Why America Really Challenged The British Empire The Secret Venezuela

This documentary analyzes the Venezuelan Crisis of 1895, a pivotal but often overlooked diplomatic confrontation that fundamentally altered the global balance of power. The narrative examines how a remote border dispute between Great Britain and Venezuela, escalated by the discovery of gold, became the catalyst for the United States to assert its regional hegemony. We investigate the aggressive diplomatic strategy employed by U.S. Secretary of State Richard Olney, whose ultimatum to the British Empire invoked the Monroe Doctrine not as a defensive policy, but as a declaration of American supremacy in the Western Hemisphere. The film deconstructs the strategic and financial calculations that forced the world's preeminent power, Great Britain, to concede to American demands. This event marked the end of Britain's "splendid isolation" and initiated the "Great Rapprochement," a strategic realignment that saw Britain tacitly accept American dominance in the Americas, paving the way for the Anglo-American alliance and the rise of the "American Century."

Source 'Money Rewind':
https://www.youtube.com/@MoneyRewindd

KEY CONCEPTS
The Monroe Doctrine
The Venezuelan Crisis of 1895
British Guiana Border Dispute
The Schomburgk Line
The Olney Note (Olney's "Twenty-Inch Gun")
British Foreign Policy of "Splendid Isolation"
The Great Rapprochement (Anglo-American Relations)
Geopolitical Power Transition
The Roosevelt Corollary

RESEARCH & REFERENCES

President Grover Cleveland's Special Message to Congress on the Venezuelan Boundary Dispute, December 17, 1895. This primary document outlines the official U.S. position and the threat of unilateral action that escalated the crisis.

Dispatch from Secretary of State Richard Olney to Thomas F. Bayard, Ambassador to Great Britain, July 20, 1895. Known as the "Olney Note," this text contains the foundational U.S. argument that its "fiat is law" on the continent, representing a radical reinterpretation of the Monroe Doctrine.

LaFeber, Walter. "The New Empire: An Interpretation of American Expansion, 1860-1898." Cornell University Press, 1963. A seminal academic work that situates the Venezuela Crisis within the broader context of America's economic and ideological drive for overseas expansion at the end of the 19th century.

Perkins, Bradford. "The Great Rapprochement: England and the United States, 1895-1914." Atheneum, 1968. This historical study provides a definitive account of the strategic shift in British policy toward the United States in the direct aftermath of the crisis.

Zakaria, Fareed. "From Wealth to Power: The Unusual Origins of America's World Role." Princeton University Press, 1998. This book provides a theoretical framework for understanding how America's immense late-19th-century industrial and financial power was translated into assertive foreign policy during moments like the Venezuela Crisis.

Source 'Money Rewind':
https://www.youtube.com/@MoneyRewindd