treat. China’s trade with the region grew over 40-fold between 2000 and 2024, from $12 billion to $515 billion. Also during this time, with the US distracted by war in the Middle East and Eastern Europe, Latin America suffered somewhat less meddling from the US.
Now, however, as the US retrenches from some of its commitments further afield, or at least tries/pretends to, the Trump administration is looking for peoples, resources and markets closer to home to exploit and plunder. Sadly, it seems that a new chapter in Latin America’s long history of open veins is about to be written.
Shades of the Past
In the wee hours of January 3, the US carried out its first direct military intervention in Latin America since its 1989 invasion of Panama to depose the then-military ruler, Manuel Noriega. That attack resulted in the deaths of at least 3,000 people, mostly civilians. Current reports suggest that around 100 people, including 32 Cuban soldiers that were protecting President Nicolás Maduro, died in the US attacks against Venezuela in the early hours of January 3.
The attack has drawn inevitable parallels with the “capture” of Noriega as well as the Honduran army’s kidnapping and removal of President Manuel Zelaya to Costa Rica in 2009. It also bears similarities with the US’ kidnapping of the Mexican drug cartel leader Mayo Zambada in 2024. Like Zambada, Maduro may have been kidnapped by US forces as a result of insider betrayal, but there is as yet no definitive proof of this.
As Ambassador Chas Freeman said in an interview with the Neutrality Studies podcast, Maduro appears to have fallen victim to his own complacency regarding Trump’s intentions:
Nicolás Maduro discounted it too much. He seemed to believe that Trump would not be serious. The first thing to note is that the operation itself was very skilfully managed. The second is that it is entirely illegal, indecent, an atrocity really. And I think it put to an end three centuries of trying to develop a rule of law internationally.
Now, the Trump administration claims to have taken full control of Venezuela despite having no troops on the ground. After the extraordinary rendition of Maduro, the Chavista political and administrative system is still very much in tact.
The question many are asking is how long it can hold together, especially with Trump threatening to launch a second wave of attacks should it fail to comply with US demands. This is a government that has faced just about every possible form of attack from the US over the past two decades, with the exception of a land invasion, and managed to survive.
In her first communication as new acting president of Venezuela, Delcy Rodríguez struck a combative stance, accusing Israel of involvement in the attack and declaring that Venezuela will never be the colony of an empire again. She also demanded the release of President Maduro. In her second address, however, she struck a much more conciliatory tone:
“Venezuela reaffirms its commitment to peace and peaceful coexistence. Our country aspires to live without external threats, in an environment of respect and international cooperation. We believe that global peace is built by first guaranteeing peace within each nation,” according to a post Rodríguez wrote in Instagram on Sunday.
“We invite the US government to collaborate with us on an agenda of cooperation oriented towards shared development within the framework of international law to strengthen lasting community coexistence,” read the post.
“President Donald Trump, our peoples and our region deserve peace and dialogue, not war. This has always been President Nicolás Maduro’s message, and it is the message of all of Venezuela right now. This is the Venezuela I believe in and have dedicated my life to. I dream of a Venezuela where all good Venezuelans can come together. Venezuela has the right to peace, development, sovereignty and a future.”
Some prominent Chavistas, including Eva Golinger, are clearly not happy about Rodriguez’s acquiescence.
Just a day after the US bombed Venezuela and abducted Maduro, Delcy is openly cooperating with Trump and moving forward. No more calls to return Nicolas and Cilia. She’s President now, with Trump’s blessing. Next up, US Embassy reopens in Caracas. pic.twitter.com/ucLzhdOLLw
— Eva Golinger (@evagolinger) January 5, 2026
When it comes to betrayal by presidential successors, Latin America has a rich history, as reader vao noted in yesterday’s comments:
The handover from Rafael Correa to Lenin Moreno in Ecuador constitutes a sobering precedent: from a leftist government that implemented quite a number of reforms favouring the working class, sovereignty in the exploitation of resources, and autonomy from the USA to one doing a 180-turn (Baerbock-360) that privatized everything, abolished social reforms, exited ALBA, accepted the yoke of the IMF, and started a steady cooperation with the USA. The former basis of Correa protested heavily, and was crushed.
Moreno had been vice-president of Correa, and was member of the same party — just like Delcy Rodriguez wrt. Nicolas Maduro.
Rodríguez’s promotion also brings to mind the US-approved appointment of Dina Boluarte, Peru’s then-vice president, as president in 2022, following the removal, arrest and imprisonment of Pedro Castillo, Peru’s first ever indigenous president. Broadly reviled from the get-go, Boluarte would go on to become one of the world’s most unpopular leaders, reaching a disapproval rating of 94% before herself being impeached by Peru’s Congress late last year.
