The Venezuela Crisis And India

The US President’s (Trump) decision to seize and transfer the Venezuelan President (Maduro) to a New York prison marks one of the most audacious U.S. interventions in Latin America.

Nicolas Maduro Arrest 

• Unprecedented Intervention: The U.S. President publicly released an image of the Venezuelan President aboard the USS Iwo Jima (a U.S. Navy amphibious assault ship and forward-deployed military platform), symbolising direct military involvement in Venezuela’s internal political crisis.
• Strategic Escalation: Arresting a sitting president and whisking him away on a military ship is both physically and symbolically massive, far exceeding the impact of conventional sanctions.

Regime Seduction Vs Regime Change

• Earlier Approach (Regime Change): The system and army were dismantled (Iraq 2003), resulting in chaos and civil war.
• Current Approach (Regime Seduction): The U.S. strategy appears less focused on outright regime change and more on regime seduction, aimed at removing only the leader while co-opting the existing establishment.
• Core objective: The approach seeks to preserve stability and uninterrupted oil flows by reshaping Venezuela’s political trajectory without dismantling the existing system or triggering disorder.

India’s Response- Sound of Silence

• Perceived Diplomatic Restraint: India’s official reaction to the U.S. intervention was widely seen as restrained and timid compared to stronger statements from its BRICS partners. 
  • Brazil, Russia, and China strongly condemned the U.S. action and described it as illegal.
• Consistency in Crisis Response: India has shown similar restraint after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022 and during U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities.

Reasons behind India’s Policy

• Post–Cold War Shift: Unlike during the Cold War, India today avoids moral sermonising directed at major partners. 
  • It has moved from idealism to realism in foreign policy. 
• Pragmatic View of International Law: India no longer places unquestioned faith in the enforcement of international law.
• Selective Norm Advocacy: It invokes international norms primarily when China violates them, as China poses a direct threat to India.
• Limited Strategic Stakes: Venezuela remains a “distant spectacle”, with limited direct impact on India’s core strategic interests.
  • Brazil: As a neighbouring country, Brazil is directly affected by developments in Venezuela.
  • Russia and China: Both have invested billions of dollars in the Maduro regime, giving them substantial stakes in the outcome.
• Trade Imbalance: India’s annual trade with Latin America is only about $45 billion, compared to China’s $500 billion.

India’s Longstanding Neglect of Latin America

• Historical Yet Shallow Ties: Despite historical connections such as Rabindranath Tagore’s visit to Argentina in 1924, India’s engagement with Latin America has remained shallow.
• Diplomatic Deficit: High-level political visits are infrequent, commercial diplomacy remains thin, and institutional presence is limited.
• Shallow Political Literacy: Indian elites lack a deep understanding of Latin American history, economics, and society.
• Cultural Fascination Without Policy: Past fascination with figures such as Fidel Castro and Che Guevara, and symbolic gestures like naming roads after Simón Bolívar, produced cultural symbolism rather than substantive policy engagement.

Reasons For India and Latin America Partnership

• Trade Diversification Pressure: The “Year of Trump’s Tariffs” has forced India to diversify export markets.
• Untapped Economic Potential: Latin America, with a combined GDP of around $5.5 trillion and a population exceeding 650 million, remains underexplored by India.
• Opportunity from U.S.–China Competition: As the U.S. pressures Latin American states to reduce dependence on China, many countries will seek diversification rather than substitution.
• Scope for Indian Entry: This creates significant commercial opportunities for India across trade, investment, and supply chains.

Impact on Latin America

• Reassertion of U.S. Dominance: A strategic reorientation of post-Maduro Venezuela would mark a reassertion of American dominance in Latin America.
  • Return of the Monroe Doctrine: The Western Hemisphere was declared a U.S. sphere of influence that prevents any European colonial intervention in the Americas.
• Ideological Realignment: It could accelerate the region’s rightward political drift after decades shaped by left-wing populism and criminal mafias.
• Challenge to Rival Powers: Such a shift would directly challenge Cuban, Russian, and Chinese ambitions in the Western Hemisphere.
• Trump Corollary: Trump’s revival of a muscular Monroe Doctrine, reinforced by the “Trump Corollary” in the U.S. National Security Strategy, aims to curb China’s expanding economic influence in Latin America.

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Way Forward

• Independent Policy Orientation: India should stop merely following the BRICS positions and pursue an independent foreign policy.
• Deepening Engagement: India must expand its footprint through more trade missions and sustained economic outreach.
• Regional Understanding: Engagement with Latin America should move beyond symbolism, such as posters and T-shirts, toward deeper political and economic understanding.

Conclusion

The Venezuela episode highlights the return of power politics over norms in the Western Hemisphere. For India, strategic silence cannot substitute strategy—only sustained economic engagement, political literacy, and independent diplomacy can prevent marginalisation in an increasingly contested Latin America.

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