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# During the civil wars in Venezuela in the late nineteenth century, European merchants in the country suffered heavy losses, chiefly German, French, Spanish and Belgian capital
- URL: https://theparnassian.com/en/v-khode-grazhdanskikh-voin-v-venesuele-v-kontse-xix-v-evropeiskie-kommersanty-v-strane-ponesli-bolshoi-ushcherb-v-osnovnom-nemetskie-frantsuzskie-ispanskie-i-belgiiskie-kapitaly/
- Published: 2026-01-03T12:03:01.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-01T05:27:29.000Z
- Author: Alexandr Radayev
- Tags: Archive, In the Press, Geography, Society

During the civil wars in Venezuela in the late nineteenth century, European merchants in the country suffered heavy losses, chiefly German, French, Spanish and Belgian capital. The ambassadors of these countries demanded compensation. The dictator of the day, Cipriano Castro, refused to pay reparations or service the foreign debts. The principal creditor, Great Britain, expressed its displeasure and summoned Venezuela to The Hague for arbitration. Venezuela, for its part, counted on being safe from foreign interference thanks to the American "Monroe Doctrine", which had proclaimed America a zone closed to the interference of the European powers. Not so fast.

The Arbitral Tribunal on the dispute between Venezuela and England was opened first in Paris, in the summer of 1899\. Later England joined forces with the other European powers against Venezuela. In 1902 an Anglo-German agreement on action against Venezuela was concluded, and real steps to call the country to account began.

The country's debts stood at about 120 million dollars, its annual revenue at about 30 million.

In the Moskovsky Listok for 18 December 1902 we read:

> Great Britain is not averse to resolving the Venezuelan conflict by arbitration, subject to the following conditions:

> 1) Venezuela must pay in 300,000 dollars as proof of good intentions;  
> 2) the court of arbitration shall take charge of the customs houses until judgment is pronounced.

> The most suitable mediator is President Roosevelt

On 20 December the story continued:

> ...the Venezuelan expedition is merely the beginning of a crusade of the bankers against America. England and Germany have undertaken it solely in the interests of their great financiers. After Venezuela it will be the turn of Brazil, which has not paid its debt to a German railway joint-stock company, and then England will pounce upon the Argentine Republic.

A little later Novosti Dnya published a telegram from London:

> ..the blockade of the Venezuelan ports will not be lifted until the government of Venezuela expresses its readiness to act with complete sincerity and to settle the matter with proper safeguards

Meanwhile the United States tried to keep its distance. As early as July 1901, while still Vice-President, Roosevelt had declared that *"if any South American country misbehaves towards any European country, let the European country spank it"*.

> Roosevelt has declined to take upon himself the role of mediator in the conflict between the European powers and Venezuela. ..he will undertake mediation only if there is no other way out. But a way out has already been found: mediation will be offered to the Hague peace conference

The blockade produced results, and not without the participation of the United States in the negotiations. Venezuela promised to hand over to its creditors 30% of the customs revenue of its principal ports, together with other payments. But the Europeans found this too little, and in 1903 the question of additional payments was referred, by the votes of ten countries, to the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague.

This turn of the Venezuelan crisis led to a revision of the "Monroe Doctrine": the United States endowed itself with the right to intervene in international disputes in order to stabilise the affairs of the states of the Caribbean basin and Central America, so as to forestall European intervention.

The crisis did not end there, but passed into a stage of years of solitary confrontations and lawsuits. In 1908 the conflict between Holland and Venezuela flared up:

> In Buenos Aires parliament has appropriated 140 million piastres for preparations for war, in Rio de Janeiro 75 million dollars. Dutch ironclads blockading the coast of Venezuela have seized two Venezuelan coastguard vessels and are pursuing a Venezuelan torpedo boat. In America it is believed that President Castro of Venezuela, who has gone to Europe, will not return to his homeland

Though Russkoye Slovo remarks:

> The declaration of war on Holland by Venezuela produces here the impression of an operetta performance, given that Venezuela has no fleet at all, while Holland has absolutely no landing force.

The age of the "Roosevelt Corollary" was the period when the American "Big Stick" appeared. In Venezuela, and throughout the region, unrest continued; Europe and America never ceased to muddy the waters, though they arranged everything, naturally, to the letter of the law