The United States is now engaged in what I am calling “smash-and-grab” diplomacy in Venezuela, and it will perhaps soon do the same in Greenland, a territory of the Kingdom of Denmark. In case you have never heard the term, smash-and-grab refers to robberies undertaken by smashing store windows and/or display cases and taking what is readily available without concern about alarms going off or people on the street or in the store seeing what the robbers are doing. The phrase seems more descriptive than the older one of “gunboat diplomacy” in which, not infrequently, the mere display of force was used rather than actual attacks to obtain concessions from a weaker nation.
The current practitioners of the U.S. form of smash-and-grab diplomacy leave little to the imagination, prefering big displays of violence and simply taking what they want with no pretext that the target country is accepting terms through negotiation. Witness the brazen taking of all exported oil from Venezuela, the proceeds from which are supposedly going to be used “for the benefit of the American people and the Venezuelan people” (whatever that means), according to U.S. President Donald Trump.
Readers certainly know that in the past there have been other more subtle ways that major powers have taken the resources they need for their industries and militaries. For instance, what followed the era of gunboat diplomacy—which more or less ran from the late 19th century through early 20th century—was a era of less direct bullying of weaker countries by major powers. As empires crumbled, newly independent countries were strongly encouraged to install leadership friendly to American and European foreign policy and economic interests—or else! One of the “or else’s” was detailed in a book called Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, written by one of the unofficial emissaries from the United States who carried a message of consequences if the target countries’ leaders did not acquiesce. The author began the book with this:
Economic hit men (EHMs) are highly paid professionals who cheat countries around the globe out of trillions of dollars. They funnel money from the World Bank, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), and other foreign “aid” organizations into the coffers of huge corporations and the pockets of a few wealthy families who control the planet’s natural resources. Their tools included fraudulent financial reports, rigged elections, payoffs, extortion, sex, and murder. They play a game as old as empire, but one that has taken on new and terrifying dimensions during this time of globalization.
As weaker countries across the world grew their economies and became more confident in their power, this form of intimidation ceased to be as effective. The rise of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela and Evo Morales in Bolivia are two examples.
In an age of rising prosperity and the free flow of resources around the world, the waning power of American and European institutions to impose their will did not seem as problematic as it might otherwise have been. But with the return of scarcity of key metals (think: China’s restriction on strategically important metals), energy (think: natural gas in Europe), food (think: China’s purchases of farmland around the world), and water (think: well, all over the globe), expect more countries to engage in some form of smash-and-grab diplomacy as shortages lead to military operations designed to alleviate those shortages and/or prevent future ones.
What the current U.S. administration is doing, though probably unwittingly, is saying the quiet part out loud. As the natural resources that the modern world depends on become more and more scarce, countries will more and more resort to openly violent methods to secure access to those resources.
Smash-and-grab robberies result in losses to the merchants affected and inconvenience and upset for the public. But as such robberies become an instrument of foreign policy over the decades ahead, they will only mean more chaos for everyone.
Of course, world society could arrive at a global “kumbaya” moment and decide to cooperate on dramatically reducing worldwide consumption, first by eliminating waste and then by prioritizing consumption that is essential for a healthy, functioning society. We can wish for this. But nothing in the crumbling international order suggests that it will happen.
"diplomacy" ???
nope
in no sense is the unwarranted indefensible intolerable criminal neoColonial thuggery of Amerikkka – vastly exacerbated and metastasized by Emperor Dick-Tater-Tot
"diplomacy"!
surely literate writers / editors could craft a better phrase
recycling tired tiresome anachronistic phrases – such as "gunboat diplomacy' – is not a clever creative masterwork !
it sounds a bit like obsequious brownnosing to evade The wrath of psychopaths
I am glad your article has analyzed the US grab of Venezuela in terms of harbinger of more scarcity of key resources sustaining current high energy, high complexity global economy. Very few public analysis are taken this view (although there may other valid analytical dimensions) which has the potential to take Geopolitical discourse towards more constructive directions. However, I would liked to see you explore further and recommend an alternative direction towards which statesman across the world could reorient Geopolitical strategies and policies that can empower humanity to navigate The Great Simplification ahead of us. I think it is time, we address questions intuitively present among many readers "so what do should be done about it?"
Amerikkka is not being primarily driven by resource scarcity. Amerikkka is essentially the dregs of the Brrrritisch Empiah which it subsumed at the end of WWII
Rank flagrant colonialism was cleverly morphed into corpiratism with all of the debts deficits destruction of the colonial era fully intact and un remediated un-reparated.
Amerikkka spun a performative perfunctory narrative which fooled only Amerikkkans.
Now, a demented disregulated rageaholic vindictive vitriolic control-freak rapist criminal con-man is running amock – and there are no Adults in the room to step on his leash!
He's a pathological liar with no redeeming qualities or any basic human decency engaging in gratuitous isolationist anti-diplomacy.
Perplexity Critique
The article “Venezuela and Greenland: ‘Smash-and-grab’ diplomacy in the age of scarcity” by Kurt Cobb frames recent U.S. actions in Venezuela and interest in Greenland as a new, openly coercive form of resource grabbing driven by ecological limits and strategic scarcity, but it relies heavily on a specific political narrative and downplays the complexity of sovereignty, law, and local agency in both cases ��.
