![\"Guaido](\"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2002\/10\/Guaido-Maduro.png\")
<\/a><\/p>\nThe Trump administration\u2019s January 23 recognition of Venezuela\u2019s National Assembly leader, Juan Guaid\u00f3, as the president of Venezuela, in opposition to the \u201cde facto\u201d and \u201cde jure\u201d president of Venezuela, Nicolas Maduro, threatens an avalanche of nations recognizing leaders of various political factions in countries around the world as legitimate governments. In reaction to Trump\u2019s move, Maduro severed diplomatic relations with Washington and ordered all US embassy personnel in Caracas to leave the country within 72-hours. Venezuela\u2019s opposition-controlled National Assembly declared a caretaker government as a rival to the Maduro government with Guaid\u00f3 as the interim president.<\/span><\/p>\n Maduro was recently sworn in for a second term as Venezuela\u2019s president, an action that has been rejected by the US-financed Venezuelan right-wing opposition. US Vice President Mike Pence declared \u201cthe United States\u2019 resolute support for the National Assembly of Venezuela as the only legitimate democratic body in the country.\u201d Luis Almagro, the secretary general of the Washington-based Organization of American States (OAS), previously referred to Guaid\u00f3 as Venezuela\u2019s \u201cinterim president.\u201d OAS members Canada, Colombia, Brazil, Peru, and Argentina stand ready to recognize Guaid\u00f3 as president of a rival Venezuelan government. Mexico has rejected the anti-Maduro stance of the \u201cLima Group,\u201d a right-wing bloc of Latin American states demanding Maduro\u2019s ouster.<\/span><\/p>\n We may soon see a situation where the governments of the United States, Canada, Argentina, Brazil, and other countries declare Venezuelan diplomatic personnel accredited by the Maduro government expelled and their embassies turned over to loyalists of the Guaid\u00f3 government. With the severance of Venezuelan relations with the United States, the Trump administration may turn over the keys of the Venezuelan embassy in Washington to the Guaid\u00f3-led opposition.<\/span><\/p>\n A similar situation has already been experienced by Syria. In 2013, the Syrian opposition established a rival \u201cinterim government\u201d based in Azaz, Syria, that was in opposition to the \u201cde facto\u201d and \u201cde jure\u201d government of President Bashar al-Assad in Damascus. The \u201cinterim government\u201d was backed by Turkey, the United States, Saudi Arabia, and others, but it has all-but-dissolved following Assad\u2019s overall victory in the Syrian civil war. Assad\u2019s government retained the support of Russia, Iran, Iraq, China, North Korea, and Venezuela.<\/span><\/p>\n What portends for Venezuela is a situation that will rapidly be copied by other countries that will rush to recognize rival presidents and governments, perhaps even extending support to the establishment of governments-in-exile. Such situations will only add to the destabilization of international relations that already permeates the globe.<\/span><\/p>\n There are several diplomatic \u201cdominos\u201d that are following the example of Venezuela. The most pressing situation is in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where opposition leader F\u00e9lix Tshisekedi was declared the winner of the nation\u2019s contentious presidential election, receiving 38.57 percent of the vote. Tshisekedi is due to replace outgoing president Joseph Kabila. However, supporters of another presidential candidate, Martin Fayulu, have called the former ExxonMobil executive the actual winner of the DRC election. Fayulu won 34.8 percent of the vote. Emmanuel Ramazani Shadary, a third candidate, who was backed by Kabila, decisively lost, receiving 23.8 percent of the vote.<\/span><\/p>\n Already, thanks to the American example being set in Venezuela, various countries are lining up to support either Tshisekedi or Fayulu as the leaders of rival DRC governments. The DRC has a tortured history of rival governments, starting from its independence in 1960. After Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba was deposed in a Central Intelligence Agency-led coup in 1960, leftist leader and Lumumba deputy prime minister Antoine Gizenga established the Free State of the Congo in Stanleyville (now Kisangani) as a rival to the Republic of the Congo in Leopoldville (now Kinshasa). Gizenga\u2019s government was recognized by the Soviet Union, China, Mongolia, Poland, East Germany, Yugoslavia, Albania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Cuba, Iraq, the United Arab Republic, Ghana, Guinea, the Algerian provisional government, and Morocco. The Leopoldville government continued to be recognized by the United States, United Kingdom, France, Belgium, and other Western countries.