In the days since U.S. Delta Force detained Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores on grounds related to drug and weapons charges, there have been frantic questions about the operation. Why would President Trump direct something so brazen and, potentially, illegal? What is the U.S. government’s plan for Venezuela’s future? And now that we’ve pulled off the audacious kidnapping of a head of state and essentially taken over a foreign country, could it happen again?
At the moment, Trump is renewing threats to take Greenland, the island territory under Danish administration that he says is strategically important for national security. It would be difficult for Greenland and Denmark to mount any sort of significant defense should Trump decide on a military operation to take the island, according to David Silbey, a professor of history at Cornell University specializing in military history and defense policy.
“Denmark is not a country that can resist particularly effectively,” Silbey said in an interview. “[Trump] picks on weaker targets to get what he wants.” Denmark is a part of NATO, and a U.S. takeover of Greenland could constitute an attack on a member state. But the ability and appetite of other NATO members to push back on U.S. power is probably limited, Silbey said—regardless of the alliance’s serious rhetoric of late.
It’s ludicrous for Trump to mount a takeover of Greenland; current defense treaties already allow the U.S. broad latitude to install defense materiel and personnel on the island. And U.S. companies could almost certainly have a crack at the rare earth minerals Greenland has, too, through ordinary business contracts. But that doesn’t suit what Silbey sees as Trump’s desire to dominate the Western Hemisphere through acquisition.
“I think he’s also realizing that he’s a lot less constrained in foreign policy than he is in domestic policy,” Silbey said. “The courts have, in a limited way and tentatively, been constraining him a bit at home; there’s very few countries that can do that to the United States abroad. And so suddenly Trump is running rampant and enjoying himself.”
Trump Has Also Threatened Colombia
Though Trump has been in a prolonged spat with Colombian President Gustavo Petro, with the Treasury Department taking the extraordinary step of sanctioning Petro and a number of his family members last September, it would make even less sense to try to topple Petro than it did to take over Venezuela. (Though Trump has claimed that Petro himself is involved in the trafficking of cocaine, there’s no evidence to support that.)
That’s primarily because Petro’s time in power is drawing to a close; he is limited to one term, and the new election season starts in March. There are two front-runners at the moment, one from the right wing and one who would essentially continue Petro’s policies, plus a slew of more centrist candidates who will struggle to break through.
The U.S. could intervene in the presidential election, similar to Trump’s successful efforts to sway midterm legislative elections in Argentina via a $20 billion credit lifeline, as well as the presidential election in Honduras last year. But there’s a question of how successful that intervention might be, according to Sebastian Bitar, an associate professor at the Alberto Lleras Camargo School of Government at the University of the Andes, Colombia. Abelardo de la Espriella, the right-wing candidate, “is trying to get Trump’s approval every day,” Bitar said in an interview. “He’s just saying beautiful things about Trump all day.” But the voting population may not be so easily swayed.
“I think that [a Trump endorsement] might have an influence on donors to campaigns, and through that mechanism, maybe that can have some impact,” Bitar said. “But I wouldn’t overstate it. I wouldn’t think it’s as large as Trump would like it to be.” Colombia’s relationship with the U.S. is important to voters for security reasons; the U.S. has provided military capacity-building, intelligence sharing, and materiel for decades to suppress the drug trade and guerrilla conflict, which benefits both countries. But voters are much more concerned with internal domestic issues—managing inflation, fighting corruption, ensuring the government’s ability to combat drug smuggling, and containing the country’s expanding militias. While continued U.S. security cooperation certainly contributes to those issues, it is not the only deciding factor.
UPDATE: Trump and Petro had a conciliatory phone call on Wednesday, discussing Trump’s attack on Venezuela and Colombia’s efforts to stem cocaine production and trade. The White House has extended an invitation to Petro, although it is unclear when that meeting will take place.
Long-Term, Rubio Has His Sights Set on Cuba
Many observers see last weekend’s Venezuela operation as a setup to weaken Cuba and, eventually, collapse the government of Miguel Díaz-Canel, the successor to Raúl Castro, brother of Communist revolutionary Fidel.
When it comes to Cuba, there isn’t much there for the U.S. to plunder, like the oil reserves in Venezuela. Trump has not signaled a major appetite to intervene, and seems to think that the Cuban government will fall on its own. But there are still Cuba hawks and lots of anti-Communist Cuban Americans (particularly in vote-rich Florida) who might want to see regime change—most significantly, Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
“Cuba has always been a strategic point as a gateway to the Americas,” Daniel Pedreira, a professor in the Department of Politics and International Relations at Florida International University, said. There could be strategic imperatives for the U.S. to have an increased foothold in Cuba, including as a vantage point to observe drug trafficking and immigration patterns as well as political changes throughout Latin America.
