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<a class="gmail-domain gmail-reader-domain" href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/interviews/empire-colonialism-and-solidarity-a-conversation-with-nick-estes/">venezuelanalysis.com</a>
<div class="gmail-domain-border"></div><h1 class="gmail-reader-title">Empire, Colonialism and Solidarity: A Conversation with Nick Estes</h1>
<div class="gmail-title-entry-excerpt"><span style="font-weight:400"></span></div><div class="entry-meta entry-meta-divider-dot"> <span class="gmail-posted-by"> <a href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/guest-author/cira-pascual-marquina/">Cira Pascual Marquina</a> </span> <span class="gmail-posted-on"> August 23, 2025</span></div>
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<div class="gmail-moz-reader-content gmail-reader-show-element"><div id="gmail-readability-page-1" class="gmail-page"><div><p><em>An enrolled member of the Lower Brule Sioux Tribe, well-known historian Nick Estes co-hosts </em><a href="https://www.youtube.com/@TheRedNation"><em>The Red Nation podcast</em></a><em>. He is the author of </em>Our History Is the Future: Standing Rock Versus the Dakota Access Pipeline, and the Long Tradition of Indigenous Resistance<em>
(Verso, 2019), a book that situates the struggle against the pipeline
in the context of centuries of Indigenous resistance to US colonialism
and imperialism. </em></p><p><em>In this interview, Estes traces the
continuities between US settler colonialism and imperial projects
abroad, highlighting how the so-called Indian Wars provide the template
for Washington\u2019s forever wars. He also discusses how the United States
has targeted both Indigenous peoples within its own territory and
countries like Venezuela through dispossession, war, and sanctions.</em></p><p><em>Estes\u2019
perspective underscores both the depth of US imperialist violence and
the urgent need to forge links among Indigenous, anti-imperialist, and
Bolivarian and Latin American struggles.</em></p><p><strong>It\u2019s well
known how US imperialism is violent and even exterminist toward people
and nations abroad, with the genocide it is carrying out in Palestine
and the unilateral coercive measures it directs at Venezuela being clear
examples. However, imperialism is also rooted in internal colonialism,
particularly the dispossession of Indigenous nations in North America.
How do the imperialist processes inside the US mirror those that take
place outside?</strong></p><p>In our hemisphere, two key ideologies underpin US colonialism and imperialism: Manifest Destiny and the Monroe Doctrine. The <a href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/interviews/bolivarian-diplomacy-vs-the-monroe-doctrine-a-conversation-with-carlos-ron-part-i/">Monroe Doctrine</a> is essentially an extension of Manifest Destiny.</p><p>When
the United States was founded 250 years ago, it consisted of just 13
colonies along the eastern seaboard. Within a century, it had expanded
to seize more than a billion acres of territory and overseas
possessions. This expansion advanced the project of a white supremacist
nation at the expense of Indigenous peoples. The Monroe Doctrine
extended that same logic to the entire hemisphere.</p><p>We can see this
doctrine scaled up to the global stage today, with Palestine as the
most extreme example. What is the point of such violence? It\u2019s partly
terror\u2014sending a message to the world: <em>this is what happens if you resist Empire; this is what you can expect if you try to build sovereignty and liberation.</em></p><p>Israel,
a Zionist project, also serves US interests by projecting power in West
Asia, destabilizing regional sovereignty, and ultimately opening a
\u201cback door\u201d to China. This is closely tied to the Trump administration\u2019s
agenda: tariff wars, targeting China\u2019s neighbors, and controlling the
resources necessary for new technologies. None of this is hidden: it is
openly stated.</p><p>Finally, the wars in West Asia are also warnings to this hemisphere.</p><p>The
Monroe Doctrine has meant coups and interventions across Latin
America. Recently in Venezuela, it has expressed itself in devastating
sanctions and gangster-style regime change attempts, including a <a href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/venezuela-decries-50m-narcoterrorism-bounty-on-maduro-as-ridiculous-smokescreen/?swcfpc=1">$50 million bounty</a>
