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Alex Lo

When China’s trade with Latin America reached a record US$518.4 billion in 2024, it marked a fundamental shift in hemispheric economics. Beijing is now the largest bilateral creditor and second largest trading partner of Latin America and the Caribbean, with President Xi Jinping pledging a new credit line of 66 billion yuan (US$9.2 billion) at the 2025 China-Celac (Community of Latin American and Caribbean States) forum.
Chinese investment has evolved from extractive industries towards clean energy and manufacturing, with electric vehicle production expanding across Brazil and Chinese-made vehicles capturing 57 per cent of Ecuador’s market by the first half of this year.
Washington’s response under President Donald Trump has not been subtle. Rather than competing economically, the administration has reverted to traditional gunboat diplomacy under the so-called Donroe Doctrine.
Washington has been employing outright imperialist methods that undermine international law and the sovereign interests of America’s neighbours in the region.
The January military raid on Caracas that captured Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro exemplifies this approach. Operation Absolute Resolve killed about 80 people, including 32 Cuban security personnel, with no American casualties. Maduro is being put on a show trial in New York while the US has secured effective control over 65 billion barrels of Venezuelan oil reserves through a deal granting Washington 55 per cent of output from 17 oilfields over 100 years. Acting President Delcy Rodríguez, who once denounced foreign colonialism, signed legislation privatising the energy sector – reversing two decades of socialist policy – under evident American pressure.
Washington doesn’t even bother to hide the true intention behind the violent regime change. The Pentagon is expected to take a direct stake in the parent of North American Blue Energy Partners, the private oil producer hand-picked by Washington for the deal.

When devastating earthquakes struck Venezuela in June, killing at least 6,500 people, the Trump administration’s humanitarian response was summed up thus by a New York Times headline: “With $8 Billion in Venezuelan Oil Money, US Gives $300 Million in Quake Aid”.
Cuba’s suffering is even starker, thanks to America’s coercive statecraft over 66 years and counting. Trump has escalated a fuel blockade and threatened to punish any nation trying to sell oil to the island state. That has produced catastrophic humanitarian consequences.
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights reported in June that Cuba’s infant mortality has doubled to 9.9 per 1,000 births, while childhood cancer survival rates have fallen from 85 to 65 per cent.
Fuel supplies are down 60 per cent, prompting basic food costs to rise sharply. Essential medicines are down to 30 per cent of normal supply levels, and power cuts regularly exceeding 20 hours daily have crippled hospitals, water systems and food refrigeration. Volker Türk, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, stated bluntly: “Children are dying because doctors lack access to essential medical supplies and medicines.”
Trump’s Shield of the Americas, unveiled at a March summit in Florida, purports to counter drug cartels and Chinese influence through military cooperation among 17 nations. The initiative appears less a hemispheric alliance than an ideological coalition of right-wing governments, evoking uncomfortable parallels to Operation Condor, the 1970s network of military dictatorships that engaged in systematic repression with American support.
Beijing’s loans, infrastructure projects and technology transfer do raise legitimate questions … But the appropriate response is not military intervention, resource extraction disguised as partnership, or sanction regimes that kill children

The Pentagon’s maritime strike campaign reinforces these concerns. Since September 2025, US forces have struck at least 67 vessels in alleged counter-narcotics operations, killing at least 223 people, in the Caribbean and east Pacific. The Pentagon has refused to release identities or provide evidence of drug trafficking. Extrajudicial killings or just plain murders?
China’s deepening economic engagement in Latin America inevitably invites scrutiny and competitive response. Beijing’s loans, infrastructure projects and technology transfer do raise legitimate questions about debt sustainability, environmental standards and political influence. But the appropriate response is not military intervention, resource extraction disguised as partnership, or sanction regimes that kill children.
Regional governments are caught in the middle. Recent US presidents have warned Latin American leaders about ties to Beijing. While they offered few concrete alternatives to Chinese trade and investment, Trump has escalated from political pressure to outright military operations, thus doing away with sustained economic engagement, good-neighbour diplomacy and respect for sovereignty.
Trump’s approach violates international law, alienates partners and strengthens rather than weakens China’s position by default. Washington is resorting to tariffs, deportations and militarisation; Beijing is offering trade and investment. For a region seeking development pathways beyond commodity extraction, the choice grows clearer with each military strike and each Cuban blackout.
The Donroe Doctrine is becoming catastrophic for the region and the world at large.


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United States

The US’ dangerous reversion to imperialism in Latin America

Clouds form over pumpjacks and power transmission towers on Lake Maracaibo, one of the world’s richest petroleum-producing regions, in Cabimas, Venezuela, on September 1. The US has secured effective control over 65 billion barrels of Venezuelan oil reserves. Photo: AP

An aeroplane flies past the Pentagon, seen from the Washington Monument, on September 1. The US Department of Defence is involved in an oil production deal between the United States and Venezuela. Photo: AP

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US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping’s relationship has been marked by periods of relative cooperation and confrontation, with how physically close the two leaders will get at meetings among the sub-markets on prediction platforms. Photo: Reuters

Former White House teleprompter operator Gabriel Perez was investigated for using advance access to President Donald Trump’s remarks to place bets on Kalshi. Photo: Reuters

Prediction platforms such as Polymarket and Kalshi have already turned the expected Xi-Trump summit and its potential outcomes into tradeable markets. Photo: TNS

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US President Donald Trump walks with his host, President Xi Jinping, through Zhongnanhai Garden on May 15. Photo: Pool via AP

Opinion

World Opinion

News

World

Washington aims not only to counter growing Chinese influence but to reestablish hegemonic control in the region


Washington aims not only to counter growing Chinese influence but to reestablish hegemonic control in the region.


China-Latin America relations

Donald Trump

Americas and the Caribbean

Diplomacy

US-China relations

Venezuela

Cuba

Expresses the views, ideas and conclusions of the author. (Eg. Enough of Crazy Rich Asians, think of crazy poor Hongkongers.)


Column

As I see it

The US’ dangerous reversion to imperialism in Latin America

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Washington aims not only to counter growing Chinese influence but to reestablish hegemonic control in the region

Washington aims not only to counter growing Chinese influence but to reestablish hegemonic control in the region