As Trump eyes Venezuela, one key target may be closer to home
Cuba could be factoring into the White House’s calculations.
By Stephen Kinzer – Boston Globe - November 6, 2025
Preparations for a military assault on Venezuela raise an obvious question: Why? President Trump campaigned on a promise to “end the endless foreign wars.” In his inaugural address, he asked Americans to judge him “not only by the battles we win, but also by the wars that we end, and perhaps most importantly, the wars we never get into.” Given all that, why has he been threatening to launch a war of choice against Venezuela?
Maybe it’s an empty threat. Trump said in a recent interview that the Venezuelan government’s days are numbered, but when asked if he will order an invasion, he replied, “I don’t think so.” That would mean he has approved a massive and highly expensive deployment just for show.
The stated reason for intensifying pressure on Venezuela is that it exports deadly drugs to the United States and President Nicolás Maduro is complicit. It is not persuasive. Venezuela produces no fentanyl and is a smaller player in the cocaine trade than Colombia, Peru, or Mexico. War in Venezuela will not substantially reduce the availability of drugs in the United States. Despite what the White House says, this war would not be waged only to fight drug traffickers.
Venezuela has the world’s largest proven oil reserves. Big powers throughout history have seized foreign lands in order to loot their resources. Chevron is eager to repair Venezuela’s collapsing oil infrastructure and drill Venezuelan oil if political conditions change. President Trump is notoriously willing to shape his foreign policy to suit corporate interests. Even if war in Venezuela would open up a new energy supply and produce rich corporate profits, though, it would probably not be waged for that reason alone.
A third possible explanation for the Venezuela war fever is that Washington is driven by a wish to depose Maduro. He has been harshly authoritarian and outspokenly anti-American. In August the United States doubled the bounty it has placed on his head, from $25 million to $50 million. Taking him down would feel like a geopolitical victory. The recent awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to a Venezuelan activist who has urged the United States to invade her country could cloak an overthrow in moral legitimacy. But if taking down odious Latin American leaders is the goal, why not start with President Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua, whose regime is equally anti-American and even more repressive? Some in Washington would enjoy seeing Maduro handcuffed and in an orange jumpsuit. Nonetheless, that wish is hardly intense enough to justify an invasion.
Nor could an invasion be explained as a simple attention-grabber, a kind of “Operation Distract From Epstein.”
The real reason this administration is threatening Venezuela may lie beyond Venezuela itself. Trump’s policy toward Latin America is driven by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who has built his career on confronting Cuba. Today Cuba and Venezuela are close partners. If the United States can depose Maduro, Cuba could edge closer to collapse. For Rubio, that would be a transcendent victory. Forcing change in Venezuela would not be worth this massive deployment if the reason had to do with Venezuela alone. The real reason is that Venezuela is a stepping stone toward the grand prize: Cuba.
For three generations, Cuba has been this hemisphere’s chief tormenter of the United States. Today Venezuela is its last bastion of support in South America. Venezuela supplies Cuba with most of its oil. In return, Cuban advisers have helped Maduro build an effective security service and an apparently loyal military. As Cuba’s economy spirals downward, Venezuela is its lifeline. Rubio wants to cut it.
This strategy has an appealing logic. Deposing Maduro and establishing a pro-American regime in Venezuela would indeed be a great blow to Cuba. Isolated and without means to provide electricity for its people, the Cuban government could face social unrest and ultimately fall. That, at least, is the tantalizing fantasy.
As with many fantasies, this one may be more complicated in reality. An American military attack on Venezuela would be a return to the days of gunboat diplomacy, when the United States landed Marines to depose and install governments around the Caribbean Basin. That would touch a nationalist nerve even in many Latin Americans who have no love for Maduro.
If military action against Venezuela includes the landing of American troops, guerrilla war could break out. Venezuelans deeply admire their national hero, Simón Bolívar, who fought against a foreign power. Some Venezuelans today might take up arms against invading Americans as a way to honor and emulate Bolívar. So might hotheads from other Latin American countries. Whether in Veracruz in 1914, Santo Domingo in 1965, or Panama in 1989, invading American troops have repeatedly faced resistance from determined nationalist fighters.
The fixation on Cuba that drives Rubio reflects the extraordinary hold that country has on the United States. Presidents since Thomas Jefferson have dreamed of seizing Cuba. Americans invaded in 1898 and dominated the country for more than half a century. Fidel Castro’s revolution chased American companies out, and when the CIA sought to topple him at the Bay of Pigs in 1961, it suffered a humiliating defeat.
Since then, six decades of American efforts to bend Cuba to Washington’s will have failed. Rubio hopes to change that. His route to Cuba is through Venezuela. That, more than any other factor, is driving the escalation we are now seeing off Venezuela’s coast.
Stephen Kinzer is a senior fellow at the Watson School of International and Public Affairs at Brown University.