on Nicolás Maduro. It\u2019s worth noting that this \u201cbounty\u201d closely echoes
the bounties the US once placed on Indigenous resistance leaders. In
short, today\u2019s attacks on Venezuela, Cuba, and Nicaragua are
continuations of the wars once waged against Indigenous nations in what
is now the United States.</p><p>When the ink on the Constitution was
still wet, George Washington led a bloody war against the Northwest
Confederacy of Indigenous nations. This marked the beginning of more
than a century of so-called Indian Wars: fourteen major conflicts marked
by genocide and dispossession. The effects are still felt today.</p><p>The
US uses these wars as a precedent for its current \u201cforever wars.\u201d For
instance, when it bombed Iran\u2019s nuclear facilities, Trump did so under
the same authority of the first president, George Washington, who waged
war in 1790 against Indigenous nations without formally declaring war or
seeking congressional approval. Following World War II, this logic was
extended to wars in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, and
beyond. In this way, the so-called Indian Wars became a model for
permanent global warfare.</p><p><strong>Both in North and South America,
colonialism morphed into imperialism. We share a history of
dispossession. Do you see this shared past\u2014and our present struggles\u2014as
bringing our peoples closer together? I raise this question because
Indigenous movements in the US fight for land, sovereignty, and
self-determination, and these are also central pillars of the Bolivarian
Revolution.</strong></p><p>I\u2019d like to answer with recent history. In
the US, Indigenous people are racialized through erasure. We\u2019re often
seen as historical relics rather than as living, political
communities\u2014colonialism still shapes our daily reality. In South Dakota,
where I\u2019m from, Indigenous life expectancy is just 59 years, nearly two
decades lower than that of white people.</p><p>So yes, we struggle for
land, sovereignty, and self-determination, which aren\u2019t abstract ideas
for us. They are tangible because they increase our life chances.</p><p>Half
a century ago, the Red Power movement went international, building
relationships with Nicaragua, the Palestine Liberation Organization, and
other revolutionary organizations around the world. More recently, in
2007, Vernon Belcourt, a leader of the American Indian Movement, visited
Chávez to establish a Citgo program that provided heating assistance to
tribal nations. My tribe benefited from that program\u2014that was how I
first learned about <em>Comandante</em> Chávez and the Bolivarian Revolution.</p><p>A
few years later, at Standing Rock, when people asked why we were
resisting the Dakota Access Pipeline, activist Winona LaDuke explained
that our struggle against the pipeline was also a rejection of US
sanctions on Venezuela, the country with the world\u2019s largest oil
reserves. In other words, the pipeline\u2014designed to transport some of the
dirtiest oil in the world\u2014was directly tied to the Empire\u2019s goal of
crushing Venezuela. Internationalist connections were being made in the
midst of the struggle. Local media couldn\u2019t grasp this, but Indigenous
movements there knew the struggles were linked.</p><p>Within the US, we
also face an internal struggle. Tribal sovereignty can be aligned either
with imperialism\u2014sometimes through reactionary currents tied to
Trump\u2014or with anti-imperialism and solidarity with the struggles of
oppressed peoples around the world. History shows that aligning with
imperialism has always been disastrous for Indigenous peoples.</p><img width="395" height="263" src="https://venezuelanalysis.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/chavez.jpg.webp" alt="" class="gmail-moz-reader-block-img" style="margin-right: 25px;">Hugo
Chávez and a Pemón person. The Bolivarian Constitution represents a
before and an after for Indigenous people. However, there are still
pending tasks. (Prensa Latina) <p><strong>In 2019,
you visited Venezuela with a delegation of young Indigenous people from
the US. You visited again in 2020 and 2021. Can you share some of your
experiences?</strong></p><p>When I visited Bolívar state [southern
Venezuela], I was very taken by the resilience of the Indigenous
communities, specifically the Pemón community, which identified openly
and explicitly as Chavista, saying they are part of the revolutionary
