John Mearsheimer / US Military Intervention in Venezuela 2026 / 2026-01-06
Position
“The US intervention in Venezuela is a textbook case of old-fashioned imperialism - seizing a country's oil by military force. It has nothing to do with the Monroe Doctrine or narco-terrorism. Trump says quite clearly: we will run Venezuela, and Venezuela's oil is our oil. This is almost certain to fail because imperialism does not work in the age of nationalism.”
Contributing sources
[interview] John Mearsheimer: Venezuela, Greenland & the End of NATO — 2026-01-07[speech] 'Good Old-Fashioned Imperialism': Mearsheimer Talks Venezuela and Iran — 2026-01-22[speech] Interventionism on Steroids - The Trump Takeover of Venezuela — 2026-01-06[interview] Asking for Big Trouble in Venezuela — 2026-01-09
Position from 2026-01-06
International relations are governed by power dynamics between great powers, not by international law or institutional frameworks
Their wording: “This is old-fashioned imperialism - seizing a country's oil by military force”
Mearsheimer frames US behavior through realist power dynamics - great powers seize resources from weaker states when they can, regardless of stated justifications
Also held by (4)
John Mearsheimer — Mearsheimer's entire argument is framed through realist cost-benefit analysis - the US should be focused on great power competition, not lobby-driven Middle Eastern warsNeema Parvini — The entire position is built on great-power realism as its analytical framework - Parvini explicitly invokes 'great power realities' and argues realist analysis would have predicted the outcomeJordan Peterson — Peterson acknowledges realist constraints within his broader moral framework - the archetypal hero does not merely assert values but must also possess the strength to defend them, making military deterrence a moral necessityMatt Walsh — Walsh explicitly dismisses international law as fictional - power dynamics, not legal frameworks, govern international relations
Incompatible with (2)
“Defending territorial integrity against aggression is essential to maintaining the rules-based international order”Med
held by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Aaron Bastani, Joe Biden, Stephen Colbert, Destiny (Steven Bonnell), Lindsey Graham, Nikki Haley, Jimmy Kimmel, Piers Morgan, John Oliver, Jordan Peterson, Marco Rubio, Bernie Sanders, Richard Spencer, Jon Stewart
US foreign military intervention is an extension of American imperialism and hegemonic maintenance
Their wording: “Trump says quite clearly: we will run Venezuela, and Venezuela's oil is our oil”
Mearsheimer describes the operation as naked imperial hegemony - the US asserting direct control over a weaker state's resources
Also held by (15)
Aaron Bastani — Bastani holds this from socialist anti-imperialist framework informed by his Iranian heritage - he sees the strikes as continuous with decades of Western intervention in the region, from the 1953 coup to the presentBrian Berletic — Berletic frames all three conflicts as facets of a single US hegemonic project, not isolated eventsTucker Carlson — Carlson's anti-hegemony framing here is selective: he opposes US hegemonic structures (NATO, foreign bases) but supports US territorial expansion into Greenland, revealing that the objection is to multilateral obligation, not to American power projectionNoam Chomsky — REUSED from Iran position (chomsky-iran-imperialism). Chomsky holds this from the SAME systematic critique of US imperial power - in Iran he applied it to US nuclear hypocrisy and the 1953 coup, here he applies it to NATO expansion as an expression of US hegemonic extension into Russia's security sphere. The analytical framework is identical: US power projection creates the conditions for conflict, then the US frames itself as the defender of order it disruptedStephen Colbert — Colbert uses the Iceland/Greenland confusion to frame the entire enterprise as imperial overreach dressed up in strategic language - the incompetence of the execution reveals the nature of the projectGlenn Greenwald — Greenwald frames the intervention as proof that the permanent foreign policy establishment controls US military policy regardless of which party holds powerJackson Hinkle — Hinkle's position is rooted in categorical opposition to US military intervention anywhere, particularly against governments that resist US hegemonyJimmy Kimmel — The 'real housewife' metaphor frames the Greenland threat as the kind of petty territorial aggression that international norms exist to prevent, made dangerous only by the power asymmetryAlexander Mercouris — Mercouris holds that American hegemonic interventions impose costs on the global economy, and that the Hormuz disruption proves the US can no