Under the Chávez and Maduro governments, Cuba traded medical personnel for oil, which the country used to power its own grid as well as sell on the international market in exchange for foreign currency for trade. The lack of that commodity will certainly cause severe economic challenges for the island, but the flow of Venezuelan oil had already diminished in recent years. Mexico stepped up its oil exports to Cuba in 2024, and the European Union has provided some humanitarian assistance as well, but it’s unclear what that aid looks like post-Maduro.
Much of the Cuban American population wants to see business and trade relationships with the island, and many would support U.S.-led regime change, according to Pedreira. But there is a long history of U.S. military intervention and occupation of Cuba going back to the Spanish-American War of 1898. Despite the dire economic situation in the country, the majority of the Cuban people are unlikely to welcome or even accept such an intervention.
“Going into Cuba would mean pretty much starting from the ground up and rebuilding an entire country,” Pedreira said. “Whereas Venezuela, there’s some sectors that you may have to focus on, but generally, it’s not falling apart like Cuba has been for a while now, especially now with all these different crises that have emerged and converged at the same time,” including rolling blackouts, a crumbling health sector, and environmental disasters like Hurricane Melissa.
Regardless of what the U.S. does in Cuba—intervene somehow or goad the government into falling—there will need to be a significant flood of humanitarian assistance and capacity-building, and it’s not clear that the Trump administration has an appetite for such an endeavor.
And Then There’s Iran
The history of the Iranian regime reinforces the pitfalls of U.S. intervention. The 1953 U.S.-enabled coup that toppled democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh installed the autocratic (but friendly to the U.S. and other Western oil interests) Shah Reza Pahlavi. His reign spurred a backlash that triggered the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
Since the hostage crisis over 45 years ago, Iran has had varying levels of conflict with the U.S., which usually plays out in diplomatic or clandestine actions, like the Stuxnet virus unleashed on Iranian nuclear facilities in the early 2000s. Relations with Iran are at a low point right now mostly due to the regime’s ongoing conflict with Israel, but also because of the failure to come to a new agreement about the country’s nuclear development since Trump dismantled the JCPOA agreement in his first term.
That long-term conflict already puts Iran in Trump’s crosshairs, coupled with Israel’s repeated attacks on Iranian soil as part of its war on Gaza and Trump’s own willingness to use force against the regime (including a bombing campaign against nuclear sites last year and the assassination of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps commander Qassem Soleimani early in 2020). There’s always a possibility that Trump and his administration might try to push regime change in Iran.
It might not happen soon, though Trump is threatening action in the face of ongoing protests against the regime over abysmal economic conditions. But that doesn’t negate the possibility that the administration would try in the future, according to Ali Vaez, the Iran Project director at the International Crisis Group.
“If you look at it from an Iranian perspective, first, the regime is quite concerned, because it knows that President Trump has taken ‘madman theory’ to new heights,” Vaez said in an interview. “He has also proven that he is not just willing, but able to take big risks, because in the case of Iran, he ordered the killing of Soleimani in 2020; he attacked Iran in 2025 and so I do think that they take his threat seriously, and the fact that they don’t know what form it would take, whether it’s covert or overt, kinetic or non-kinetic action, adds to their dilemmas.”
Israel’s more aggressive stance toward Iran is also a factor; Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu could try and make a case for broader joint action to Trump.
But it would undoubtedly result in a quagmire for the administration for a number of reasons. For one, the regime is so deeply entrenched in the economy and society, and has been for decades, that removing the top players would be unlikely to change much on the ground, much less the country’s relationship with the U.S. But more to the point, the U.S. would face much more significant military pushback in Iran than it did in Venezuela.
“Iran is still a state that, although it’s been weakened, it is not weak,” Vaez said. “It is still a country that has the ability to inflict significant harm on the U.S. and its interests in the region. It’s important to remember that Iran didn’t use any of its short-range missiles and naval capabilities [in its retaliatory June attacks on the U.S.’s Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar] that could inflict significant harm on U.S. bases in the region.”
The Floodgates Aren’t Just Open for Trump
China and Russia might also try to mount military operations or kidnappings in their own backyards now that Trump has set that precedent in Venezuela. Though kidnapping Maduro and targeting other nations may be in part an effort to counter Chinese and Russian influence in the Western Hemisphere, it also means U.S. military power is occupied. That could give China an opening to attack Taiwan, or Russia the chance to kidnap Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Still, the U.S. hasn’t exactly abandoned Taiwan; in December, the administration announced a $11.1 billion arms package for the island, the largest ever. And the U.S. and European allies just committed to security guarantees for Ukraine should a cease-fire agreement with Russia come to fruition.