Caracas and Washington on collision course

Feb 11, 2026 Editorial, News

(Kaieteur News) – Early indications are that Venezuelans have grown tired of the Americans. It didn’t take quite a month, since the abrupt removal of former President Nicolas Maduro, for the uneven relationship to start fraying at the edges.

The Venezuelans, led by interim President Delcy Rodrigues, have had enough. Enough of the infuriating, humiliating presence of Trump’s men on the ground, and enough with the orders originating in Washington. One didn’t have to be a palm reader, or an intellectual of any great standing, to know that the arrangement being forced down the throats of Venezuelans didn’t have much prospects of lasting too long.

Acting president Rodriguez made her country’s position clear. “Let Venezuelan politics resolve our differences and our internal conflicts. This republic has paid a very high price for having to confront the consequences of fascism and extremism in our country.” In other words, get out, go home, and stay there. The Americans with Donald Trump in the driver’s seat have their eyes on the oil, Venezuela’s much coveted treasure. Venezuelans have their own eyes set on seeing the backs of the Americans, and only for them to come back when invited.

Other countries should watch and draw their conclusions about where the world tilts today, and who is doing the tilting. The US is the new United Nations, and it had also set itself up as the new World Court. Smaller countries are free to resist, but they do so at their own peril, if there’s no stomach to let others push them around, and decide for them on the way to run their countries. Countries that are rich in natural resources are higher on the risk scale, with Venezuela and Greenland standing as the current main exhibits on the reach of US power. There’s utter contempt for international law, longstanding conventions, and the rights of sovereignty. Respect for the rule of law is now as low as it has been in a long time.

Guyana is a classic example of a resource rich country that have the Americans snatching the wealth of the country right out of the grasp of the country. In return for protection from a big, covetous neighbour, and a small pocketbook of cash, Americans grab almost a million barrels of oil daily, and all but exercise control over the governance moves of Guyana, as such relate to the management of the nation’s oil. If that seems like a parallel of what is unfolding in Venezuela, Guyana has been there for almost a decade. What Venezuela’s shaky leadership structure is now experiencing in 2026, Guyanese leaders have lived with since 2016. The oil wealth belongs to Guyana, but it is controlled by Americans, with two differences.

US hegemony is more nuanced with a seemingly hands-off approach to national affairs, in direct contrast to the barreling juggernaut that is US foreign policy for Venezuela and its massive reservoirs of oil. President Trump has been very open about his objectives in Venezuela, and his zeal towards getting his kind of leaders there to assure success to his dangerous foreign policy adventure. This is what has tired Venezuela’s makeshift leadership architecture in these early days of the post-Maduro era, and against which there is restless chafing. The second difference of note is that Guyanese leaders, with the incumbent PPPC Government in the forefront, are quite content to be watercarriers for US oil interests in Guyana, and to jump to attention in anticipation of the next command from Washington or Texas. Venezuelan leadership has had enough of the smugly arrogant Americans, and have had enough of their orders. Guyanese leadership cannot wait for the next order to come, so as to fall in line, with heels clicking smartly.

Delcy Rodriguez is an uncertain political figure, but she has shown that there is some steel in her spine, in standing up to the US schoolyard bully. A woman could have that kind of national pride in Venezuela, while right here, the men (and they are mostly men) cower before the Americans. They compete with one another to sellout the wealth of Guyanese for pennies, and betray the interests of the people who trust them to do their best for them.

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Caracas, Delcy Rodrigues, Editorial, Nicolás Maduro, Washington

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