The Debrief: New intervention, old US playbook in Venezuela

US interventionism in Latin America, once relegated to the past or retrofitted to combat terrorism, is seeing a revival under President Trump as the threat of US strikes inside Venezuela remains.

Several weeks into the campaign of US strikes across the Caribbean and eastern Pacific, the operation remains shrouded in opacity. There have been no trials, no evidence sharing, and no public announcement of charges, if any were filed. The identities of the 83 people killed so far have not been released by US officials even as US allies pull back their support. What has remained public, however, are President Trump’s increasingly direct warnings of potential attacks on land in Venezuela, stopping just short of naming Venezuelan leader Nicholas Maduro himself.

The Trump administration has cast the expanding offshore campaign as a “non-international armed conflict” targeting drug cartels, and has reportedly authorized covert operations inside Venezuela. The Pentagon has shifted America’s largest warship into the US southern command’s area of operation, underscoring Washington’s willingness to escalate a conflict that is steering the United States and the northern South America into unchartered, murky waters.

At the center of the standoff is Tren de Aragua, a Venezuelan criminal group designated a terrorist organization by the Trump administration in February. A memo released the following month accused the group of working “against the United States,” allegedly with the support of the so-called “Cartel de los Soles, a criminal network purportedly tied to Maduro’s inner circle, though many cartel experts regard the Soles a “non-thing.”

“The US has a history of interference [in the region]. The excuse before was to avoid the spread of communism, and the excuse now is to avoid immigration or cartels from expanding,” Factal Senior Editor Irene Villora said, pointing to CIA-backed regime changes in Guatemala in 1953 and Chile in 1973.

“Despite Trump’s claims, there are no proven ties between Tren de Aragua and Maduro’s administration. Some experts say that the Chavez administration tried to get involved in negotiations with the group at some point, but there’s no evidence anywhere … that there’s a direct relationship between Maduro’s administration and Tren de Aragua as of this day.”

US intelligence agencies concur. A briefing circulated in February stated there were no indications that Maduro’s regime controlled Tren de Aragua.

Villora also noted the group’s discrete operational style, such as no visible tattoos or identifying marks, and said its presence in the US appeared more opportunistic than strategic.

“I think their expansion into the US was more like an opportunity off the back of the migrant influx, and happened more organically, rather than like a proper plan to attack the US.”

“The Maduro administration repeatedly said they see this as a provocation and a bigger plan to destabilize the country and topple the government.”

Tren de Aragua was born – and thrived – inside Tocoron prison in Venezuela’s Aragua state, a sprawling complex with amenities more suited to a resort (zoo, pool, bar and restaurants), than a correctional facility. It served as the cartel’s operational base until 2023, when leader Guerrero Flores escaped shortly before the Venezuelan army raided the compound. From there, Flores diversified its ventures and took the cartel overseas despite periodic government crackdowns.

“Tren de Aragua has become a transnational organization, believed to have presence in Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Chile, and, in a lesser capacity, in Brazil and Bolivia,” Villora said. “It does have a presence in the United States – that is undeniable … but their expansion hasn’t been as significant there as it has been in other countries. They don’t really have the capabilities to pose a real national security threat to any of the countries that they operate in, let alone the United States.”

Maduro has remained firm in rejecting Trump’s accusations, and dismissed suggestions that Venezuela is supporting cartel activity.

“The Maduro administration [has] repeatedly said they see this as a provocation and a bigger plan to destabilize the country and topple the government.”

Despite the intelligence community’s assessments, and at the risk of a widening rift with major ally United Kingdom, which appears to have ended intel sharing in the Caribbean, the Trump administration has continued the strikes, refused to rule out deploying US troops inside Venezuela, and declared that its airspace should be considered closed, even as he held a call with Maduro.

Caracas, meanwhile, has responded by projecting readiness for a potential confrontation on Venezuelan soil.

“Are land strikes really part of an end game to topple Maduro and put someone else in power, or just a measure of pressure on the regime to basically accept some conditions like oil exploitation?”

The Venezuelan defense ministry announced a large-scale mobilization of “land, air, naval, riverine, and missile assets” as well as “weapons systems, military units, and the Bolivarian Militia,” in what it described as a move toward “full operational readiness.”

Yet, even with these mobilizations, Venezuelan military resources are no match for the United States. Years of economic collapse have left the “failed petrostate” reliant on decades-old Russian equipment and chronically undersupplied troops with only locals to feed them.

“It’s obviously difficult to know exactly what the military capabilities of a dictatorship are, especially after so many years,” Villora said. “But I think it’s quite obvious that their resources, both manpower and also in terms of weapons and having enough air, maritime, land defenses are just non-existent … .The inequality between both militaries is so big that [Venezuela] would have no chance at all at self defense.”

There is also no sign, Villora added, that Venezuela’s more powerful allies like Iran, Russia or China, are prepared to provide military support in the event of a real escalation.

For now, the Venezuelan government has emphasised civilian resistance and the deployment of militias to disrupt any US ground operations or attempt at regime change. The Bolivarian Militia, composed largely of civilians with basic training, as become central to the government’s narrative of mass resistance.

“You [respond with the threat] of a general strike if you get invaded because you really have no resources to fight whatsoever,” Villora said.

What the Trump administration ultimately hopes to achieve goal in Venezuela remains unclear. Observers piecing together signals from the strikes, military movements and diplomatic maneuvers are left wondering whether the goal is regime change, or simply leverage.

“[Are] land strikes really part of an end game to topple Maduro and put someone else in power, or just a measure of pressure on the regime to basically accept some conditions like oil exploitation?” Villora said.

The Venezuelan leader has accused the US of exactly that. In a letter to the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, Maduro claimed the Trump administration was trying to seize Venezuelan oil and requested the group’s assistance to stop American “aggression.”

For now, the threats hang over Venezuela, leaving the country bracing for escalation, with little sense of what comes next or how it might end.Written by Halima Mansoor. Edited by Bada Kim.

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