Maduro’s Arrest and Trump’s “Oil Card”: How the Kremlin Views the New Shift in Influence
5 January 21:11
The arrest of Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro by the United States has deprived Vladimir Putin of an ally and may strengthen U.S. “oil influence,” but at the same time, Moscow is eyeing the potential benefits of the division of the world into spheres of influence promoted by President Donald Trump.
This is reported by Reuters , according to "Komersant Ukrainian".
Special forces detained Maduro just eight months after the Russian president agreed to a strategic partnership with his “dear friend.” Trump stated that the U.S. is 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 establish control over Ukraine after nearly four years of war.
At the same time, on another level, what Russia calls “piracy” and “regime change” by Trump in the U.S. “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 high-ranking Russian source on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the topic.
“But if this is an example of Trump’s Monroe Doctrine in action, as it seems, then Russia also has its own sphere of influence.”
The source was referring to the Trump administration’s desire to restore U.S. dominance in the Western Hemisphere and revive the 19th-century Monroe Doctrine, which declared the region a zone of Washington’s influence.
Another Russian source noted that Moscow views the U.S. operation as a clear attempt to gain control over Venezuela’s oil wealth, pointing out that most Western countries have not openly condemned it.
The Dangers of Trump’s “Wild West”
Putin is attempting to delineate Russia’s sphere of influence across the former Soviet republics in Central Asia, the Caucasus, and Ukraine—a course Washington has opposed since the end of the Cold War.
Putin has not publicly commented on the U.S. operation in Venezuela, although the Russian Foreign Ministry has called on Trump to release Maduro and return to dialogue. Previously, the ministry described Trump’s actions as modern-day piracy in the Caribbean.
Russian propaganda media described the operation as a “kidnapping” by the U.S., quoted Trump’s remarks about America’s “sick” neighbors, and recalled the U.S. capture of Panamanian leader Manuel Noriega on January 3, 1990.
“The fact that Trump simply ‘stole’ another country’s president shows that international law effectively does not 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 modern version of the Monroe Doctrine, which Trump proposed updating as the “Donro Doctrine,” can be interpreted in different ways.
“Is the U.S. truly ready to recognize Russia’s dominance in the post-Soviet space, or is it simply so powerful that it will not tolerate any major power alongside itself?” Markov asked.
Alexei Pushkov, chairman of the Federation Council’s Committee on Information Policy, saw the U.S. operation in Venezuela as a direct embodiment of the U.S. National Security Strategy, characterizing it as an attempt to revive American hegemony and gain control over new oil resources.
At the same time, he said, this threatens a return to “19th-century wild imperialism” and the de facto revival of the concept of the Wild West.
“Will this triumph turn into a catastrophe?” 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 criticized the loss of an ally so soon after Bashar al-Assad’s fall in Syria and compared the speed of U.S. action to Russia’s much slower progress in Ukraine.
