On Monday the United States decided to add it to the list Designated Foreign Terrorist Organization the “de los Soles” drug cartel, which the White House continues to link to the President of Venezuela Nicolas Maduro.
This decision can be considered as one more measure of pressure in the ongoing campaignTrump administration move not only towards narcoticsbut regarding Venezuela’s stance that remains loyal to the socialist ideals and positions of President Chavez’s Bolivarian Revolution, and could be a sign that the “non-international armed conflict” carried out by the Pentagon on the mandate of the White House may enter a new phase. A phase that could include not only CIA “covert operations” and special CIA units authorized by Trump to carry out actions on Venezuelan territory, but also what is defined as “kinetic actions.” To be clear: airstrikes and military actions involving the use of force against specific targets on Venezuelan territory.
The Cartel de Los Soles is a “terrorist” enemy of the US
The choice to consider the Cartel de Los Soles a terrorist organization has “significantly” increased the danger that these operations will also be carried out outside the region. Caribbean Seawhere task forces sent by the Trump Administration have indiscriminately targeted narcotics ships. According to the data revealed, at least they will be 15 Isunken boat with a total of at least 76 deaths.
Last week, Defense Minister Pete Hegseth, who recently announced the launch of the operation, made the call Southern Spearwhich has a purpose”take action against drug offenders” which uses trading hubs in Venezuela to carry out trade in the Caribbean, said there was an “increasing US military option in the region”, which in recent months has seen an increase strengthening the US military presence in the Caribbean in a way not seen since the Cuban missile crisis of 1962.
Currently more than twenty warships, including the aircraft carrier USS Gerald Ford with its Strike Group, two submarines and at least seven destroyers armed with Tomahawk cruise missiles are sailing in the Caribbean Sea next to a invasion fleet consisting of three naval units for amphibious operations loaded with Marines. At land bases in the region, from Puerto Rico to Guantanamo Bay, squadrons of attack aircraft and drones joined F/A-18 Hornets and Super Hornets aboard the aircraft carrier Ford, which had been “identified” along with spy planes in the skies north of Venezuela on November 21. Meanwhile the intelligence vessel M/V Ocean Trader, which was observed in training operations with special forces helicopters of the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment, which is notoriously associated with the infiltration and exfiltration of raiders in enemy territory, has been stationed in the region for some time.
Caracas’ response to US move
The Caracas government, which has mobilized all reserve forces and deployed all available air defense systems to defend sensitive targets near the coast, has condemn acts of violence the indiscriminate attacks that the United States continues to carry out in the Caribbean, accusing Washington of wanting to unlawfully overthrow President Maduro. Venezuelan Foreign Minister Yvan Gil stated that Venezuela “categorically, categorically and absolutely rejects the new and ridiculous discovery of US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, who designated the non-existent Cartel de los Soles as a terrorist organization.“, referring to the theory of links between President Nicolás Maduro and drug cartels as “a notorious and cowardly lie to justify illegitimate and illegal intervention against Venezuela, according to the classic US scheme of regime change. This new maneuver will suffer the same fate as previous and repeated attacks on our country: failure“.
Nonetheless, agency sources Reuters confirmed that the United States”ready to launch a new phase of operations regarding Venezuela in the coming days“, and inclusion on the list of narco-terrorist organizations could allow combatants of the US Navy or Marines, or armed drones operated by the CIA, to attack targets on Venezuelan territory, causing the possibility of increased escalation in the event of a shooting.
The target of a possible attack ordered by the Pentagon
If the Pentagon gets an order or green light from President Trump, the attacks, which have so far only hit narcotics-related ships while transiting the Caribbean Sea, could be expanded to terrestrial destination “closely linked to cartels and drug production“, excluding state structures, analysts wrote War Zonebut included “laboratories, logistics centers, such as port facilities, and cartel personnel” on the target list.
As mentioned, if US forces attack any type “military installations or other state infrastructure that the United States believes actively facilitate drug trafficking“, this would represent a hostile act distinct from the Pentagon’s “non-international armed conflict”, and would lead to afurther escalation.
While psychological warfare and possibly hybrid warfare operations are being examined, in addition to the “black operations” that have been announced but will most likely not be known before the end of this complex and complicated war. asymmetric war on drugs which occupies the Caribbean and always countries “not alignedfrom South America.
