President Trump recently had an extraordinary success in Venezuela, capturing drug lord dictator Nicolas Maduro. In addition to serving as Secretary of State, National Security Adviser, Administrator of USAID, and Chief Archivist of the U.S. government, the president appears to have also appointed Marco Rubio to be the interim president of Venezuela.
During the press conference announcing Maduro’s capture, President Trump said that the United States would “be running” Venezuela. Reports indicate that Secretary Rubio has been assigned to this portfolio. This is understandable. To prevent chaos, you need your most capable hand to navigate the turmoil. But also, we should be working quickly to hand the country back to the people of Venezuela. We tried running Iraq, and it did not turn out well.
Let me go through the reasons why. First of all, Rubio is very smart, but Venezuelans know more about their own country than any American does. Second, Most Venezuelans lived in a time when their country was a democracy, unlike in Iraq and Afghanistan, and have the culture and experience of a democratic government. Third, and most importantly, every hour Rubio spends on Venezuela is an hour not spent on China, Russia, and Iran. So while it makes sense that we should be focused on Venezuela in the near future, it also makes sense to give the country back to its rightful owners, the people of Venezuela.
We learned in Iraq that we cannot run a country about which we know little. Instead, what we got was more than ten years of focus there, which distracted us from China and Russia. It will be terrible if we repeat the same mistake.
Instead, President Trump has built enormous leverage over Venezuela and its current government, who live in fear of also being arrested or killed. He is also worried that the country could become unstable and turn into chaos. As a result, he should force them to smoothly give up power and hand it to an elected government. Here’s the todo list:
• First, demand that they release all political prisoners and allow Maria Machado back into Venezuela;
• Second, force the new president, Delcy Rodriguez, to fire Diastado Cabello, the minister of interior in charge of domestic oppression, and Vladimir Padrino López, the minister of defense, who, I kid you not, was named after Vladimir Lenin; both are under U.S. indictments for drug trafficking;
• Third, kick out Iranians and Cubans;
• Fourth, get Rodriguez to announce free elections with international observers.
President Trump has few equals when it comes stick and carrot negotiating. We already have the stick. Here comes the carrot: Grab the money you have stolen from Venezuelans and go wherever you want. The problem is that, since the creation of the International Criminal Court (ICC), it is difficult to convince people to leave. They fear that they could be tried at the ICC and spend the rest of their lives in a prison cell. So Trump and Rubio should work with the ICC to grant Venezuelan regime officials immunity to live where they want, as long as they leave Venezuela.
Trump did what nobody thought was doable -- especially media hungry Democrats. Now, we should avoid getting bogged down there. 30 million Venezuelans had been begging us to liberate them. If we help them restore their democracy, for a generation, nobody will be elected dog catcher in Venezuela without telling their constituents how much they love America. But if we try to stay there perpetually, or keep a friendly dictatorship in power, they will eventually chase us out, as they did in Afghanistan and Iraq, and we will never gain influence there.