Core argument of the articleCobb defines “smash-and-grab” diplomacy as a modern, brazen form of imperial resource seizure: instead of subtle economic pressure or coups, it involves overt military or financial coercion to simply take what is needed (oil, minerals, territory) with minimal pretense of negotiation or legality ��.
He argues that in an age of peak oil, climate disruption, and critical mineral shortages, great powers are reverting to raw power politics, where the U.S. is now openly seizing Venezuela’s oil exports and eyeing Greenland’s rare earths and strategic location as part of a “last-man-standing” scramble for resources ��.
The piece ties this to Trump-era rhetoric about annexing Greenland and Canada, portraying it as a logical extension of an “America First” doctrine that treats the world as a zero‑sum arena where resources must be secured by any means, including force or financial strangulation ��.
Cobb contrasts this with older forms of “gunboat diplomacy” and post‑WWII “economic hit man” tactics, suggesting that today’s version is more transparent and less constrained by norms or international law ��.
Strengths of the analysisThe article usefully reframes resource conflicts in terms of physical limits (energy, minerals, arable land) rather than purely ideological or security narratives, which aligns with ecological economics and peak resource thinking ��.
It correctly highlights that Venezuela and Greenland are both rich in strategically important resources (oil, gas, rare earths, lithium, cobalt) that are essential for high‑tech industries and military systems, making them focal points in a world of tightening supply ��.
Cobb also makes a valid point about the erosion of diplomatic norms: the willingness to openly discuss annexation of foreign territory (Greenland) and to unilaterally seize another country’s export revenues (Venezuela) does represent a shift toward more overt, coercive statecraft, especially under a leader who openly rejects multilateral constraints ��.
His critique of “America First” as a cover for resource imperialism, rather than genuine disengagement, is a coherent and widely shared left‑realist perspective ��.
Problematic assumptions and omissionsThe analysis treats Venezuela and Greenland as essentially passive, resource‑rich “prizes” to be grabbed, downplaying the agency of their populations, governments, and legal frameworks ��.
In Venezuela, decades of internal political struggle, economic mismanagement, and U.S. sanctions have created a complex crisis; reducing it to a simple “smash‑and‑grab” by the U.S. ignores the role of domestic elites, corruption, and the contested legitimacy of both Maduro and opposition figures ��.
Similarly, Greenland is an autonomous territory of the Kingdom of Denmark with its own elected government and constitution; any attempt to “grab” it would require overriding Danish sovereignty and Greenlandic self‑determination, not just a unilateral U.S. decree ��.
The article largely treats Greenland as a geopolitical chess piece, not as a society with its own democratic processes, indigenous rights (Inuit), and environmental concerns about mining and militarization ��.Legal and geopolitical realismCobb’s framing implies that the U.S. can simply “take” Venezuela’s oil or Greenland’s territory by force or decree, but in practice, such actions would face massive legal, diplomatic, and military constraints ��. Unilaterally seizing another state’s natural resources violates core principles of international law (sovereignty, non‑intervention, law of the sea) and would almost certainly trigger counter‑measures, sanctions, and potential armed resistance or proxy conflict ��.Even under a highly aggressive U.S. administration, outright annexation of Greenland or Canada is politically and militarily implausible; what is more realistic is intensified economic pressure, covert operations, support for separatist movements, and military posturing (e.g., reopening Thule Air Base, expanding Arctic patrols) to gain de facto control over resources and strategic space without formal annexation ��. The article’s “smash‑and‑grab” metaphor risks oversimplifying this into cartoonish banditry, when the actual mechanisms are more often layered: sanctions, financial warfare, intelligence operations, and “invitations” from local elites ��.Overlooking alternative strategiesThe piece presents resource competition as an inevitable, almost mechanical outcome of scarcity, with states either grabbing or being grabbed ��. This deterministic view underplays the role of diplomacy, multilateral institutions, and alternative economic models (degrowth, circular economies, deep decarbonization) that could reduce the pressure to seize resources by force ��.It also downplays how other powers (China, Russia, EU) are responding: China’s Belt and Road investments, resource-for-infrastructure deals, and long‑term contracts in Africa and Latin America are a very different form of “grabbing” than the U.S. model Cobb describes, yet they still raise serious questions about debt traps, environmental damage, and neocolonial dynamics ��. A more balanced analysis would compare these different modalities of resource imperialism rather than focusing almost exclusively on the U.S. ��.Usefulness for a critical perspectiveFor readers interested in ecological limits and the geopolitics of scarcity, the article is a valuable polemic that cuts through liberal diplomatic euphemisms and names raw power politics for what it often is: coercion backed by military and financial dominance ��. It serves as a useful warning that in a world of climate chaos and resource crunch, great powers may increasingly abandon the pretense of rules‑based order in favor of direct seizure of strategic assets ��.However, as a rigorous geopolitical analysis, it would be stronger if it engaged more deeply with: the legal and institutional constraints on such actions; the internal politics and agency of Venezuela and Greenland; the role of other powers; and the possibility of non‑imperialist pathways (e.g., international resource sharing, climate‑driven cooperation, or radical reductions in consumption) that could mitigate the “last‑man‑standing” logic it describes ���
. https://www.perplexity.ai/search/analyze-and-critique-https-www-OkxjeBnCRnKoQdojXYkCFQ