President Donald Trump has dropped some heavy hints that this weekend's military operation in Caracas and the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro may be the start of a series of foreign military interventions.
The man who ran on a campaign promise of ending foreign wars but who authorised attacks in seven countries in 2025 now appears eager to unleash the US military whenever necessary to achieve his sweeping geopolitical vision, which includes American hegemony of the Western Hemisphere and limited strikes globally on groups he regards as hostile to US interests.
During a news conference after Saturday's attack that ended in the capture of Mr Maduro and his wife, Mr Trump made a reference to the “Don-roe Doctrine”, a play on the 1823 policy of James Monroe, the fifth US president, who said European colonial powers should not interfere in the Americas.
That policy has been criticised as being used to justify US invasions and interventions in Latin America that have had damaging results. But Mr Trump has embraced the doctrine; his national security strategy for the coming year refers to a “Trump corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine.
“American dominance in the Western Hemisphere will never be questioned again,” Mr Trump said. “I will never allow terrorists and criminals to operate with impunity against the United States. This extremely successful operation should serve as warning to anyone who would threaten American sovereignty or endanger American lives.”
Earlier on Saturday, Mr Trump hinted that the possible next target could be Mexico, which the US President says is being run by drug cartels.
In an interview with Fox News, he said that while he liked the country's President Claudia Sheinbaum, “something's going to have to be done with Mexico” to stop drugs coming across the US border.
Another likely target for US military intervention is Colombia, whose leftist President Gustavo Petro has been a frequent source of condemnation from the Trump administration because of his perceived failure to clamp down on drug trafficking.
“It sounds good to me,” Mr Trump said on Sunday when asked if there would be a military operation in Colombia.
And Cuba, a key ally of Venezuela, remains under a magnifying glass. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, whose parents were Cuban immigrants, has long spoken out against Havana's communist government.
“The Cuban government is a huge problem,” Mr Rubio told NBC News on Sunday when asked if Cuba will be the Trump administration's next target. “I think they're in a lot of trouble, yes.”
Added to the three Latin American countries, Greenland is also back in focus, as well as the Panama Canal. Mr Trump early last year suggested a US takeover of both, by force if necessary.
In a message on X, Katie Miller, who is married to Stephen Miller, the senior Trump adviser seen as a main driving force in US foreign policy, wrote “Soon” alongside an image of Greenland covered in an American flag.
Saturday's raid drowned out what on a normal day would have been major international news, when Mr Trump posted that the US could militarily intervene in Iran.
“If Iran [shoots] and violently kills peaceful protesters, which is their custom, the United States of America will come to their rescue. We are locked and loaded and ready to go,” he wrote on Truth Social.
Just in the past year, Mr Trump has ordered attacks in Somalia, Iraq, Yemen, Iran, Venezuela, Syria and Nigeria.
In many of these attacks, the Trump administration has pushed ahead with little or no congressional action. It is clear it holds the concept of international law largely in contempt.
The Republican-led Congress has shown itself to be wilfully impotent at demanding legal authorisation for Mr Trump's military interventions and conservatives have quickly circled the wagons to defend his abduction of a foreign president.
Mr Trump claims to have ended eight wars. It is more complicated than that, and he deserves credit for trying to use American clout to resolve long-standing conflicts.
But without any pushback from Congress, and with loyalists from his Make America Great Again – for the most part – jumping in line to support their leader, there is no reason to think 2026 will not involve further US interventions around the world, the consequences of which are impossible to predict.
