When events don’t make sense, one tries to put ear to as many voices as one could from either side in play.
Thus has emerged over a week a plausible narrative for me.
Three threads appear connected to the recent Venezuelan saga concerning Nicolas Maduro.
Thread 1 : Rigged Polls
When Donald Trump lost the US presidency in 2020, the voting in 28 states and Puerto Rico was through Dominion Voting System, originally founded in Canada, which was said to have its servers in Serbia and Venezuela.
Republicans believed those elections were rigged.
Trump and his supporters were convinced that Dominion was part of an international cabal which stole the elections; that it used its voting machines to transfer millions of votes from Trump to Biden, as per Wikipedia.
Lawsuits and many affidavits later, the Dominion System suddenly disappeared. Some of their offices returned across the border to Canada.
Lord Mark Malloch-Brown, an associate of George Soros, was once involved with Dominion before he joined Smartmatic, co-founded by three Venezuelans (Antonio Mugica, Alfredo Jose Anzola, Roger Pinate).
Smartmatic, out of nowhere, was chosen to replace the voting machines ahead of 2004 elections in Venezuela.
Smartmatic was also involved in the 2020 US elections.
Both Dominion and Smartmatic were accused by Trump of election frauds.
A few weeks ago, in November, Trump wrote in a Truth Social post,: “We must focus all our energy and MIGHT on Election Fraud”
This explains the personal interest of Donald Trump in Nicolas Maduro and what the latter could offer in uncovering the plot.
Thread 2: Money-Laundering
In August 2025, The Guardian reported that the US government is probing money-laundering charge in offshore financial centres against Smartmatic.
Some 14 of these financial offshore centres, call them tax havens or money-laundering hotspots, were created by Britain in the 1960s.
Today they are said to have wealth of up to — hold your breath — $75 trillion! (India’s total economy is $4.3 trillion).
These centres are beyond the reach of any government or legislation.
They can’t be probed and any evidence produced against them is inadmissible in a court of law.
Quite a few of them are in the Caribbean islands.
Money-laundering is said to be the “Mother of all Crimes”.
It makes most other crimes possible — because it makes them pay.
If a crime doesn’t pay, a lot of it would disappear.
Money-laundering is also a huge source of funds for banks which we deem respectable in a society.
Thread 3: Canada’s Role
In May 2024, Canada fined its TD Bank to the tune of 9.2 million Canadian dollars for failing to submit suspicious transaction reports.
A few months later the US regulators imposed $3.1 billion penalty on its US operations.
But nobody went to jail in Canada.
In Canada there is a Stinchcombe Rule where you are bound to inform the accused after 90 days that he is being investigated.
This not only allows criminals to escape on the matter of money-laundering but also on drug-trafficking.
In October 2024, the largest and most sophisticated illicit drug “superlab” was busted in Canada.
But nothing happened.
The whole money laundering network enables drug-trafficking, which also involves human trafficking,
Canada is up to their eyeballs in this dirty business.
Lot of it is sold in the US in cash and then laundered back in Canada, notably in TD Bank as per an ex-State Department official.
In 2022, the Cullen Commission found widespread money-laundering in Canada.
This week Canada’s Globe & Mail has written a editorial, headlined: “Is Venezuela fate a warning to Canada.”
In 2014, head of anti-drug enforcement in Russia, Viktor Ivanov, said money-laundering is the foundation of western financial system.
And that it couldn’t survive without the massive drug-running network.
Nicolas Maduro Saga
It’s well-known no appreciable drug-trafficking comes to the US from Venezuela.
But Maduro knows many secrets which Trump is in quest for.
There is a possibility there could have been a trade off between the two.
Quite a few facts point towards the same.
- Despite Maduro’s ejection, there is no regime change in Venezuela;
- In December, Trump said he is very close to a deal with Maduro; the latter on his part said he had a very cordial and respectful talk with Trump;
- US normally don’t capture a leader — they decapitate him. They killed Gaddaffi and didn’t bring him to trial. They wanted to kill Bashar al Assad and Recep Erdogan; and so was the order to kill Viktor Yanukovich of Ukraine;
- Maduro smiled, hugged, offered new year’s greetings in New York; He showed thumbs up, victory sign; there was no sign of distress;
- Maduro obviously has important evidence to share as he has gone into Witness Protection Programme;
- Picking up one of your target, in this case, Maduro is not easy: Why would his wife be also taken to New York unless the Venezuelan president himself wanted so?
The truth is Trump’s action against Maduro makes no sense.
There is no significant money to be made out of Venezuelan oil for at least a decade and that too after tens of billions of dollars are sunk.
There are at least three million Chavezista insurgents in Venezuela and Trump is not known to prefer long-drawn military engagements.
They would not roll-over but rather make life hell for the American soldiers.
Maduro probably turned himself in voluntarily.
He most likely was convinced he has threat on his life.
Soldiers killed in the narrative possibly is to garnish the story.
Russia, China Aware?
There is a possibility Russia and China know what really happened in the Maduro saga.
A Russian oil tanker was seized but it was empty and its crew has subsequently been released.
Why would Trump pick on Russia and China without whose uranium and rare-earths respectively, the US would gravely hurt itself.
Russia supplies a quarter of US needs for uranium for its nuclear industry which Washington itself admits it can’t do without over the next three years at least.
China dominates mining (70%) and processing (90%) of rare earths without which US’ high-tech defense and green energy would be dealt a mortal blow.
Today, Tucker Carlson says that the US has got to have a relationship with Russia to survive.
French president Emmanuel Macron has claimed that the United States, Russia and China have decided to divide the world amongst themselves.
The United States going to war with Russia makes no sense.
Could Washington really conquer Moscow?
What would it do with 140 million Russians?
Does it make sense for the US to militarily pin down China, an almost peer superpower?
Trump vs Globalists
In 2018, during his first term, Trump had expressed his rejection of Globalism/Globalists.
It’s no secret that Trump believes the Globalists helped steal his re-election in 2020.
Attempts on his life is also seen in that context.
It’s also well-known he hates the Europeans and in all likelihood would acquire Greenland which could spell the end of NATO.
A lot of Trump’s utterances and actions make no sense.
But look at it this way: An undercover cop is inserted into a gang or cartel to know its kingpins and how it operates (“Dhurandhar” is a corollary for Indian readers).
At times he appears extremely dirty and nasty but in truth he is your key to salvation.
There could be a possibility Trump’s deception is meant to take down the rotten global world order.
Ian Bremmer of Eurasia Group thinks so and also adds that what we are witnessing is a political revolution.
Trump has to hide his hand, can’t do it overtly, can’t put them on alert.
Canadians are nervous because the organizations which can’t be probed legally, Trump could bring them under anti-terror legislation.
Knowledgeables draw a comparison with the Opium War of the 19th century.
In the 1830s, China was the global superpower when the Opium Wars began and it suffered a “Century of Humiliation.”
US feel squeezed by money-launderers and drug-traffickers from the north and south.
The country is being flooded with illegal migrants and oceans of drugs trafficked.
Many city-streets in the US are a giveaway that the country is at the receiving end of the Opium War of the 21st century.
Marco Rubio has said this is a war on drug-trafficking networks and oligarchs.
Things would unfold soon enough for us to know if all this is a conjecture or truth.
