Watching the World Shift

Empire, Oil, and the New Geopolitics of 2026

If you’ve been glued to the news lately, you’ve probably blinked twice with your mouth opened wide at what just happened in Venezuela. Early in January 2026, the United States launched a massive military operation, called Operation Absolute Resolve in Caracas and other parts of Venezuela. In the pre-dawn chaos, its forces captured Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, and flew them to New York, where they now face federal charges on narco-terrorism and drug trafficking.

It was the kind of sudden, dramatic action that catches ordinary watchers off guard. Ships off the coast there, flags, speculation… and then something completely unexpected. U.S. special forces struck infrastructure around Caracas, and Maduro and his wife were taken, in handcuffs, to a federal court appearance in Manhattan, a sight not seen in modern geopolitics.

At a press conference, President Donald Trump asserted that the U.S. would “run Venezuela” until a safe, proper, and judicious transition” could be achieved, and suggested major access for U.S. oil companies to the country’s vast oil reserves.

Empire Rising? Or Just Politics?

There’s no shy way to say it: this feels like a watershed moment, like the U.S. is flexing a kind of hemispheric control we thought belonged to the distant past. For many, “Venezuela = oil” is shorthand. Venezuela does have some of the largest proven oil reserves in the world, and oil has long been central to both its politics and its conflict with the United States.

What happened here isn’t just an arrest or extradition, it’s a military strike leading to regime removal and detention on foreign soil. That’s why the United Nations is holding emergency meetings. Legal experts and international institutions are warning that the operation violates core principles of sovereignty and international law, because there was no UN mandate or clear self-defence justification.

Allies and adversaries alike are reacting, from Russia and China condemning the action as a breach of law to some EU states expressing cautious concern while others signal that a “democratic transition” might now be possible.

Where Oil Meets the Arctic

Which brings us to Greenland that massive, ice-covered landmass often joked about when people talk about global strategy. Famously, Greenland is not itself a huge oil producer, but it sits at the gateway to the Arctic, an area where experts estimate up to 13% of the world’s undiscovered oil and 30% of natural gas could lie beneath the seabed.

So, when the wife of US Security boss posted an image of Greenland overlaid with a U.S. flag, laughter and unease mixed together. People joked about “RedandBlueland” and wondered whether the United States’ strategic reach could go that far, not because Greenland has easy oil to pump tomorrow, but because control of the Arctic’s emerging routes and resources gives any state enormous geopolitical leverage.

A direct takeover of Greenland isn’t on any current news agenda. It isn’t just about oil at all, it’s about strategic position, control of sea lanes, early warning systems, and influence in a region where the ice is melting and the stakes are rising. Any action there would instantly pull in Denmark, NATO, and the broader global community. And right now, even bold moves like Venezuela have triggered sharp questions over legitimacy and legality.

Strategic Motives and Global Signal

It’s tempting to paint the United States as an “empire,” especially when you hear statements like “We will run Venezuela.” But there’s also a strategic signal at play here:

• That U.S. military capability is intact,
• That traditional red lines can be crossed,
• That dominance in energy and hemispheric affairs remains a central objective of U.S. policy. 

This isn’t just about drugs, even if Washington uses that language. Over decades, U.S. leaders have wrestled with how, and when, to intervene abroad. The Trump administration argues that crippling what it calls narco-terrorism is essential to U.S. domestic well-being, portraying this incursion as a law-enforcement action supported by military force rather than a classic war.

Critics say this is a pretext that blurs legal boundaries. Either way, it was a demonstration, of reach, resolve, and willingness to “do first” rather than wait for others.

Allies, Law, and the Rules-Based Order

When the U.S. acted in Venezuela without congressional authorization and bypassed common international legal safeguards, it stirred widespread unease. Even in Washington, some lawmakers are calling the raid “illegal,” pointing to constitutional norms that only Congress can declare war.

Abroad, the message is mixed. Traditional U.S. allies face a dilemma: condemn outright and strain relations with a partner, or appear to condone a precedent that could one day be used against them. Many are cautious, some supportive, but almost all are talking about international law, sovereignty, and the danger of normalization when a powerful nation directly seizes another’s leader.

So What’s Next? A Year of Surprises?

Whether you agree with the action or not, religiously, morally, politically, one thing is clear: 2026 has started with a seismic shift in geopolitics.

There are no simple narratives anymore. Oil, power, strategic geography, legal norms, media framing, and raw geopolitical ambition have all collided in one dramatic episode. Whispers about the Arctic aren’t fantasies, they are possible future flash-points if global trusts erode and strategic competition intensifies.

As a Unitarian minister, I find myself watching these events with a particular unease. They speak of deeper forces at work in our world, fear and power, security and dignity, narrative and reality colliding in real time. Whatever comes next, whether it is talk of Greenland, naval movements in contested waters, or diplomatic stand-offs in international bodies, the world is watching closely, and the rules that once held sway are being tested before our eyes.

Trump, NATO, and the Question of Agency

There is another question that keeps nudging at the edges of all this, and it is an uncomfortable one.

When Trump speaks about NATO, questioning it, threatening to step away from it, treating it less as a sacred alliance and more as a transactional arrangement, is this simply the bluster of Donald Trump? Another example of disruption for disruption’s sake?

Or is Trump, once again, the visible hand rather than the guiding one?

History teaches us that power rarely operates in isolation. Presidents come and go, but strategic interests endure. Long before Trump, there were voices in Washington arguing that NATO had outlived its usefulness; that Europe should stand on its own feet; that America was carrying the cost while others enjoyed the protection. Trump did not invent those ideas, he simply spoke them aloud, loudly, and without diplomatic cushioning.

Perhaps what we are seeing is not the blunder-house of Trump, but the surfacing of a deeper strategic impatience, a shift already forming in the corridors of power, where alliances are weighed not by shared values but by cost, leverage, and advantage. Trump may be less the architect and more the instrument, the one willing to say what others muttered behind closed doors.

From that perspective, stepping away from NATO, or hollowing it out without formally leaving, becomes not an accident but a recalibration. If NATO restrains unilateral action, if it complicates rapid military moves, if it binds the United States to consensus rather than initiative, then weakening it, even rhetorically, has strategic value.

This does not make it wise. Nor does it make it just. But it does make it intelligible.

Seen this way, Venezuela is not an isolated act, and Greenland is not a joke. They are signals, that the old architecture of collective restraint may be giving way to something colder, faster, and more transactional. And if that is true, then Trump is not acting alone. He is acting with permission, or at least with tolerance, from forces that prefer unpredictability to constraint.

That, perhaps, is the most unsettling thought of all.