Much will depend on which way the Venezuelan military jumps. For now, its generals may be backing the current regime. But will the lower ranks remain loyal to Mr Maduro or will they heed the growing unrest inside the country and the chorus of powerful voices coming from abroad?<doc-sep>President Trump took on Venezuela’s leftist authoritarian president and his regime’s Russian and Chinese backers on Wednesday by recognizing the opposition leader of the oil-rich country’s congress as its legitimate head of state. The U.S. move came just minutes after Juan Guaidó, the National Assembly’s 35-year-old leader, declared himself interim president and took an oath of office before a crowd of tens of thousands in the capital. President Nicolás Maduro responded by vowing to stay in office and said he was severing diplomatic relations with the U.S. “The people of Venezuela have courageously spoken out” against Mr. Maduro “and demanded freedom and the rule of law,” Mr. Trump said. He said he would “use the full weight of United States economic and diplomatic power to press for the restoration of Venezuelan democracy.” The U.S. recognized Juan Guaidó, Venezuela’s newly appointed National Assembly head, as interim president of the nation, following days of protests against Nicolás Maduro, whose election was widely considered illegitimate. WSJ's Jason Bellini reports. Photo: Federico Parra/ Agence France-Presse/ Getty Images The U.S. declaration threatens to further destabilize Venezuela, where opposition protesters made their first show of force since a violent government crackdown ended a previous round in 2017. Canada, Brazil, Argentina, Colombia, Chile, Peru and other South American countries quickly followed the U.S. declaration, saying they would recognize Mr. Guaidó, based on their belief that Mr. Maduro’s election last year to a second six-year term was a sham. Venezuela’s constitution says a vacancy in the president’s seat is to be filled by the head of the national Legislature until new elections are called. Venezuelans Take to the Streets in Opposition to Maduro National Assembly President Juan Guaidó declared himself the country’s interim leader A young woman cries after expressing her pain over the situation of the country, as police officers look on. Oscar B.Castillo/FRACTURES COLLECTIVES for The Wall Street Journal 1 of 8 • • • • • 1 of 8 Show Caption A young woman cries after expressing her pain over the situation of the country, as police officers look on. Oscar B.Castillo/FRACTURES COLLECTIVES for The Wall Street Journal Mr. Maduro, who has overseen an economic collapse that has driven an estimated three million people from the country, ordered all U.S. diplomats to leave the country by Saturday. “The imperialist U.S. government is directing an operation to impose through a coup a puppet government for its interests,” Mr. Maduro said in a speech from a balcony of the presidential palace. “No one here is surrendering. We’re going to combat until victory.” Mr. Guaidó dismissed Mr. Maduro’s order in an open letter to foreign embassies, telling their personnel to stay put. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement Wednesday evening that the U.S. would maintain diplomatic relations with Venezuela through the government of Mr. Guaidó, “who has invited our mission to remain in Venezuela.” Vladimir Padrino, the defense minister, expressed loyalty to the government. “The soldiers of the Fatherland do not accept a president imposed from the shadows of dark interests or illegally self-proclaimed,” he said on his Twitter account. He said the armed forces would “defend the constitution,” calling the military “the guarantor of national sovereignty.” Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro attends a rally in Caracas on Jan. 23 in support of his government and to commemorate the 61st anniversary of the end of the dictatorship of Marcos Pérez Jiménez. Photo: Miraflores Palace/Reuters Mr. Maduro received support from Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who phoned the Venezuelan leader late Wednesday and told him, “Maduro brother, stand tall, Turkey stands with you,” Turkish news agency Anadolu reported. Mexico also said it backed Mr. Maduro. And Bolivian President Evo Morales promised support “in these decisive hours in which the claws of imperialism are again looking to deal a death blow to democracy and the self-determination of the South American people.” The closely timed announcements by Mr. Guaidó and Mr. Trump followed weeks of contacts between Mr. Guaidó and his staff and supporters in the Trump administration and U.S. Congress. They included a call on Jan. 15 between Mr. Guaido and Vice President Mike Pence, who assured him then of continued