A Loaded Gun to the Head
In Rodriguez’s defence, what else could she have done?
She essentially has a loaded gun to her head. Trump himself, in full mobster mode, has said she could “pay a very big price, probably bigger than Maduro”, if she doesn’t comply with US demands, including giving US corporations “total access” to “the oil and other things”.
Delcy and her brother, Jorge, the president of Venezuela’s National Assembly, are arguably the most powerful duo in Venezuela. But they also know from first-hand experience just how high the stakes can go: their father, Jorge Antonio Rodríguez, a student leader and politician, was tortured to death by Venezuela’s US-aligned security forces in 1976 at the age of 34.
Two things we know for sure: Nobel War Prize winner María Corina Machado has been left out of the picture by both Trump and (a presumably reluctant) Rubio, at least for the foreseeable future. Trump said that while Machado was a “very nice woman,” she “doesn’t have the support within or the respect within the country” to lead Venezuela.
As we have been warning over the past month or so, there is no way the Venezuelan people, including many opposition supporters, would accept a Machado-led government, especially after Trump’s announcement in December that Venezuela’s oil effectively belongs to the US. There are apparently other reasons, however, including Trump’s wounded ego…
Insanity: Sources close to the White House told the Washington Post Trump lost interest in backing Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado to lead the country because she accepted her Nobel Peace Prize rather than demanding it be given to Trump, which was viewed as an… pic.twitter.com/FDVLJZCtJ9
— MeidasTouch (@MeidasTouch) January 5, 2026
The second thing we know for sure is that Latin America now faces a new age of US gangsterism and resource plunder. The attack on Venezuela was the first real manifestation of the so-called Trump corollary to the Monroe Doctrine, an uninhibited and authoritarian version of the old principle of Washington’s tutelage of Latin America.
The Trump corollary, as outlined in the recent National Security Strategy document, asserts Washington’s right to “restore American pre-eminence in the Western Hemisphere,” and to deny “non-Hemispheric competitors” — primarily, China — “the ability to position forces or other threatening capabilities, or to own or control strategically vital assets.”
Those vital assets apparently include Venezuela’s vast oil reserves, which Trump cannot stop talking about. However, as Yves pointed out in her post yesterday, “wringing more production out of Venezuela’s oil fields would require a long period of investment before any real payoff took place.” And that investment is likely to run into the tens of billions of dollars.
Trump has also stated that while his government would open Venezuelan crude only for US companies, he expected to keep selling crude to China, which currently consumes most of Venezuela’s small (but recovering) output.
But oil isn’t the only strategic resource lying under Venezuelan soil. The country is also home to the fourth largest gold reserves on the planet and eighth largest natural gas reserves, as well as a treasure trove of critical minerals (bauxite, iron ore, copper, zinc, nickel and even rare earth materials). However, as Investor News points out, these critical mineral riches remain largely theoretical – geological possibilities rather than proven, bankable reserves:
Yet despite this vast resource wealth, commercial extraction is negligible. Minerals such as coal, lead, zinc, copper, nickel, and gold each account for less than 1% of Venezuela’s output (Ebsco.com), and there are no major foreign mining projects on the ground…
Due to a chronic lack of infrastructure, investor-friendly regulations and up-to-date exploration data, commercial extraction is negligible, notes the Investor News piece. Minerals such as coal, lead, zinc, copper, nickel, and gold each account for less than 1% of Venezuela’s output, and there are no major foreign mining projects on the ground. At least not yet.
However, Wall Street funds are apparently already eying opportunities in the country, reports the Wall Street Journal. The kidnapping of Maduro has apparently sparked renewed interest in unlocking Venezuela’s abundant natural resources:
Some on Wall Street are already considering possible investment opportunities in Venezuela following the capture of Nicolás Maduro, according to Charles Myers, chairman of consulting firm Signum Global Advisors and a former head of investment advisory firm Evercore.
Myers said in an interview he is planning a trip to Venezuela with officials from top hedge funds and asset managers to determine whether there are investment prospects in the country under new leadership. The trip will feature about 20 officials from the finance, energy and defense sectors, among others, Myers said. The tentative plan is for the group to travel to Venezuela in March and meet with the new government including the new president, finance minister, energy minister, economy minister, head of the central bank and the Caracas stock exchange.
And lest we forget, the Trump corollary is as much about shutting out the US’ strategic rivals — namely China, Russia and Iran — from strategic resources on the American continent as it is about the US getting its own hands on them. Put simply, the spice must not flow. Here we have the US ambassador to the UN saying exactly that yesterday:
Occasionally they spell it out.
