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Two years after the Trump administration imposed its first economic sanctions on Venezuela, it is evident that the sanctions have created a greater (and more harmful) impact on Venezuela’s civilian population rather than on the government itself, which has thrown the nation into one of the world’s most troubling humanitarian and refugee crises to date.
According to a recent report conducted by the US Center for Economic and Policy Research, the sanctions have been the root cause for the significant increase in harm to human life in Venezuela, amounting in “an estimated more than 40,000 deaths from 2017–2018” (Weisbrot and Sachs 2019). Additionally, the sanctions have had a disproportionately harmful effect on the nation’s most vulnerable populations, including children who can no longer attend school, people living in extreme poverty, people living with disability, and “people who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or intersex” (2019).
Given the overwhelmingly negative impact that these sanctions have had on civilian life, Trump’s policy in Venezuela must not be understood as one that is inspired by humanitarian concern. His administration’s humanitarian relief efforts are bogus; they simply demonstrate the continuation of the long-time American tradition of using humanitarianism as a reason to justify intervention in areas that are deemed geopolitically valuable.
This tendency for the United States to express concern for human rights as justification to intervene in South America can be traced back to the Cold War. The United States would claim their presence was instilling democratic values in areas politically corrupt by communism, despite the fact that such intervention often “had the opposite effect,” quietly instilling authoritarianism for US political and monetary gain (Martinez-Gugerli 2019). Alleged Cold War humanitarian air efforts in Chile and Nicaragua, in particular, are evidence of the disastrous track record that these suspicious interventions have collected over the course of several decades.
Given what we have learned of US intervention in South America from the 20th century, it is clear that the US sanctions in Venezuela is a policy ultimately motivated by gaining geopolitical power, and in this case, power in a nation rich in crude oil resources. While the Trump administration has claimed that Venezuela presents “an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security,” these claims have no reasonable foundation to stand on (Weisbrot and Sachs 2019). Members of the international community have condemned the US’ involvement in the crisis, arguing that the transition of power must be peaceful and led by neighboring South American nations who are directly impacted by Venezuela’s current instability.
By exacerbating the economic crisis, the Trump administration has inflicted a collective punishment on the civilian population of Venezuela. The Cold War tradition of condemning certain nations for erroneous human rights records, while simultaneously and strategically embracing equally harmful nations for political purposes, is alive and well. The crisis has proven to precede the sanctions, and the outcome of these disastrous foreign policy decisions are now forcing the international community to reflect on the efficacy of such tools in curtailing abusive regimes. Sanctions have continuously failed to oust oppressive regimes, and in Venezuela, it is evident that “Trump’s policies have taken an already cruel situation and made it crueler” (Marcetic 2019).
Sources:
Baddour, Dylan. “When Humanitarian Aid Is Used as a Weapon to Bring Down Regimes.” The Atlantic, Atlantic Media Company, 21 Feb. 2019, https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2019/02/venezuela-humanitarian-aidweapon-regimes/583309/.
Marcetic, Branko. “Sanctions Are Murder.” Jacobin, 5 June 2019, https://www.jacobinmag.com/2019/05/venezuela-sanctions-trump-intervention.
Martinez-Gugerli, Kristen. “Selective Intervention: Why the U.S. Presence in Venezuela, but Not Nicaragua?” Panoramas, University of Pittsburgh, 12 Mar. 2019, https://www.panoramas.pitt.edu/news-and-politics/selective-intervention-why-uspresence-venezuela-not-nicaragua.
Weisbrot, Mark, and Jeffrey Sachs. Economic Sanctions as Collective Punishment: The Case of Venezuela. Center for Economic and Policy Research, 2019, http://cepr.net/images/stories/reports/venezuela-sanctions-2019-04.pdf.