Maduro’s Arrest and Trump’s Oil Map: How the Kremlin Perceives the New Redistribution of Influence
5 January 21:11
Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro’s seizure of the United States has deprived Vladimir Putin of an ally and could strengthen the US “oil influence,” but Moscow is also looking at the potential benefits of dividing the world into spheres of influence promoted by President Donald Trump.
Reuters writes about this, "Komersant Ukrainian" reports.
The special forces detained Maduro only eight months after the Russian president agreed on a strategic partnership with his “dear friend.” Trump said that the US was temporarily taking control of Venezuela, the country with the world’s largest oil reserves.
Some Russians criticized the loss of an ally and compared the swift U.S. operation to Russia’s inability to gain control of Ukraine after nearly four years of war.
At the same time, on another level, what Russia calls Trump’s “piracy” and “regime change” in the US “backyard” is more acceptable to Moscow – especially if Washington gets bogged down in the Venezuelan crisis.
“Russia has lost an ally in Latin America,” said one senior Russian source, speaking on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the topic.
“But if this is an example of Trump’s Monroe Doctrine, as it seems, then Russia also has its own sphere of influence.”
The source was referring to the Trump administration’s desire to restore US dominance in the Western Hemisphere and revive the 19th-century Monroe Doctrine, which declared the region Washington’s zone of influence.
Another Russian source noted that Moscow sees the US operation as an obvious attempt to gain control of Venezuela’s oil wealth, noting that most Western powers have not openly condemned it.
Dangers of Trump’s “Wild West”
Putin is attempting to outline a Russian sphere of influence in the former Soviet republics of Central Asia, the Caucasus, and Ukraine, a course that Washington has been opposing since the end of the Cold War.
Putin has not publicly commented on the US operation in Venezuela, although the Russian Foreign Ministry has called on Trump to fire Maduro and return to dialogue. Earlier, the ministry called Trump’s actions modern-day piracy in the Caribbean.
Russian propaganda media described the operation as a “kidnapping” by the United States, quoted Trump’s statements about America’s “sick” neighbors, and recalled the US capture of Panamanian leader Manuel Noriega on January 3, 1990.
“The fact that Trump simply ‘stole’ the president of another country shows that international law does not actually exist – there is only the law of force. But Russia has known this for a long time,” former Kremlin adviser Sergei Markov told Reuters.
He noted that the current version of the Monroe Doctrine, which Trump proposed to update as the Donroe Doctrine, can be interpreted in different ways.
“Is the United States really ready to recognize Russia’s dominance in the post-Soviet space, or is it just so strong that it will not tolerate any great power next to it?” Markov asked.
Alexei Pushkov, Chairman of the Information Policy Commission of the Federation Council of the Russian Federation, saw the US operation in Venezuela as a direct implementation of the US National Security Strategy, viewing it as an attempt to revive American hegemony and gain control over new oil resources.
At the same time, he said, it threatens to return to the “wild imperialism of the nineteenth century” and the actual revival of the concept of the Wild West.
“Will the triumph turn into a disaster?” he asked.
Russians compare Venezuela and Ukraine
For Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping, a U.S. president focused on the Western Hemisphere and potentially drawn into the Venezuelan crisis looks more than acceptable, given Russia’s focus on Ukraine and China’s on Taiwan.
However, some Russians have criticized the loss of an ally so soon after the fall of Bashar al-Assad in Syria and compared the speed of U.S. action to Russia’s much slower progress in Ukraine.
