The question sounds insane at first. Yet nothing about Venezuela feels normal now. The country collapsed. People starve. Hospitals resemble war zones. Millions flee by foot. And the world watches a disaster that did not appear from nothing. The US helped build the system that failed. It pressured Venezuela for decades. It weaponised the dollar, it tightened sanctions, it pushed the country into a spiral that shattered every pillar of daily life. Therefore the debate returns with brutal intensity. If the US helped break Venezuela, should the US now free it? And if analysts predict a short conflict, does intervention make sense?
The manufactured collapse: How the US helped create the disaster
Washington shaped modern Venezuela long before Maduro appeared. Oil made Caracas important. Oil also made it fragile. The US demanded compliance. It punished any leader who nationalised resources. It destabilised any government that rejected American corporate power. The Cold War never ended in Latin America. It only changed its tools.
Coups replaced diplomacy. Sanctions replaced treaties. Currency sabotage replaced direct confrontation. Therefore Venezuela broke under two forces. One force came from internal corruption. The other came from the world’s strongest superpower. The Global South saw another familiar pattern. When a state tries to act independently, the financial architecture begins to crush it.
The currency war: The silent weapon that crushed the nation
Hyperinflation exploded only after Washington restricted Venezuela’s access to global banking. Dollars vanished. Imports dried up. Industry died. Salaries turned worthless. A doctor earned less than a restaurant bill in the United States. The bolívar dissolved into nothing.
This was not magic. This was financial warfare. The same tactic appeared in Iran, Cuba, Iraq, and many African economies. The US did not need to invade. It only needed to choke the currency. And Venezuela fell into darkness.
The humanitarian catastrophe: A country without relief
The crisis destroyed everyday life. Hospitals lost power. Surgeons operated without anesthesia. Doctors cleaned instruments with cheap alcohol because sterilisation machines stopped working. Cancer patients died waiting for medicine. Children fainted in classrooms from hunger. Pharmacies stocked nothing. Blackouts killed elderly people on ventilators. Pregnant women walked for hours because ambulances had no fuel.
Nothing about the catastrophe feels abstract. It cuts skin, it spills blood. It follows families to borders when they flee on foot. Millions ran into Colombia and Brazil with broken shoes and empty pockets. Venezuela became one of the largest humanitarian collapses in the world without a war.
Who is truly responsible? Shared failure, unequal power
Maduro built a corrupt state. He imprisoned opponents, he ruined institutions. He stole billions. Yet the collapse did not begin with him alone. The US accelerated the downfall with sanctions, covert operations, and financial pressure. Both actors broke the country. However, one actor holds global power. One actor shapes global finance. One actor controls intelligence networks across continents. Therefore the burden of responsibility is not equal.
The narco state: When a government merges with organised crime
Venezuela did not fall only because of corruption or sanctions. It fell because the state fused with organised crime. The military commands major drug routes. High-ranking officers run cocaine corridors through the Caribbean. Intelligence units guard shipments instead of borders. The regime funds itself with smuggling money because the formal economy died long ago. Therefore the line between state and cartel no longer exists.
This shift changed everything. It turned politics into a criminal enterprise., it gave the government a financial lifeline that sanctions could not sever. It armed loyalists with cash from trafficking networks. And it created a security apparatus that protects profits, not citizens. The “Cartel of the Suns” became the real structure of power, not the ministries in Caracas.
Citizens joining gangs
Consequently humanitarian collapse and criminal power now reinforce each other. Desperate citizens join gangs because hunger leaves no alternatives. Smugglers operate freely because the state benefits from chaos. Police shake down civilians for bribes because salaries buy nothing. The regime survives because criminal money fills the vacuum left by the destroyed economy.
This reality complicates any future intervention. A narco-state does not surrender like a normal state. It fights like a cartel. It hides weapons in civilian zones. And it protects drug routes with the same intensity that other nations protect national borders. And its leaders fear prison more than defeat. Therefore analysts cannot treat Venezuela as a conventional military problem. They must treat it as a hybrid of dictatorship, militia network, and criminal syndicate with a flag.
A state built on trafficking will not collapse cleanly. It will not negotiate easily; it will not accept exile. It will defend its illicit economy until the last moment because that economy keeps the elite alive. And this raises a darker question: how does the world deal with a government that behaves like a cartel while pretending to be a state?
What would “freeing Venezuela” actually mean?
Freeing Venezuela means more than removing Maduro. It means rebuilding a country that collapsed under corruption, sanctions, and economic sabotage. And it means restoring electricity, medicine, and food; it means ending the era of empty pharmacies and surgeries without anesthesia. It means reopening the country to global trade so factories run again and salaries buy something real; it means building courts that work, police that protect, and institutions that do not rot from inside. It means giving Venezuelans a functioning currency instead of worthless paper. And it means opening the country to investment so people can live normal lives rather than escaping by foot across borders.
Is a US military intervention justified now?
The dilemma grows sharper. The US helped create the disaster. The disaster now kills civilians every hour. Does that give Washington the right to intervene? Or the responsibility to intervene? History complicates every answer. US interventions rarely match their promises. Iraq was supposed to last weeks. Afghanistan was supposed to end fast. Libya was supposed to stabilise quickly. Every time, chaos replaced stability.
Analysts argue that Venezuela would collapse in days. Yet analysts also argued that Iraq would greet US troops with flowers. Venezuela has militias. It has colectivos. It has Cuban intelligence officers. Caracas could become another Fallujah.
What would “liberation” look like on the ground?
Liberation sounds clean. Reality never matches that image. If the US removed Maduro, someone must govern the ruins. Someone must restore order. Someone must rebuild. Washington usually installs client states aligned with US corporate interests. That pattern appears in Iraq, Afghanistan, and post-Gaddafi Libya. Therefore the question returns. Would Venezuela gain freedom or become another dependency wrapped in new banners?
Some Venezuelans might welcome intervention because hunger kills faster than ideology. Others would resist a foreign military, even if they hate Maduro. The result could become unpredictable street warfare.
The ethical dilemma: Responsibility versus hypocrisy
Ethics collide with geopolitics. The US helped create the catastrophe. Venezuelans now suffer in ways few societies can imagine. Surgeries without anesthesia belong in the nineteenth century, not in a country with the world’s largest oil reserves. Something must happen. Yet intervention from the same power that helped engineer the destruction carries the stench of hypocrisy. Latin America remembers every coup, every invasion, every puppet regime.
Conclusion: Rescue or repetition?
Venezuela collapsed under corruption and external pressure. The humanitarian crisis reaches medieval levels. Millions flee. Children starve. Doctors operate without anesthesia. The country cannot save itself. The world refuses to act.
Therefore the question remains open: should the US attack Venezuela to free it? It might save lives. It might rebuild the country. But it might also repeat a century of imperial disasters. The answer depends on whether history guides the judgment or whether desperation demands a new, dangerous gamble.
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