Trump’s ‘peace through strength’ doctrine is being tested across three regions, as the White House pairs anti-interventionist rhetoric with rapid, forceful action in Venezuela, Nigeria and the Middle East.
Nearly a year after returning to office promising to be a “peacemaker and unifier,” President Donald Trump has ordered large-scale military strikes in Venezuela and announced the capture and removal of Nicolás Maduro, the country’s leftist strongman. The raid, launched at the start of the new year, follows a Christmas Day operation in Nigeria that Trump said targeted jihadists behind attacks on Christians. And hours before the Venezuela strike, the president warned that U.S. forces were “locked and loaded” should Iran’s clerical leadership move to crush anti-government protests.
- Advertisement -
The escalation illustrates a defining paradox of Trump’s second term: a public rejection of “so-called nation-builders” paired with a readiness to use power swiftly, unilaterally and in short bursts, while disavowing long-term commitments. It also spotlights how the administration interprets “peace through strength”—a Reagan-era mantra—less as a deterrent against war than as a justification for rapid, punitive use of force.
The White House said Maduro faced a U.S. warrant on drug charges and framed the strikes as law enforcement and security actions against a regime deemed illegitimate by much of the West following contested elections. Maduro’s government remains a United Nations member state, complicating the legal rationale. Details of Maduro’s capture and transfer out of the country could not be independently verified, and the administration did not immediately provide evidence of his status or location.
Criticism arrived swiftly from Capitol Hill. Sen. Ruben Gallego, a Democrat and Iraq War veteran, called Venezuela “the second unjustified war in my lifetime,” while acknowledging Maduro’s authoritarian rule. “It’s embarrassing that we went from the world cop to the world bully in less than one year. There is no reason for us to be at war with Venezuela,” he posted on X, formerly Twitter.
Supporters of the president argue that decisive operations, tightly defined in scope and duration, restore U.S. credibility and deter adversaries without the costs and quagmires of open-ended occupations. “We’re making peace through strength,” Trump said at a recent rally in Pennsylvania, channeling a line he has frequently invoked since returning to the White House on Jan. 20 last year.
But the administration’s approach blurs the line between deterrence and intervention. In rapid sequence over the past year, Trump authorized strikes inside Syria after the killing of U.S. personnel and supported Israeli action by ordering attacks on Iranian nuclear sites, according to his advisers—moves that mark a dramatic expansion of military activity without the layered coalition building that defined earlier eras. He also rebranded the Pentagon as the “Department of War,” a symbolic flourish that underscores his willingness to abandon post–World War II norms around the language and practice of U.S. power.
Trump’s positioning departs from the George W. Bush model of democracy-promotion and state-building yet retains its unilateral edge. “America First” has translated not into isolationism, but into a preference for swift, high-impact strikes aimed at resetting adversaries’ calculations. The administration contends that such operations—unburdened by stabilization plans—are more honest and less costly. Critics counter that they sidestep law, alienate allies and risk cycles of escalation that ultimately draw the United States deeper into conflict.
Venezuela crystallizes the tensions. The administration cites Maduro’s alleged criminality and the regime’s human rights abuses as justification. Yet the capture of a sitting leader, even one widely denounced as illegitimate, tests international norms and U.S. treaty obligations. The legal argument relies on domestic charges for a foreign head of state whose government enjoys U.N. recognition. It also creates an immediate question: Who governs Venezuela now? Washington has not outlined a stabilization plan, and Trump’s aides have long decried “nation-building”—a posture that could leave a power vacuum or empower competing factions on the ground.
The Nigeria strike amplifies the administration’s willingness to use force against nonstate actors in regions where the United States has limited basing and fragile partnerships. The White House described the Christmas Day operation as a response to extremist violence against Christians, a message likely to resonate with parts of Trump’s domestic coalition. But it also highlights the challenge of sustaining pressure against dispersed jihadist networks without local political strategies.
The Iran warning, meanwhile, signals a willingness to deter crackdowns through the credible threat of force. By declaring U.S. forces “locked and loaded,” Trump attempted to widen the costs of repression in Tehran. Such deterrence by punishment can alter short-term calculus. Over time, however, it risks miscalculation, especially after reported U.S.-linked strikes on Iranian infrastructure and the heightened volatility that follows visible red lines.
The contradictions run through Trump’s own narrative. He has long castigated the Iraq invasion and mocked “so-called nation-builders,” even as he expands the circumstances under which Washington is prepared to pull the trigger. He has dismissed multilateral constraints—downplaying the United Nations and other conventions—while insisting that shows of strength deliver a faster route to peace than diplomacy. Foreign rivals watch for openings; allies watch for process, consultation and predictability.
In an irony not lost on detractors, the latest Nobel Peace Prize went to Venezuelan opposition figure María Corina Machado—an award Trump has coveted and cited as validation of his worldview. And FIFA president Gianni Infantino last month presented Trump a prize for “exceptional and extraordinary actions to promote peace and unity around the world,” an honor that jarred with the president’s harsh rhetoric toward migrants and domestic opponents. The juxtaposition underscores a central tension: symbolic awards and slogans on the one hand, kinetic action on the other.
What happens next will determine whether the administration’s thesis holds: that measured but forceful action can impose order and avoid the entanglements of previous decades. The unanswered questions are mounting. In Venezuela, who assumes authority, and on what legal basis? In Nigeria, how does Washington prevent jihadist regrouping without embedding deeply in local politics? In Iran, what threshold—if any—would trigger direct U.S. intervention, and how would the White House prevent a limited action from spiraling?
Trump’s first year back in office has made one fact plain: “Peace through strength” is no longer mere slogan. It is an operating system, designed for speed and shock. Whether it delivers durable stability—or multiplies risks without resolution—will shape the presidency’s legacy and the United States’ standing long after the strikes stop.
By Abdiwahab Ahmed
Axadle Times international–Monitoring.
