World Reframed 9: Is Venezuela really trying to start a war with ... Trinidad and Tobago
When the US picks a fight, what do you do?
“We need to make straight away the film of ‘The kidnapping, the torture and the liberation of the 252 Venezuelans who were in Nayib Bukele’s concentration camp.’ I think it would be a great success. Do you know where it would be a great success? In the United States. A film like that would be a great success - in El Salvador.”
That was Venezuela’s president Nicolás Maduro pitching what he clearly believes would be a blockbuster. The project sounds like a budget nightmare - who’s going to hire 252 leading actors for one film? And besides, the title could probably use some tightening. But behind the theatrics lies a serious message.
Maduro is furious with Donald Trump. Earlier this month, Trump ordered an airstrike on a Venezuelan boat, then another, and claimed to have carried out a third. He framed it as part of a clampdown on a state-sanctioned drug smuggling operation. International reaction was swift, since such extrajudicial killings are usually reserved for the gravest terrorist threats. Venezuela, under pressure to respond, turned to fiery rhetoric.
“If life puts us on the path of having to take up arms to begin an armed struggle against imperialist aggression, our people will do it with serenity, with certainty and also with joy,” Maduro warned.
Softer targets
Despite the tough talk, the last thing Venezuela - or any country - wants is open war with the United States. But Maduro doesn’t need to look far for smaller targets. On 14 September, Venezuela’s Defence Minister, Vladimir Padrino López, warned that if aggression were launched from the territory of Trinidad and Tobago, Venezuela would respond in “legitimate self-defence.”
Why Trinidad and Tobago? The islands have aligned themselves with US efforts to fight organised crime, including drug, arms and human trafficking. Prime Minister Kamala Persad-Bissessar has denied that her country would ever host an invasion force, but Caracas appears eager to pick a fight it might plausibly win. The disparity is stark: Venezuela has nearly 29 million people and over 123,000 active soldiers; Trinidad and Tobago, with just 1.5 million people, can muster only about 4,000. Geography, too, makes the threat plausible - only 11 kilometres separate the nations.
And yet, the two countries once shared close ties. Trinidad was ruled from Caracas until 1802, and both remain members of CARICOM. But Trump is a divisive figure across the Americas, and his policies risk driving deeper wedges between neighbours.
He, for his part, seems pleased with his strategy.
“A lot of drugs are coming out of Venezuela… They send the Tren de Aragua, that’s the gang. They’re probably the worst gang in the world. We don’t like what Venezuela is sending us—whether it’s drugs or gang members. We don’t like it. Not one bit,” Trump told reporters.
Rather than dial things down, he has expanded his warnings to Colombia, Bolivia, Myanmar and Afghanistan - accusing them too of failing to block drug shipments. The prospect of US strikes in or around those countries suddenly feels less remote. International law, of course, forbids such attacks in international waters unless a vessel poses an imminent threat. A fishing boat, even if packed with cocaine, hardly qualifies. But the US has long been lukewarm about international enforcement mechanisms, recently going so far as to sanction members of the International Criminal Court.
That leaves smaller nations exposed. Venezuela has not only targeted Trinidad and Tobago but also escalated tensions with Guyana, reviving old claims to an oil-rich border region. Trinidad’s support for Guyana in that dispute has only fuelled animosity.
In all of this, it’s the ordinary people—especially fishermen—who end up losing. Boats seized, livelihoods destroyed, and lives caught in the middle of geopolitical posturing.
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World Reframed is produced in London by Global South World, part of the Impactum Group. Its editors are Duncan Hooper and Ismail Akwei.
This story is written and edited by the Global South World team, you can contact us here.
