From New York Times opinion, I'm Ross Douthand. And this is Interesting Times.

What is actually happening in Venezuela?

Is it a real regime change?

A cynical attempt to replace one dictatorship with another.

An even more cynical grab for oil revenue.

A Trumpian break with past U.S. policymaking,

or just Yankee imperialism as usual.

My guest this week helped make U.S. foreign policy toward Latin America under three different

Republican presidents, Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush, and in Donald Trump's first term.

He's intimately familiar with coups and civil wars and successful transitions to democracy.

And he's long been an advocate of overthrowing Nicolas Maduro, but maybe not overthrowing him this way.

Elliot Abrams, welcome to interesting times.

Thank you.

So we're just going to jump right in, though I should actually mention that we are

recording this on a Tuesday morning.

Ideally, the episode will appear relatively quickly, but obviously we're talking about events

that are very much in flux, and there's always a possibility that the landscape will

have shifted even in 24 to 48 hours.

So listeners should bear that in mind.

But to begin, last November, you wrote an essay for Foreign Affairs with the very much of the moment title

How to Topple Maduro, why regime change is the only way forward in Venezuela.

Congratulations. He's been toppled.

...