Here’s the US at the UN security council this afternoon pic.twitter.com/hLLJPAB0ZH
— Saul Staniforth (@SaulStaniforth) January 5, 2026
This may sound vaguely familiar to long-standing NC readers, since a similar message was conveyed three years ago by the former SOUTHCOM commander, general Laura Richardson, in her address to the Atlantic Council.
Rare earth elements, lithium, oil, light sweet crude, copper, gold, the Amazon, and fresh water.
This is what the United States wants to plunder from Latin America and the Caribbean. pic.twitter.com/Q9Rh5XP0jB
— Kawsachun News (@KawsachunNews) January 21, 2023
Gen Richardson relayed how Washington, together with US Southern Command, is actively negotiating the sale of lithium in the lithium triangle to US companies through its web of embassies, with the goal of “box[ing] out” our adversaries — i.e. China, Russia and Iran.
Which begged the question: what would happen if the US was unable to “box out” Russia and China, especially given the explosion of Chinese trade and investment in the region, as well as Beijing’s tendency not to attach such onerous conditions to said trade and investment? Richardson answered (emphasis my own): “in some cases our adversaries have a leg up. It requires us to be pretty innovative, pretty aggressive and responsive to what is happening.”
As we warned at the time, the US was essentially rejigging its Monroe Doctrine for a new age — an age in which it was rapidly losing influence, even in its own “backyard”. The 200-year old foreign policy position that had opposed European colonialism in the Americas and was then adapted by Theodore Roosevelt to justify intervening in the affairs of Latin American countries if they steered from the straight and narrow, was now being applied to China and Russia.
At more or less the same time, Biden administration signed, to minimal fanfare, a “minerals security partnership” (MSP) with some of its strategic partners, including its five-eye partners, the European Commission, Canada, Australia, Japan, the Republic of Korea and the UK. In a press statement, the US Department of State said:
“The goal of the MSP is to ensure that critical minerals are produced, processed, and recycled in a manner that supports the ability of countries to realise the full economic development benefit of their geological endowments.”
As NC reader Sardonia put it sardonically, this is “surely some of the most polite language ever heard from someone holding a gun to someone else’s head as they demand the contents of their victims’ purse.” The US describes the partnership as a coalition of countries that are committed to “responsible critical mineral supply chains to support economic prosperity and climate objectives.” Reuters offered a more fitting description: a “metallic NATO.”
The Trump administration is merely taking this approach to a whole new level, and doing so in the crassest, most dangerous possible way. After kidnapping Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, just two days ago, Trump has made direct threats against the governments of Cuba, which depends heavily on Venezuela’s commandeered oil, Colombia and Mexico.
BREAKING:
🇨🇺🇺🇸 Marco Rubio and Trump are now THREATENING Cuba as well:
“If I lived in Havana and I was in the government, I’d be concerned, at least a little bit” pic.twitter.com/cQ0Janvw8E
— Megatron (@Megatron_ron) January 3, 2026
Senator Lindsay Graham is hardly able to contain his glee as Trump tells reporters that “Cuba is ready to fall”, and that there are “a lot of great Cuban Americans that will be happy about this”.
Look at Lindsey Graham. He looks like a little boy at Christmas. He can’t hide his neocon orgasm when he hears Trump about Cuba. When he looks at the other guy he’s thinking “See. I told ya I would get him to do it, I told ya.”
pic.twitter.com/R8QIxSqoAx— Kim Dotcom (@KimDotcom) January 5, 2026
Here is Rubio, again, explaining that while the US (apparently) doesn’t need Venezuelan oil, China, Russia and Iran certainly shouldn’t be getting their hands on it.
🚨 HOLY HELL: Marco Rubio just said the quiet part out loud.
Asked by Kristen Welker why the U.S. needs Venezuelan oil, Rubio didn’t cite law, trade, or consent.
He said:
“Why does China need their oil? Russia? Iran? This is the West. This is where we live.”
Russia, China,… pic.twitter.com/blWYMFW1L5
— Brian Allen (@allenanalysis) January 4, 2026
On Sunday, Trump told reporters on Air Force One:
“Colombia is governed by a sick man, who likes to make cocaine and sell it to the United States, but he is not going to continue for much longer, let me tell you.”
When asked by a reporter if Washington is considering “an operation like the one in Venezuela,” Trump did not rule it out: “It sounds good to me.”
Trump has also threatened, once again, to attack Mexico in recent days, prompting a stinging rebuke from President Claudia Sheinbaum:
We categorically reject intervention in the internal affairs of other countries. The history of Latin America is clear and compelling: Intervention has never brought democracy, has never generated well-being or lasting stability.
Like this: https://t.co/JSIfflew8X pic.twitter.com/5bMy5soEjA
— Sizwe SikaMusi (@SizweLo) January 4, 2026