U.S. support. The week before, White House national security adviser John Bolton said the Trump administration “does not recognize” the legitimacy of Mr. Maduro’s government, while lauding Mr. Guaidó. The declaration by the U.S. and its allies is fraught with risk: Mr. Trump isn’t taking on only the radical leftist movement that has led Venezuela for 20 years, but also its most important backers, China and Russia. Both countries have bestowed loans, business deals and diplomatic cover for Mr. Maduro, while Venezuela’s closest ally, Cuba, provided intelligence aid to thwart coup attempts. If Venezuela’s government were to arrest Mr. Guaidó or clamp down, it could force Washington into ever-escalating measures that might strengthen Mr. Maduro in a country where a third of Venezuelans still back him and view the U.S. with suspicion. Mr. Guaidó, who was detained this month after his colleagues elected him president of the assembly, faces the threat of arrest in a country where many opposition leaders have been jailed, exiled or ordered to remain under house arrest. A group of demonstrators heads toward a highway after the military forced them to move. Photo: Oscar B.Castillo/FRACTURES COLLECTIVES for The Wall Street Journal A senior U.S. administration official said the Trump administration would act if Mr. Maduro’s government uses violence against Mr. Guaidó or other assembly members. He said “everything is on the table, all options,” including the use of force. While the U.S. has so far decided against a blockade or banning purchases of Venezuelan oil, the official said the U.S. would now recognize only transactions with Mr. Guaidó as legal, with payments to the Maduro regime seen as illegitimate. “That will entail a whole bunch of consequences on daily interactions between Venezuela and the U.S.” With the U.S.’s support, Mr. Guaidó’s interim government may be able to take control of oil revenue and the assets of state oil company Petróleos de Venezuela SA—such as its U.S.-based refiner, Citgo Petroleum Corp. Juan Guaidó, president of the Venezuelan National Assembly, speaks to supporters in Caracas after declaring himself the nation’s interim president on Jan. 23. Photo: Cristian Hernandez/EFE/Zuma Press “This would be the greatest single source of power that the opposition has had up until now,” said Francisco Rodríguez, a Venezuelan economist who, in the past, had an open door to high-ranking officials. On Wednesday, there was elation in Caracas and other cities as demonstrators, angry about a hard-line government that has brought hunger and deprivation to the once-affluent country, took to the streets by the tens of thousands and demanded that Mr. Maduro leave office. Seven people were killed in protests outside the capital, according to Foro Penal, a Venezuelan human-rights organization. The demonstrations marked the first big show of opposition force since 2017, when the government unleashed a violent crackdown. And it wasn’t just in Venezuela—Venezuelan exiles attended rallies from Santiago, Chile, to New York’s Central Park, where a statue of 19th Century Venezuelan liberator Simon Bolivar is located. Standing on a sound stage, Mr. Guaidó raised his right hand and held up the constitution with his left. The opposition argued that in usurping powers from the National Assembly, the courts and other entities, Mr. Maduro has violated the constitution and made his own administration, which first won power in 2013 and succeeded the late Hugo Chávez, illegitimate. “Today, Jan. 23, 2019, in my capacity as president of the National Assembly, before God Almighty, Venezuela and my fellow deputies, I swear to formally assume the powers of the national executive as the president in charge of Venezuela,” Mr. Guaidó said. “I only hope that Maduro gets out of here because he’s generated so much suffering for the country,” said a 63-year-old retiree, José Antonio Pérez, who took to the streets in Caracas. “It’s the last hope we have in our heart. We have nothing to lose because we’re already worse than African countries.” Mireya Cardozo, 40, who had also taken to the streets, said she was elated to see Mr. Guaidó as interim leader.<doc-sep>CARACAS, Venezuela — When President Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela was sworn in for his second term on Thursday before the country’s Supreme Court, a small group of supporters standing outside greeted the news by waving tiny flags with little enthusiasm. The huge crowds that gathered to greet him after his first inauguration were nowhere to be seen. In the years since Mr. Maduro first took office, violence and hunger have become emblematic, inflation has skyrocketed, and the migration of Venezuelans out of the country has reached unprecedented levels. Mr. Maduro and his predecessor, Hugo Chávez, presided over the free fall of what was once Latin America’s wealthiest nation. The country’s economy continues to unravel at an alarming rate. And Mr. Maduro’s re-election last year was widely denounced by other countries as fraudulent. Venezuela’s increasing isolation was evident inside the Supreme Court on Thursday. The presidents of Bolivia, Cuba, El Salvador and Nicaragua did attend the ceremony, along with representatives from China, Mexico and Turkey.<doc-sep>
