What is the Monroe Doctrine?
And what application does it have to Venezuela in 2026?
On December 2, 1823, as part of his annual address to Congress, President James Monroe articulated what would become known as the “Monroe Doctrine.” In simple terms, it was a warning to European powers that they should not seek further colonization in the Western Hemisphere and was in support of the Latin American republics that had recently declared/were in the process of declaring their independence from Spain. It is worth noting that in 1823, our young nation, which had recently been invaded by Britain, was in no position to enforce such a policy position.
Here are some relevant bits (emphases herein are mine):
With the existing colonies or dependencies of any European power we have not interfered and shall not interfere. But with the Governments who have declared their independence and maintain it, and whose independence we have, on great consideration and on just principles, acknowledged, we could not view any interposition for the purpose of oppressing them, or controlling in any other manner their destiny, by any European power in any other light than as the manifestation of an unfriendly disposition toward the United States. In the war between those new Governments and Spain we declared our neutrality at the time of their recognition, and to this we have adhered, and shall continue to adhere, provided no change shall occur which, in the judgement of the competent authorities of this Government, shall make a corresponding change on the part of the United States indispensable to their security.
[…]
It is impossible that the allied powers should extend their political system to any portion of either continent without endangering our peace and happiness; nor can anyone believe that our southern brethren, if left to themselves, would adopt it of their own accord. It is equally impossible, therefore, that we should behold such interposition in any form with indifference. If we look to the comparative strength and resources of Spain and those new Governments, and their distance from each other, it must be obvious that she can never subdue them. It is still the true policy of the United States to leave the parties to themselves, in hope that other powers will pursue the same course….
Really, as a “doctrine,” it isn’t especially clear. It has long been understood to be an assertion of some level of US dominion over the western hemisphere, but really only in terms of new European incursions or attempts to reverse the independence of the fomally Spainsh colonies. If you look further at the relevant portions of the speech, there is also some discussion of negotiations with Russia and Great Britain over the use and access to various territories.
What most people think of (if they think anything at all) when they hear “Monroe Doctrine” is more along the line of the “Olney Doctrine” (or the “Olney Corolllary” or the “Olney Interpretation”) as expressed by Grover Cleveland’s Secretary of State Richard Olney in 1895 in a letter to the British government regarding a territorial dispute over British Guyana and Venezuela. In that letter, he wrote:
Today the United States us practically the sovereign on this continent, and its fiat is law upon the subjects to which it confines its interposition. Why? It is not because of the pure friendship of good will felt for it. It is not simply by reason of high character as a civilized state, nor because wisdom and justice and equity are the invariable characteristics of the dealings of the United States. It is because, in addition to all other grounds, its infinite resources combined with its isolated position render it master of the situation and practically invulnerable as against any or all other powers.
That kind of sounds familiar, does it not?
The stated principle that the US’ hegemonic control of the hemisphere also meant the right to intervene internally in Latin American states was articulated by Theodore Roosevelt in what came to be known as the Roosevelt Corollary of the Monroe Doctrine (1904):
Any country whose people conduct themselves well can count upon our hearty friendship. If a nation shows that it knows how to act with reasonable efficiency and decency in social and political matters, if it keeps order and pays its obligations, it need fear no interference from the United States. Chronic wrongdoing, or an impotence which results in a general loosening of the ties of civilized society, may in America, as elsewhere, ultimately require intervention by some civilized nation, and in the Western Hemisphere the adherence of the United States to the Monroe Doctrine may force the United States, however reluctantly, in flagrant cases of such wrongdoing or impotence, to the exercise of an international police power.
What Trump has done fits squarely in this view (an imperialist view, I would underscore) by his actions in Venezuela.
The bottom line is that all of these “doctrines” and “corollaries” are just about raw expressions of power. They are neither moral nor legal justifications for what the US is doing in Venezuela.
This is true for the so-called “Trump Corollary” as proclaimed by the administration last month:
Today, my Administration proudly reaffirms this promise under a new “Trump Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine: That the American people—not foreign nations nor globalist institutions—will always control their own destiny in our hemisphere.
I am not even sure what that means, especially as it concerns the moral/legal argument for ousting Venezuela’s leader, claiming to now be running the country, and asserting control over its oil.
Don’t get me wrong, Maduro was a bad leader, and the regime that started with Hugo Chavez in the late 90s has been a long-term, slow-moving, man-made disaster. That Maduro is no longer in power is, in a vacuum, a good thing. The problem is that his outer is not in a vacuum, and it is wholly unclear what happens next. History dictates that it will not go smoothly.
Worse, all of this fits into Trump’s National Security Strategy, which views the world as being dominated by great powers that control their spheres of influence. You know, the way Putin looks at Ukraine.
And in that sense, likening back to Monroe, Olney, and Roosevelt is relevant, as that was a world dominated by great powers competing for colonies and influence so as to maintain their empires. Trump is very much acting like we are back in the late 19th/early 20th centuries.
