Najm us Saqib
The struggle for power and resources is a constant of history, but its methods evolve. Ancient empires conquered outright, claiming land and wealth by force, their motives veiled in glory. The modern era preferred subtlety – controlling oil and minerals through economic pressure and political influence, without the burden of direct rule.
The US capture and prosecution of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro mark a daring fusion of these old and new models. It is ancient resource plunder, executed with the precise instruments of modern legal warfare. This event reveals a grim reality: sovereignty is not a sacred principle, but a conditional privilege granted by power.
We are forced to confront a couple of critical questions: has the international rules-based order itself been weaponised? Has the language of justice been emptied to serve the ancient logic of domination? The courtroom has not just replaced the battlefield – it has become a more potent one. Here, raw power undergoes a masterful alchemy, transformed into perceived legitimacy through the rituals of law.
History provides a clear contrast. Rome’s annihilation of Carthage was, at its heart, a war for economic supremacy, ending with Rome directly administering its rival’s silver mines. Conquest was total. The modern era developed a different template. The 20th-century ‘wars for oil’ typically avoided formal empire, aiming to install compliant regimes without the burden of direct rule, as seen in post-1953 Iran or the 2003 Iraq War.
The Maduro operation defies both categories. It is not a military invasion, yet it far exceeds mere sanctions, coercion or extortion. By deploying special forces to airlift a Head of State under a domestic criminal indictment for narcoterrorism, it achieves a novel form of dominion: the decapitation of a resource-rich state to break its will. It is a juridical coup d’état. The United States, invoking Article 51 self-defence against a ‘narcoterrorist’ threat, not only bypassed international law; it also authored a radical, unilateral expansion of it, posing serious geopolitical questions to the world’s conscience.
Its precedent lies not in declared wars, but in the grey zone of state abduction. The controversial 2004 removal of Haiti’s President Jean-Bertrand Aristide – aided by foreign powers under a ‘liberation’ narrative – provided a blueprint. Nicolás Maduro’s capture is a bolder application, executed not during open rebellion but after diplomatic overtures.
The global reaction exposed the fragile architecture of the post-1945 world order. Major rivals like Russia issued stern but cautious condemnations, revealing an unwillingness to risk direct confrontation. The European Union’s paralysis highlighted deep internal divisions. Institutions like the UN Security Council and the International Court of Justice were rendered spectators, their authority dependent on the very powers that bypass them.
The selective outrage of traditional US allies was particularly revealing. Nations like France and Germany were quick to admonish President Trump on the need to uphold UN Charter principles regarding Greenland, yet remained silent on Venezuela. This selective advocacy highlighted a broader pattern: the same powers have overlooked violations of UN principles in Gaza, Palestine, and Kashmir. Such inconsistency revealed a world order in which national interests routinely take precedence over the established rules-based international system – a glaring reality.
Simultaneously, the operation exploits Venezuela’s tragic core paradox: a nation collapsing into social and economic misery while sitting atop the world’s largest oil reserves. Years of crippling sanctions had immiserated the population but solidified the regime’s grip. Maduro’s removal shatters the stalemate but offers no clear path for political succession, risking a violent vacuum in which armed factions and criminal syndicates could vie for control.
This reveals the operation’s most profound danger: it weaponises the institutions designed to restrain power. The international system, built to bind power to principle, is shown to be a cage effective only for the weak. The powerful no longer stand outside the law to defy it; they now stand within it to redefine it, granting themselves the unwritten right to act as global sheriff, judge, and jailer.
The ramifications of the operation are profound. Economically, it opens a path for Western firms to access vast resources through unilateral force, undermining the stability of the global economic order. Politically, it establishes a chilling precedent. The spectacle of a sitting President tried under a rival’s domestic law announces that the shield of sovereignty is nullified for those in the crosshairs. The message to capitals from Tehran to Pyongyang to Bogotá to Brasília is one of stark, selective enforcement: international law is a tool for the powerful, a trap for the weak.
Maduro’s capture is therefore a geopolitical watershed. It achieves the ancient goal of controlling resources not by annexing territory, but by ‘legally’ dismembering its leadership. Where Romans annexed mines, modern powers seek to annex the legal person of the sovereign.
The long-term implications are stark: can Venezuela ever rebuild political legitimacy after such a violation, or will it fragment into a protectorate? Worse still, will the people of Venezuela accept this change as a fait accompli? On the other hand, will this action deter ‘rogue regimes’, or merely accelerate their pursuit of ultimate military deterrents? Most fundamentally, has the bedrock norm of sovereign equality been shattered for good? The answers do not bode well for a rules-based international order.
Indeed, the methods have evolved from overt pillage to covert rendition to public indictment – each a more refined instrument of control. But the objective remains unchanged: the strong commandeering the resources of the weak. The ancient world called this fate. We have learned to call it law.
The writer is a former Ambassador of Pakistan and author of eight books in three languages. He can be reached at najmussaqib1960@msn.com
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