project. </p><p>Some of the people I spoke with had received formal
training as community healthcare specialists, combining their Indigenous
knowledge of healing and medicine with Western science. The <a href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/constitution/">Constitution</a> allows this, promoting protection for traditional practices all the way up to the level of political participation.</p><p>In
Indigenous communities, people often vote by consensus and, in some
instances, without a secret ballot, thus maintaining their core
assembly-based practices. These are constitutional protections that we,
as Native people in the United States, simply don\u2019t have. </p><p>Additionally,
the Venezuelan Constitution not only safeguards these practices but
also guarantees Indigenous representation in the National Assembly. By
contrast, Indigenous peoples in the US have no guaranteed representation
in Congress and lack constitutional protections like those in
Venezuela. We are often told that things are better in the US, but
constitutionally and politically, Indigenous peoples in Venezuela are
far more integrated into the national project.</p><p>Of course,
Venezuela\u2019s process is not perfect: there is an ongoing struggle and
persistent demands for legal and constitutional reforms, which I
understand may be coming soon. However, <a href="http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/tag/sanctions">sanctions</a>
directly undermine these efforts. If we are committed
internationalists, the first step is to work toward lifting sanctions,
allowing Indigenous peoples and all Venezuelans to pursue
self-determination within the Bolivarian framework.</p><p><strong>We\u2019ve
seen moments of reciprocal solidarity: Chávez\u2019s heating program for
tribal nations and Standing Rock\u2019s recognition of the harm the US
inflicts on Venezuela are just two instances. Yet, building deeper,
ongoing connections remains an unfinished task. Since the Venezuelan
communal project draws from Indigenous traditions, and Indigenous
peoples in the US continue to struggle to advance community-building
efforts, the question becomes: How can we strengthen these ties?</strong></p><p>In
North America, even within Indigenous movements, there\u2019s sometimes
hesitancy to connect with international struggles. Liberal
environmentalists, for instance, often try to silence these connections.
But we have every right to build relationships with movements around
the world, just as the American Indian movement did in the late 60s and
70s.</p><p>When I visited the Kaika Shi community in Caracas, a
matriarch told us, \u201cThe first enemy is the capitalist in your head.
Don\u2019t wait for someone else to solve your problems, you must solve them
here and now!\u201d Her words deeply resonated with the Indigenous youth
traveling with me. In the US, we often suffer from
\u201cprogram-itis\u201d\u2014programs for everything, yet crises of addiction,
suicide, and poverty persist. Programs alone don\u2019t dismantle
colonialism. Self-determination does.</p><p>Delegations like ours are
crucial. It\u2019s hard for Venezuelans to travel to the US, but exchanges
are necessary. Too often, Indigenous peoples in the United States
internalize chauvinism and dismiss other struggles. But when they meet
Venezuelan, Bolivian, or Cuban comrades face-to-face, they see the
connections immediately.</p><p>I remember one youth delegate telling me
something that was deeply meaningful: \u201cVenezuela is one big
reservation.\u201d They meant two things: first, that Venezuela is besieged
by the US; second, that, like a reservation, Venezuela has a communal
spirit where everyone knows each other and struggles together.</p><p>This
is something you can only truly understand by meeting people who are
actively building the world we all want. Venezuelans never told us:
\u201ccopy our model.\u201d Instead, they always said: \u201cMake your revolution at
home. Build dignity among your people first, while aligning with the
Bolivarian Process.\u201d</p><img width="395" height="263" src="https://venezuelanalysis.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/08/nick-kaika-shi.jpg.webp" alt="" class="gmail-moz-reader-block-img" style="margin-right: 25px;">Kaika Shi in Caracas. Below, Indigenous youth delegation in Kaika Shi. (Nick Estes and archives)</div></div></div>
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