<\/span><\/p>\n A secessionist State of Katanga, led by Moise Tshombe and supported by Belgian mercenaries, was established in Elisabethville (now Lubumbashi). At the same time as the Katangan secession, the State of South Kasai was proclaimed in Bakwanga, with Albert Kalonji as president. Although no nation extended diplomatic relations to either Katanga or South Kasai, they received military support from France, Belgium, South Africa, and the Central African Federation (also known as the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland).<\/span><\/p>\n In a case of d\u00e9j\u00e0 vu, the Tshisekedi presidency is supported by South Africa, Zimbabwe, Nigeria, Algeria, Russia, and China, while Fayulu has the backing of France, Belgium, United Kingdom, the United States, and the Vatican. Zambia, whose president originally backed Fayulu and called for a recount, changed its position to support Tshisekedi. The DRC seemed to have slipped into a time machine, ending up in 1960, with some of the same foreign actors lining up on the same sides in support of rival Congolese leaders.<\/span><\/p>\n In Yemen, there are rival governments backed by rival countries. Two leaders claim to be the leaders of the Republic of Yemen. One is led by interim president Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, who largely rules from exile in Saudi Arabia. The other, which has occupied the Yemeni capital of Sana\u2019a, is led by Mohammed Ali al-Houthi, the President of the Revolutionary Committee of Yemen. Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Cooperation Council nations of Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Oman, as well as the United States, Egypt, and Pakistan, recognize Hadi\u2019s government as the legitimate government of Yemen. Iran, Syria, and Lebanese Hezbollah recognize al-Houthi as the legitimate government of Yemen. Supporters of the former independent South Yemen took control of Aden in January 2018 and established the Southern Transitional Council, which, although not enjoying any diplomatic recognition, enjoys the support of the United Arab Emirates.<\/span><\/p>\n The Trump administration, which appears to thrive on chaos and instability at home and abroad, has given a jump start to other rival governments. Washington is encouraging nationalist sentiments, both Chinese and Taiwanese, on Taiwan. The \u201cRepublic of China\u201d on Taiwan claims to be the government of China. However, the People\u2019s Republic of China considers Taiwan to be a renegade province. China and Taiwan have vied for diplomatic advantage by engaging in \u201ccheckbook diplomacy.\u201d China has been successful in weaning away nations recognizing Taiwan by offering them substantial aid packages in return for establishing relations with Beijing and severing them with Taiwan.<\/span><\/p>\n With the Trump administration advancing the concept of extending diplomatic relations to rebellious political leaders, other effects of this dangerous policy will soon be felt in nations with rival political power centers or secessionist claims. These include Somalia, Libya, the Central African Republic, Afghanistan, Mali, Equatorial Guinea, Vietnam, Laos, Gabon, Nigeria, Niger, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Madagascar, Myanmar, Ethiopia, Turkey, Iran, Iraq, Sri Lanka, Egypt, Cameroon, Nigeria, and Comoros.<\/span><\/p>\n Extending diplomatic relations to rival governments, including those in exile, rarely succeed. After the fall of the Spanish Republic in 1939 to the fascist forces of Generalissimo Francisco Franco, the Spanish Republic established a government-in-exile, first in France, and then in Mexico. During its exiled existence, the Spanish Republic was only recognized by Mexico, Panama, Guatemala, Venezuela, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Yugoslavia, Romania, and Albania.<\/span><\/p>\n The plans by the Trump administration to recognize the right-wing opposition in Venezuela as the legitimate government of that nation is as doomed as the Spanish Republic in exile in Mexico and other failed exiled governments, including the East Turkestani government-in-exile in Washington, the Western Kurdistan government-in-exile in London, and the Free City of Danzig government-in-exile in Berlin.<\/span><\/p>\n What Trump has unleashed with his actions directed toward Venezuela is a situation where competing governments will be fighting over seats in the United Nations, embassies and consulates abroad, and the right to speak on behalf of their countries in international forums. It is the sort of bedlam upon which Trump, a proud destroyer of institutions, thrives.<\/span><\/p>\n It is increasingly being said that Trump\u2019s White House consists of a team of \u201cmorons\u201d and \u201cidiots.\u201d When it comes to the White House recognizing Venezuela\u2019s right-wing opposition as the government of Venezuela, those appellations for Trump and his administration have definite merit.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n