longer conduct military operations without destabilizing the system it claims to protect.John Oliver — Oliver frames the power asymmetry as the core issue - the US pressuring Denmark is not a negotiation between equals but a superpower leveraging its dominance, which is the behavior the rules-based order was designed to preventCandace Owens — Owens frames the intervention as serving a globalist/Zionist agenda rather than American national interestsHasan Piker — Piker highlights the geopolitical timing - the strike came the day after a Chinese diplomatic visit, framing it as a direct challenge to Chinese influence in Latin AmericaScott Ritter — Ritter frames the operation as imperial hegemonic overreach establishing a new doctrine of US hemispheric controlRichard Spencer — Spencer is unusual among holders of this premise: he does not oppose American hegemony in principle but opposes this specific application of it, arguing that hegemonic resources are being spent on someone else's priorities rather than maintaining American dominance.Cenk Uygur — Uygur frames the intervention as bipartisan establishment foreign policy that persists regardless of which party or candidate is in power
Incompatible with (3)
“The Iran-Israel conflict is a civilizational struggle between Western democratic values and theocratic barbarism”Low
held by Stephen Colbert, Jordan Peterson, Dave Rubin, Marco Rubio, Ben Shapiro, Matt Walsh
The narcoterrorism and democracy framings of the US intervention in Venezuela are pretextual - the primary motivation is access to Venezuelan oil reserves and geopolitical control of the Western Hemisphere
Their wording: “If you're talking about narco-terrorism or narcotics coming into the United States, you ought to invade and capture the leader of Mexico before you capture the leader of Venezuela”
Mearsheimer dismisses both the narco-terrorism and Monroe Doctrine justifications as pretextual, arguing the operation is straightforwardly about oil extraction
Also held by (10)
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez — AOC identifies the pattern of threat inflation used to justify prior interventions, arguing that the narcoterrorism and democracy framings do not justify unilateral military invasionTucker Carlson — Carlson directly states the narco-terrorism justification is false - the fentanyl claim is pretextualStephen Colbert — Colbert uses Trump's broken peace promise to highlight the gap between rhetoric and actionGlenn Greenwald — Greenwald holds that the narco-terrorism justification is a manufactured pretext identical to the WMD claims that justified IraqJimmy Kimmel — Kimmel frames the entire operation as political distraction - the timing relative to the Epstein file releases is the real explanationDouglas Macgregor — Macgregor attacks the economic rationale by arguing the oil infrastructure is too degraded to deliver returnsHasan Piker — Piker reduces the operation to its domestic political utility - distraction from Epstein, economic failures, and broken promises - plus oil interestsScott Ritter — Ritter argues the military operation was theater - the real operation was CIA bribery of Venezuelan officials, making the 'military victory' narrative misleadingJon Stewart — Stewart's argument is that the open admission of oil motives is historically unprecedented - previous interventions at least maintained the pretense of higher purposeCenk Uygur — Uygur argues the Venezuela operation serves Israeli strategic interests - Netanyahu branded Venezuela 'in cahoots' with Iran, connecting the two targets
Incompatible with (1)
“Venezuela under Maduro operates as a narcoterrorist state that directly threatens American security through drug trafficking, alliances with Hezbollah, and harboring of criminal organizations like Tren de Aragua”Med
held by Lindsey Graham, Nikki Haley, Marco Rubio, Ben Shapiro, Donald Trump, JD Vance, Matt Walsh
Military regime change does not work in the age of nationalism - externally imposed governments lack legitimacy, resistance is inevitable, and the intervening power becomes responsible for a state it cannot govern
Their wording: “This is a case of old-fashioned imperialism - the sort that went away because it does not work in the age of nationalism”
Mearsheimer holds this as a structural claim rooted in his offensive realist framework - nationalism makes occupied populations ungovernable
Also held by (15)