Since I am scraping old PPTs from class, I will end on this as an example of what ideas like the Olney and Roosevelt corollaries wrought.
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I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again.
Until after the US Civil War, the Monroe Doctrine was a bit of a delusion.
The main obstacles to Spain attempting a full-scale effort to retake Latin America were internal divisions in Spain, given the cost.
And in the British support for South American independence.
“Monroe” only became effective from the 1870’s, when massive US economic expansion gave it the power to enforce it’s will (within limits).
Incidentally, after Lord Salisbury publicly gracefully gave way to the US over its demand for a arbitration comission over the Venezuela-Guiana border dispute, he was quietly furious.
Though resigned to accepting a US “Moroe Doctrine” demand he considered presumptuous.
He remarked in private, in relation to that and the US Civil War:
I’d argue a fair number of Americans acquisition of power is an ethic in-itself.
Legal justification is a moot point. Certainly domestically. Internationally, it doesn’t matter. Whatever fallout happens from this, and whatever is yet to come, will play out over the course of years. Much of it will likely occur in economics—finance, trade, currency.
Americans clearly have no idea that much of America’s economic condition was enabled by security guarantees in exchange for economic benefits, and aid to improve security through the world.
Nor do they seem to realize that imperialism has immense costs, and I am guessing that Venezuela is th first in several dominoes—Greenland may not be next, but I suspect it is a priority.
Talk about shades of the hysterical triumphalism that swept America in the days following the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Right-wingers once again have mistaken a brilliant military operation for a successful strategic accomplishment. The fires are still burning in Caracas but MAGA pundits are celebrating the prosperous, democratic Venezuela that is sure to emerge from the ashes.
The signs are already there that the Trump regime has no idea what happens next. Machado has already been ruled out as a potential replacement president by Trump’s stunningly sexist dismissal. Rubio is going to govern Venezuela for the time being; apparently running the State Dept and the National Security Council leaves him plenty of time for moonlighting. Maybe Musk can lend him some of the teenagers who proved so useful in reforming the US government.
An exercise that will make the Gaza “peace plan” look like a master class in nation-building. It’s almost inevitable that US troops will be deployed in Venezuela sooner or later, and God knows what will follow from that.
@Kurtz and @Ken_L:
What scares me most is “what happens next” ends up being anything close to a successful strategic accomplishment. Even modest success in Venezuela would validate Trump’s National Security Strategy in the minds of the MAGAts and oligarchs and the course would be set for decades of great powers imperialism in both hemispheres.
@Taylor:
I dunno, man, Chevron is looking like one of those “globalist institutions” these days.
Also, your US interventions list ends at 1934. Professor Google gives us this update:
Not nearly as productive as the first third of the 20th Century. But perhaps it took awhile after WW2, Korea, and Vietnam, for good ‘ol American jingoism to find its way back into the White House.
@Scott F.:
In the immediate aftermath of the Iraq War 2, while a lull settled over the war torn nation, a coterie of “baby neocons” descended upon Bagdad to present their pitch for American goods and services at the first commercial trade fair exhibition, franchise opportunities and all. Hopes were high! But these cherubic faces beat a hasty retreat back to America when guns blazed and bombs burst as the beginnings of a bloody 3 year insurgency put a damper on their sugar plum dreams of capitalist opportunities. The end result of our ill-informed adventurism was the displacement of millions of people, the rise of ISIS, a dominoing of more refugees into Eastern Europe, fueling rise of rightwing authoritarianism and intolerance in those countries — not to overlook the tens, hundreds of thousands of people who died directly and indirectly from GWB+Cheney+neocon idiocy. Total human disaster. It is unlikely the geniuses of this current Administration will improve much on that outcome, if they persist on their current course.
Trump’s interpretation of the Monroe Doctrine has always been Caribbean-centric. Meanwhile, China built Peru a shiny new deep-water Pacific port. Much cargo between South America and China that was previously transshipped through ports in Mexico or even Long Beach/Los Angeles will now go direct. Shortly after the new port opened, Bolivia signed a deal to increase production of lithium bound for China.
@Rob1: My list was specifically linked to the imperialist era. There was a pause with FDR and his “Good Neighbor Policy” (not to mention the Great Depression and WWII).
What you are correctly noting is the resumption of interventions during the Cold War. That is its own set of discussions.
@Michael Cain:
Indeed, part of the point of the table I shared above was to note that that was the prior era’s focus as well. It was part and parcel of the notion that the Caribbean was just a “Great American Lake” and that all of this was our “backyard.”
As noted above, we were interventionist in the region during the Cold War, but Trump’s behavior is far more Teddy Roosevelt than Richard Nixon.
I cannot tell you how much all of this feels like a weird echo of the past for those of us who have studied and taught about the region.
You’d think it was meant more for things like Napoleon III’s attempt to place a minor Austrian noble as Emperor of Mexico.
One junior high school history teacher explained the Monroe Doctrine as the US telling Europe “I call dibs on the western hemisphere!”