Well, 2026 looks like it is going to be an “interesting” year!
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer: The UK was not involved “in any way” in the US-led strikes on Venezuela……………. (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cy4qgvwxp08o).
What happens next?
Well, we will have to wait and see. IF the Venezuelan regime succeeds in consolidating it’s forces against their internal opponents, the ball will have been kicked back into the US’s court. Will the US take any further action?
It might be the case that the Trump regime will content itself with it’s two captives and see to it that they are put through a so-called criminal trial and inevitably both will be sentenced to many decades in a maximum security US federal penitentiary.
Señor Nicolás Maduro and his wife Señora Cilia Flores de Maduro will have little alternative but to observe by what news reports they will be allowed to receive as to the fate of their regime in Venezuela. IF it succeeds in maintaining itself against further US destabilisation actions until January 2029, the Maduros can look with some degree of optimism to their release in February 2029. This means that they will have spent some 37 months in custody.
Why do I suggest this?
An assumption that the Democrats will win the next US Presidential election and would be keen to improve relations with a Venezuela run by the continuing regime.
I will not be surprised to witness the Maduros refusing to plead to the charges which will mean that pleas of not guilty will be entered into the trial proceedings on their behalf.
They may well choose to represent themselves and use the trial as a political platform.
Both will know that the end result of the rigged trail is inevitable: Conviction and a sentence of many many decades in prison.
How long the Maduros spend in a US prison will depend upon the survival or otherwise of the present regime in Venezuela. In other words, politics. They are political prisoners after all.
What will be of interest to us in the UK is the reaction by British politicians. Mr Farage has already come out in support of Mr Trump’s actions. Jeremy Corbyn has quite predictably come out in support of his deposed friend. Other politicians will be more cautious and guarded in their statements.