United States Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth announced a new operation called “Southern Spear” against drug traffickers. “President Trump ordered intervention and the Department of Defense carried it out,” he wrote
The fight against drugs
“Today I announced Operation Southern Spear to crack down on narco-terrorists in the Western Hemisphere,” was the secretary’s post. Led by Joint Task Force Southern Spear and U.S. Southern Command, the mission “aims to defend our nation, eliminate narco-terrorists from our hemisphere, and secure the drugs that are killing our people.”
As CBS revealed, Trump was briefed on the latest options for a potential operation in Venezuela, including a ground attack. Meanwhile, two US warships were spotted about 50 kilometers from the coast of the Venezuelan state of Falcón, in international waters but within the South American country’s exclusive economic zone.
Venezuela’s concerns
President of Venezuela Maduro he issued a rallying cry in Caracas: “The people of the United States must join with Venezuela for American peace.” The demand, at a time of rising tensions with the country, is not to get involved in another protracted conflict: “No more endless wars. No more unjust wars. No more Libya. No more Afghanistan”.
Jorge Rodriguezpresident of Venezuela’s Parliament, warned of “untold consequences” of a possible war in the Caribbean, and denounced the threat posed by military deployments ordered by the US president. “The pain that the conflict has brought to all countries on the continent, including the United States, is not worth it,” Rodríguez told state television VTV. The President of Venezuela’s Parliament accused Washington of “maximum form of aggression”.
Ministry of Justice: the raid was legal
The more than 40-page memorandum from the Justice Department’s legal office appears to provide Trump with a legal basis for his actions. The bombings of recent days, which have claimed the lives of 80 people and are considered illegal from a legal point of view, have received strong criticism from public opinion, but in a secret note from the Department of Justice, reported by the New York Times, we read that the United States is at war with drug smuggling cartels and therefore the raids on ships decided by the government were legal.