Venezuela’s political crisis was turned on its head on Wednesday as a succession of world powers declared they were recognizing the opposition leader Juan Guaidó as the South American country’s rightful interim president. “The citizens of Venezuela have suffered for too long at the hands of the illegitimate Maduro regime,” Donald Trump tweeted as he announced what some believe could prove a game-changing decision. Soon after, Canada, Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Peru, Ecuador, Argentina, Paraguay and Costa Rica said they would follow suit – although Mexico’s left-leaning government said there would be no change of policy for now and Bolivia’s president, Evo Morales, attacked what he called an imperialist assault on South America’s right to democracy and self-determination. “Brazil will politically and economically support the transition process so that democracy and social peace return to Venezuela,” tweeted Brazil’s far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro. A senior US administration official said the move meant “Maduro and his cronies” now needed to understand they had no future and had no choice but to accept “a peaceful transition” and “an exit solution” from the country. But as the dramatic news sunk in, Venezuela specialists said they were unsure what the immediate impact might be – and how Maduro might react. 01:57 Venezuela: Juan Guaidó declares himself interim president after mass protests – video report Eric Farnsworth, a former US diplomat and vice-president of the Council of the Americas, said Guaidó’s move – and Trump’s swift recognition – which came on a day of rare mass protests in Venezuela – was “a clear inflection point” that could prove the tipping point for Maduro’s embattled regime. “I don’t think we can automatically assume he is on the way out. But I do think today is the most serious threat he has faced,” said Farnsworth. Yet it was also a moment fraught with danger, both for the regime and the country. “Maduro can’t acquiesce to this shift – he is going to have to react in some way,” Farnsworth predicted. Maduro wasted no time in launching his counter-attack. From the presidential palace’s “people’s balcony” he announced he was breaking diplomatic relations with the US and gave US diplomatic personnel 72 hours to leave the country. Maduro claimed an attempted coup backed by the “gringo empire” was under way and urged supporters – and crucially the armed forces – to resist it “at all costs”. “We are defending the right to the very existence of our Bolivarian Republic,” Maduro said, accusing his foes of trying to steal Venezuela’s oil, gas and gold: “They intend to govern Venezuela from Washington. Do you want a puppet government controlled by Washington?” Juan Guaidó waves to the crowd during a mass opposition rally n which he declared himself the country’s ‘acting president’. Photograph: Federico Parra/AFP/Getty Images Beyond breaking ties with the US, many now expect Maduro to order the arrest of Guaidó or other opposition leaders. Farnsworth said Maduro might also “turn sharpshooters on crowds and try to scare everybody back home”. If that happened, the US and the international community would be forced to react. The US official said it had “a host of options” if such a crackdown occurred: “Everything is on the table – all options.” Ratcheting up oil sanctions in an attempt to economically strangle Maduro’s regime would be the most likely step, with the official warning “we haven’t even scratched the surface” with sanctions. But David Smilde, a Venezuela expert from the Washington Office on Latin America advocacy group, said the US in fact had few good options were Maduro to respond with violence or political repression. “The US and other countries have really upped the ante … but it’s not clear that it breaks new ground,” he said. Increased economic sanctions could exacerbate an already severe humanitarian emergency that the UN says has created the biggest migration crisis in recent Latin American history. A military intervention that would potentially lead to massive destruction and great loss of life and could drag the US into a messy and protracted occupation and reconstruction process was also undesirable.