President Donald Trump has unveiled what he calls the ‘Donroe Doctrine,’ a significant moment on the global stage.

This doctrine is inspired by the Monroe Doctrine, a foreign policy initiative introduced by President James Monroe back in 1823.

Similar to Monroe’s original stance, Trump’s doctrine emphasizes American authority throughout the Western Hemisphere, essentially granting Washington the prerogative to oversee its own region.

Additionally, the doctrine acknowledges the existence of other global ‘spheres of influence’ where America should exercise caution and allow other powers to take the lead.

Analysts suggest this could impact situations like Ukraine’s ongoing struggle against Russian aggression and the potential threat of a Chinese invasion of Taiwan.

By embracing this policy, Trump could face criticism from his ‘America First’ supporters, as it opens the door to U.S. involvement in other nations within the Western Hemisphere.

But they are likely to back the move to leave the rest of the globe more to its own devices.

Any foreign interventions in America’s back yard are, however, likely to draw accusations of violating international law, including from some allies.

The capture of Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela was the first example of the doctrine in action.

But President Trump’s recent comments signaled the possibility of expanding military action to countries like Colombia and Mexico over drug trafficking accusations.

The president is also using the Monroe Doctrine as he reupped his threat to take over the Danish territory of Greenland for the sake of U.S. security interests.

‘We need Greenland from the standpoint of national security,’ he said after the Maduro raid.

Leaders from major European powers rallied behind Greenland on Tuesday, saying in a joint statement that the Arctic island belongs to its people.

‘Greenland belongs to its people. It is for Denmark and Greenland, and them only, to decide on matters concerning Denmark and Greenland,’ said the statement by leaders of France, Britain, Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain, and Denmark.

Notably, on December 2, the anniversary of the Monroe Doctrine’s founding, Trump issued a message from the White House.

He said: ‘Today, my Administration proudly reaffirms this promise under a new “Trump Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine: That the American people – not foreign nations nor globalist institutions – will always control their own destiny in our hemisphere.’

Just days later, planning for a potential military raid to capture Maduro began.

At his press conference after Maduro’s capture, President Trump was even clearer on how the Monroe Doctrine is influencing his strategic foreign policy.

He accused Venezuela of stealing ‘massive oil infrastructure’ and being guilty of a ‘gross violation of the core principles of American foreign policy, dating back more than two centuries. All the way back dated to the Monroe Doctrine. And the Monroe Doctrine is big deal.

‘But we’ve superseded it by a lot, by a real lot. They now call it the Donroe document.’

The President added: ‘We sort of forgot about it, very important but we forgot about it, we don’t forget about it any more.

‘Under out new National Security Strategy, American dominance in the Western hemisphere will never be questioned again, wont happen. 

‘We will never allow foreign powers to rob our people and drive us out of our hemisphere.’

Trump was expanding on his own National Security Strategy document, released in November, which sent shockwaves through capitals around the world.

It said: ‘After years of neglect, the United States will reassert and enforce the Monroe Doctrine to restore American preeminence in the Western Hemisphere, and to protect our homeland and our access to key geographies throughout the region.

‘We will deny non-Hemispheric competitors the ability to position forces or other threatening capabilities, or to own or control strategically vital assets, in our Hemisphere.’

It declared a ‘Trump Corollary’ to the Monroe Doctrine as a ‘common-sense and potent restoration of American power and priorities.’

In the wake of Maduro’s capture the State Department reiterated the policy, posting on X: “This is OUR Hemisphere, and President Trump will not allow our security to be threatened.”

Secretary of State Marco Rubio said: ‘This is the Western Hemisphere. This is where we live and we’re not going to allow the Western Hemisphere to be a base of operation for adversaries, competitors, and rivals of the United States.’

Secretary of War Pete Hegseth said: ‘As we continue to ensure that American interests are protected in the Western Hemisphere, the Monroe Doctrine is back and in full effect.’

The Monroe Doctrine was first laid out by by the fifth president James Monroe 1823 address to Congress.

It was initially intended to stop European colonization and meddling in the Western Hemisphere.

In return, the U.S. also agreed to stay out of European wars and internal affairs.

The Monroe Doctrine has been invoked in the two centuries since to justify various U.S. military interventions in Latin America.

In the Cold War era it was invoked as a defense against communism, including the U.S. demand in 1962 that Soviet missiles be withdrawn from Cuba.