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez — AOC holds this from the progressive anti-war tradition informed by the post-9/11 generation's experience watching regime change wars produce failed states rather than democraciesJoe Biden — Biden's generation of Democratic foreign policy was shaped by the Iraq War's aftermath. He opposed the 2007 surge as a Senator and consistently argues that regime change creates more problems than it solves, producing power vacuums, insurgencies, and decades-long commitments.Stephen Colbert — Colbert draws the explicit Iraq parallel - same mustachioed dictator, same oil promises, same inevitable failureNick Fuentes — Fuentes explicitly rejects nation-building - maps directly to the premise that externally imposed governance failsTulsi Gabbard — Gabbard's opposition to regime change is rooted in her Iraq deployment experience, which taught her that military force cannot create democratic governance in societies where national identity and local power dynamics reject external impositionGlenn Greenwald — Greenwald uses the Iraq parallel to argue that capturing a leader is the beginning, not the end, of a failed occupationKonstantin Kisin — Kisin warns that military action against Iran risks triggering nationalist consolidation behind the regime and regional escalation - the same pattern that made Iraq and Afghanistan catastrophic despite initial military success.Douglas Macgregor — Macgregor holds this from direct military experience and his analysis of US military overextension in Iraq and AfghanistanPiers Morgan — Morgan's worry that Iran is not Venezuela reflects skepticism that military action against a large, nationalistic, prepared adversary will produce the quick resolution that regime change advocates promise.Gavin Newsom — Newsom frames regime change failure through a governance lens, emphasizing the absence of post-intervention planning as an institutional failure that predictably produces chaosJohn Oliver — Oliver invokes the Iraq-Libya failure pattern - military regime change without a post-strike plan leads to strategic catastropheCandace Owens — Owens invokes the failure pattern of previous US interventions to predict the same outcome in VenezuelaReza Pahlavi — Pahlavi's insistence on 'from within' rather than external military action implicitly accepts that externally imposed regime change fails - he designs around this constraintScott Ritter — Ritter warns the precedent will lead to further interventions with escalating consequencesCarl Benjamin (Sargon of Akkad) — Benjamin points to the pattern of Iraq, Libya, and Syria: Western military intervention destabilizes countries, produces refugee flows that burden Western societies, and fails to achieve stated objectives.
National sovereignty is inviolable under international law; no state has the right to militarily intervene in another state or abduct its leader, regardless of that government's character
Their wording: “What the Americans did was kidnap the president of Venezuela”
Mearsheimer frames the abduction of a sitting head of state as a fundamental violation of the international order that sets dangerous precedents
Also held by (11)
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez — AOC applies anti-imperialist principles consistently, arguing that even an authoritarian government cannot be replaced by external military force without violating the people's fundamental right to self-governanceJoe Biden — Biden applies the sovereignty principle to constrain US military intervention in Venezuela, creating consistency with his Ukraine and Greenland positions. He treats sovereignty violations as corrosive to the international order regardless of the target government's character.Tucker Carlson — Carlson holds this not from an internationalist perspective but from a consistency argument - if the US violates sovereignty, it can no longer credibly condemn Russia or China for doing the sameTulsi Gabbard — Gabbard holds this as a fundamental principle derived from her military service - she has seen firsthand that violating sovereignty produces worse outcomes than the regimes being replacedJackson Hinkle — Hinkle frames the Maduro capture as a violation of sovereignty within a pattern of US imperial interventionsGavin Newsom — Newsom holds this as an institutional Democrat who frames foreign policy through legal and governance norms, arguing that US credibility depends on consistent application of the rules it championsCandace Owens — Framing the operation as a hostile takeover directly implies sovereignty violationScott Ritter — Ritter frames the operation as establishing a new doctrine of unilateral US regime change in the AmericasBernie Sanders — Sanders rejects US imperial prerogative over other nations while explicitly not defending Maduro's regimeJon Stewart — Stewart mocks the casualness with which the operation was received, implying Americans have become desensitized to sovereignty violationsCenk Uygur — Uygur characterizes the Maduro capture as a kidnapping rather than a military operation or law enforcement action