Mapping the International Left on Venezuela: Campism vs. Critical Solidarity, 2018–2026

The January 2026 U.S. military extraction of Nicolás Maduro forced every tendency on the international left to show its cards. No more theoretical abstraction, no more equivocation about "objective conditions." The Venezuelan crisis divided the global left into three irreconcilable camps, and this ebook maps exactly where each organization stood when it mattered most. Category A organizations—the Fourth International, International Socialist Tendency, Liga Internacional de los Trabajadores—maintained working-class independence throughout. They defended Venezuela's sovereignty against imperialist aggression while refusing to grant Maduro's bureaucracy a political blank check. When the Communist Party of Venezuela broke with the regime in 2020 to form the Popular Revolutionary Alternative, these organizations backed the move. When Maduro's "Operation Tun-Tun" arrested 2,000 protesters after the fraudulent 2024 elections, they named it for what it was: authoritarian repression masquerading as anti-imperialism. Category B embraced campism without apology. Monthly Review, The Grayzone, sections of the Revolutionary Communist International argued that U.S. sanctions explained everything, that internal criticism "aided the enemy," that defending the "anti-imperialist camp" required silence about wage pulverization and union repression. The bankruptcy of this position became undeniable when Chevron operated freely in the Orinoco Belt while Venezuelan workers faced state terror for organizing. The theoretical framework collapses under examination. Campist logic mirrors the Stalinist defense of the Moscow Trials: criticism equals wrecking, dissent serves imperialism, the primary contradiction justifies any atrocity. But sovereignty belongs to the Venezuelan working class, not the state bureaucracy. The Fourth International grasped this; Monthly Review did not. This guide provides exhaustive documentation: the 2020 PCV rupture, the 2024 election crisis, the 2025 military escalation, the competing responses from every major Trotskyist international. It demonstrates why "critical solidarity" is not a contradiction but the only coherent anti-imperialist position. State-centric anti-imperialism failed in Venezuela precisely because it abandoned the workers' movement to defend bureaucratic privilege. The guide situates Venezuela within historical patterns: POUM Spain, Eastern European dissidents, every struggle where revolutionaries faced the false choice between imperialist intervention and bureaucratic dictatorship. The answer remains unchanged: oppose both, support working-class self-organization, maintain political independence. January 2026 marks the end of the Bolivarian Cycle in its state-led form. The future belongs to the grassroots organizations that Category A supported throughout: the APR, independent unions, workers who understood that defending their nation meant overthrowing both imperialism and the comprador bureaucracy strangling their movement. Red Mole Guides address organizations and issues rarely covered by mainstream research, using open-source methods and reader correspondence. These guides provide strategic intelligence for activists building effective movements, not academic neutrality for tenure committees.