It was also cited in the Reagan administration’s opposition to the leftist Sandinista government in Nicaragua.

Gretchen Murphy, a professor at the University of Texas, said Trump was ‘citing the Monroe Doctrine to legitimate interventions that undermine real democracy, and ones where various kinds of interests are served, including commercial interests.’

On the renaming of the policy as the ‘Donroe Doctrine,’ Jay Sexton, a history professor at the University of Missouri, said: ‘When you’re talking about a Trump Corollary, I just knew Trump wouldn’t want to be a corollary to another president’s doctrine, that somehow this would evolve into a Trump doctrine.’

He said the Venezuela intervention could cause a split within MAGA.

‘This is not just the sort of hit-and-run kind of job where, like in Iran a couple months ago, we dropped the missiles, and then you can carry on as normal,’ he said.

‘This is going to be potentially quite a mess and contradict the administration’s policies on withdrawing from forever wars.’

Maduro, a 63-year-old former bus driver, who was handpicked by the dying Hugo Chavez to succeed him in 2013.

He has denied being an international drug lord and claims the US is intent on taking control of his nation’s oil reserves, which are the largest in the world.

In September, the Pentagon had begun air strikes against drug boats, arguing the profits from the shipments were being used to prop up Maduro’s regime.

The death toll from the strikes on drug boats ultimately topped 100 and to observers the killings were seen as clear sign of mission creep. 

US forces built up in the Caribbean to pressure Maduro, and Trump sent the world’s biggest aircraft carrier the USS Gerald R. Ford.

The US also seized two oil tankers off Venezuela’s coast and imposed sanctions on four others it said were part of a shadow fleet serving Maduro’s government.

In a new escalation last week the CIA had carried out the first known direct operation on Venezuelan soil, a drone strike at a docking area believed to have been used by drug cartels.

Maduro had continued to accept flights carrying Venezuelan deportees from the U.S.

That led to speculation that the White House could seek to negotiate with him and not ultimately resort to regime change,.

Maduro publicly offered to talk, and Vice President J.D. Vance later revealed he had been offered various ‘off ramps’ to end the standoff, but didn’t take them.

Behind the scenes, U.S. spies were watching Maduro and the Pentagon was preparing to strike.

General Dan Caine, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, revealed that Operation Absolut Resolve, to capture Maduro, was ready to go by early December.

Over the New Year period, it was repeatedly delayed by bad weather for four days.

At 10.46pm US Eastern time, President Trump gave the order, telling those involved: ‘Good luck and God speed.’

The astonishing raid involved over 150 aircraft, in what one military analyst called a ‘ballet in the sky.’

Planes took out defense systems clearing a path to the Caracas military base where Maduro was holed up.

Helicopters skimmed over the water at 100ft and delivered the Delta Force extraction force, who came under fire but captured Maduro before he could make it to a safe room behind a huge steel door. 

‘We watched, we waited, we remained prepared,’ said Gen. Caine. ‘This was an audacious operation that only the United States could do. It required the utmost precision.

‘The weather broke just enough, clearing a path that only the most skilled aviators in the world could move through.’

The Venezuelan dictator had already survived a ‘maximum pressure’ campaign toward the end of Trump’s first term.

He was indicted in 2020 in New York, although it was not previously known that his wife had been.

 The Justice Department charged that Maduro had effectively converted Venezuela into a criminal enterprise at the service of drug traffickers and terrorist groups as he and his allies stole billions from the South American country.

There were indictments against 14 officials and government-connected individuals, and rewards of $55 million for Maduro and four others.

Bill Barr, the Attorney General at the time, branded called the Venezuelan regime ‘corrupt,’ including the Maduro-dominated judiciary and the powerful armed forces.

One indictment by prosecutors in New York accused Maduro and socialist party boss Diosdado Cabello, head of the rubber-stamping constitutional assembly, of conspiring with Colombian rebels and members of the military ‘to flood the United States with cocaine.’

The legal authority for the strike, and whether Trump consulted Congress beforehand, is not immediately clear.

The stunning, lightning-fast American military action, which plucked a nation’s sitting leader from office, echoed the U.S. invasion of Panama that led to the surrender and seizure of its leader, Manuel Antonio Noriega, in 1990, exactly 36 years ago .

It was Washington’s most direct intervention in Latin America since that 1989 invasion of Panama.