Down with US Imperialism! Statement from Hands off Venezuela

Early on 3rd January 2026 the USA carried out military strikes on Venezuelan territory and took President Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, prisoner. There were explosions in several locations including six in the capital, Caracas and others including La Guaira, Miranda, Aragua and El Higuerote. It is reported that 80 people, military and civilian, have been killed.

All this comes after a campaign of bombing and strafing small vessels off the Venezuelan coast, causing at least a hundred deaths, and the theft of three Venezuelan oil tankers by US navy forces, and decades of economic sanctions and destabilisation.

This is all being done with the aim of restoring USA domination and control over the resources of central and South America to ensure that more profit flows to US-based corporations as opposed to providing benefits to the Venezuelan masses or being siphoned off by Chinese and Russian profiteers.

In other words it is pure, old-fashioned imperialist bullying.  Venezuela has the world’s largest proven oil reserves, which Washington now seeks to control.

In the words of the US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio:

“This is the Western Hemisphere. This is where we live, and we’re not going to allow the Western Hemisphere to be a base of operation for adversaries, competitors, and rivals of the United States. It’s as simple as that.”

The old adage states that you reap what you sow. The repercussions of the actions of the military personnel of the USA, acting under the direct orders of Trump, will open up a veritable Pandora’s Box with economic, political and social consequences. Since the end of WW2, on multiple occasions the USA has used its economic and military power to destabilise, invade and overthrow any elected government in the Americas that it, the USA, thought would be threat to USA interests and in doing so stated that its actions were in the interests of democracy while trampling on the democratic wishes of the peoples of these invaded countries.

Venezuela is now the latest Latin American country to be in the firing line of the USA. Under the guise of fighting back against narco-trafficking, US military personnel have bombed civilian and military targets in Venezuela and have kidnapped the Venezuelan President, Nicolas Maduro, and his wife, Cilia Flores, an elected deputy in the National Assembly. Every gain for the workers, peasants and poor under the auspices of the Bolivarian Revolution, are now under threat. Trump has declared that the USA will “run” Venezuela and in doing so will attempt to open up Venezuelan oil and mineral resources to US companies. It is precisely the oil revenues that have enabled the social misiones to alleviate living standards for millions of Venezuelans. Many of these gains had already been eroded under Maduro, but the defence of these gains was the task of the Venezuelan workers. Trump has now trampled on these rights. 

Whatever happens now will depend on a number of factors. Will there be an enthusiastic defence of the Bolivarian Revolution given the last decade of massive falls in living conditions for millions of ordinary citizens in Venezuela. Will there be any enthusiasm or even desire to defend the remnants of the Maduro government? What is the mood amongst the rank and file of the Venezuelan Armed Forces and the popular militias based on workplaces and barrios? A few hours ago, Jeremy Bowen of the BBC, posted an article quoting the New York Times which had itself reported a wargame exercise carried out last October which had come to the conclusion that the fall of Maduro would result in “violent chaos as armed gangs competed for power”. 

We have already seen in the recent past the chaos that has been unleashed in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria, not to mention Haiti, as a result of USA interventions. Despite the nature of the Maduro government, which has consistently rolled back many of the gains of the Bolivarian Revolution, we in HoV unequivocally condemn the actions of the Trump administration. We also condemn the feeble excuses of Keir Starmer for not condemning the invasion and kidnapping of an elected Head of State. Allegedly, Starmer has to be in possession of the full facts before making any statement and he will only have these full facts after consulting his US counterparts. Enough said! 

Our demands are straightforward. Release Nicolas Maduro and Cilia Flores. Withdraw all US personnel from Venezuela. And finally, we can appeal to governments in different parts of the world or even to the UN to condemn the actions of Trump, but the only force that can affect any opposition to the desire of Trump and US Imperialism to once again resurrect the 1823 Monroe Doctrine of Latin American subservience to the USA is the international labour movement. We therefore call upon the leaders of the trade unions in Britain to organise with their international counterparts to carry out measures to isolate economically the USA as the only way to defend the interests of the majority of the Venezuelan people.

We say: Hands Off Venezuela! Down with imperialism!