Since last Monday, Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and top officials of his government have been officially designated by the United States as members of an international terrorist organization. The inclusion of the Cartel of the Suns in the State Department’s list allows Washington to impose new sanctions against the Chavista regime. Senior Donald Trump administration officials believe this step will expand their options for taking military action in Venezuela.
Meanwhile, tension remains at high levels as we wait to see what the next steps will be in the enormous military deployment that the United States maintains in the Caribbean, especially after the incorporation last week of the Gerald Ford aircraft carrier, the largest and most modern in the world, with the aim of fighting drug trafficking in the so-called “Operation Southern Spear”. The fleet, which represents 20% of US naval power mobilized in the world and includes F-35 fighters and around 15,000 soldiers, has participated in military maneuvers near Trinidad and Tobago in recent days.
Four senior US officials separately assured Reuters that the start of the second phase of the military operation is imminent, as international airlines suspend their flights over Venezuela due to the US aviation agency’s recommendation, issued on Friday, to avoid the area due to the risk of military escalation.
Officially, Washington has not confirmed any moves. This Sunday, President Trump, who chose to stay in the capital for the weekend after chaining several of them in his private residence in Mar-a-Lago, Florida, did not want to devote himself to golf, his favorite sport and to which he dedicates almost without exception every day of rest. Instead, he remained in the White House, without his office reporting any public or private activity. Secretary of State and National Security Advisor Marco Rubio was in Geneva to participate in talks on the U.S. peace plan for Ukraine.
The State Department, which already in February had included the Venezuelan Tren de Aragua and the Mexican Sinaloa cartel in its list of foreign terrorist organizations – which already includes groups such as Al Qaeda and the Islamic State – announced a week ago that starting from Monday it would also include the Cartel of the Suns in the list.
The so-called Cartel of the Suns is not an organized criminal gang, as the Colombian or Mexican cartels might be. Rather, it is an expression to indicate a set of decentralized groups, without hierarchy or structure, high officials of the Venezuelan government and armed forces who collaborate with drug trafficking and finance themselves through these activities.
“The Cartel of the Suns functions as a network of cells within the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Bolivarian National Guard, ranging from the lowest to the highest ranks. These groups operate fundamentally as drug trafficking organizations. It is unclear how these cells relate to each other, if at all,” the cartel indicates on its website. think–tank Insightcrime.
The United States assures that the military deployment it maintains in the Caribbean, and which has so far attacked at least twenty suspected drug ships in bombings in which at least 83 people have died, is intended exclusively to combat drug trafficking. But Maduro, and many others, believe that the real objective of the operation could be to try to force the fall of the Chavista leader, who Washington does not consider legitimate president of the Caribbean country.
The United States has labeled Maduro the leader of the Cartel of the Suns. In August it doubled the reward offered for his capture to $50 million.
Although the designation of the Cartel of the Suns as a terrorist organization does not in itself authorize the use of military force, the US administration has made clear that it interprets it as a legal avenue for possible attacks on Venezuelan territory.
“This gives our Department more tools to offer options to the president,” US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said last Thursday. Trump also stressed that the new designation would allow attacks on Maduro’s infrastructure and assets in Venezuela, but he was also open to diplomatic contacts with Caracas.
New phase of the operation
The president of the United States has repeatedly mentioned the beginning of a “new phase” of the “Southern Lance” operation which would include actions on the ground. He also confirmed that he had authorized US intelligence to carry out covert missions in that country.
According to the Reuters agency, which cites four senior officials, the start of the new phase could take place in the next few days. Two of the sources indicated that that phase could initially begin with covert missions. Two sources also indicated that Maduro’s fall is among the objectives being considered.
“Based in Venezuela, the Cartel of the Suns is led by Nicolás Maduro and other high-ranking figures from Maduro’s illegitimate regime, who have corrupted Venezuela’s Armed Forces, intelligence, legislature, and judiciary,” indicates the State Department statement in which Rubio announced the measure. The designation prevents, among other things, financial transactions of the group or any person involved in it.
The newspaper on Tuesday The New York Times published that Trump had given approval to a CIA covert action plan on Venezuelan territory that could pave the way for a broader military campaign. It is not clear, the New York newspaper specifies, exactly what type of actions Trump would have authorized or when they could have been carried out.
