It’s an open secret that President Trump’s opinion of acting Venezuelan President Juan Guaido isn’t as warm as it was last year, when the Trump administration formally recognized the opposition leader as Venezuela’s official president. Trump is frustrated that his maximum pressure campaign on the country has yet to result in the downfall of Nicolas Maduro and his regime. Maduro, the 56-year-old former school bus driver, union leader, and Hugo Chavez protege, is smarter than he looks. Sure, Maduro may be the world’s worst administrator and chief executive, but he is a wily character capable of keeping his government intact, his enemies in constant fear, and his chief rival, Guaido, looking like a political amateur.
So in a way, it shouldn’t be a surprise that Trump floated the possibility of meeting with Maduro directly. It also shouldn’t be a surprise that Trump backtracked on it a day after the interview was published.
We’ve been here before. Two years ago, Trump took a gamble against the advice of virtually every one of his national security advisers and decided to hold a summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Singapore. The televised event was more public relations ploy than substantive diplomacy. This was made abundantly clear eight months later when both men walked away from the table in Hanoi, Vietnam, empty-handed. Trump’s North Korea diplomacy has largely died a slow, agonizing death since then, with Kim denouncing Washington’s position as hostile and Washington increasingly concerned about Pyongyang’s saber-rattling toward South Korea.
Pundits have cited the Kim Jong Un experience to argue that meeting with dictators is not only a waste of time but an act of desperation. This, however, is the wrong point to make. The problem with Trump’s dalliance with the North Korean leader wasn’t that he went ahead with the summit — it was that U.S. policy objectives were so off the reservation it was only a matter of time before the entire effort fell apart.
Before the White House slapped a full economic embargo on the Maduro government and then-national security adviser John Bolton proudly bellowed that “the time for dialogue is over,” Maduro and Guaido’s representatives were sitting on the island of Bermuda and talking about a possible settlement to the country’s political crisis. Maduro was reportedly willing to endorse early presidential elections in 12 months in exchange for early sanctions relief and immunity for himself, his family, and his high-ranking advisers. The sly Maduro could have been playing for time or seeking to split the already divided Venezuelan opposition, but the offer was at least an offer and a starting point to what would inevitably be a tough diplomatic journey. The talks, however, collapsed before the two sides could fully consider it. Dialogue between the two sides has been in the intensive care unit ever since.
At bottom, Venezuela’s crisis is a relatively marginal problem for the United States. Ideally, Washington would get out of the way, support Latin American mediation, and allow Venezuelans themselves to talk their way out of it. Venezuela’s political disputes shouldn’t be hashed out in the corridors of power in Washington — if anything, the shady history of U.S. intervention in Latin America should give the Trump administration pause before diving feet-first into the garbage-filled pool that is Venezuela.
But if Trump insists on getting involved, he would be wise to remember his experience with Kim and apply the ultimate lesson of that failed summit: Don’t go into a negotiation with a maximalist position that is sure to create pushback from the other side, sully the environment, and, in all likelihood, nip diplomacy in the bud before the effort has a possibility of achieving something.
For North Korea, that would require putting denuclearization in the rearview mirror and concentrating on arms control and peace on the Korean Peninsula. In the Venezuela context, it would mean kissing regime change goodbye.
Daniel DePetris (@DanDePetris) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. His opinions are his own.
