The Trump administration is attacking boats in the Caribbean Sea with such frequency that it may blow up another between the publication of this article and your reading of it. The administration has so far failed to produce any hard evidence behind its allegations that the seven speedboats destroyed by U.S. airstrikes were carrying narcotics. As of October 21, reports indicate that 32 people have been killed in these attacks. On October 3, a speedboat reportedly carrying Colombian citizens was destroyed in one such missile strike, prompting Colombian President Gustavo Petro to post on X that a “war scenario” has emerged in the Caribbean.

This week, Colombia recalled its ambassador to the United States while accusing the Trump administration of “murdering” the fisherman while labelling another strike that took place in mid-September as a “direct threat to national security.” Donald Trump for his part has called Petro an “illegal drug dealer” while saying that the President of Venezuela Nicolás Maduro “doesn’t want to fuck around” with the U.S. — a reference to a report in The New York Times that alleged Maduro has tried to cut a resource deal with Washington in order to avoid a military conflict.

The legality of these strikes has been questioned by several experts. Dan Herman, senior director at the Washington-based think tank Center for American Progress, said Trump has “no legal authority to conduct these strikes” and noted that the U.S. government has “presented no evidence for its claims.” Herman believes these attacks are unlikely to have any meaningful impact on the influx of drugs into the United States.

Former army captain and army lawyer Margaret Donovan concurred in a recent MSNBC interview, stating that Trump has “no domestic or international legal authority to conduct these strikes.” Donovan, a visiting lecturer at Yale Law School, added: “When you don’t have domestic or international legal authority to conduct these types of strikes, what you are doing is murdering people.”

As of October 21, reports indicate that 32 people have been killed in these attacks.

Similarly, James Story, who served as U.S. ambassador to Venezuela from 2018 to 2023, said Trump’s strikes place the United States in “contravention with international law and it undermines our ability to work in the hemisphere.”

The current U.S. military buildup in the Caribbean Sea commenced on August 14, with the Trump administration alleging it was due to threats from Latin American drug traffickers. Based on available media reports, there are approximately 10 U.S. Navy ships in the Caribbean Sea, with three directly off the coast of Venezuela. According to Military.com, there are also currently “10,000 U.S. troops now operating in the Caribbean [who] were sent to interdict drug boats.”

U.S. foreign policy toward Venezuela, under both Democratic and Republican administrations, has long aimed at regime change. In April 2002, the administration of President George W. Bush quickly endorsed the leadership of Pedro Carmona, head of the national business federation Fedecámaras, after a faction of the military kidnapped President Hugo Chávez for 47 hours, until he was rescued by loyalist armed forces.

There are approximately 10 U.S. Navy ships in the Caribbean Sea, with three directly off the coast of Venezuela.

Since then, the United States has implemented increasingly harsh economic sanctions against Venezuela. In 2015, then-President Barack Obama declared Venezuela a threat to U.S. national security, a move that prompted foreign ministers from a coalition of 12 South American nations to call on Washington to revoke the decree. By 2017, U.S. sanctions had tangible effects: a low-income Venezuelan family of five could expect to consume only 6,132 calories per day — 1,226 per person if divided equally. Earlier this year, The Lancet reported that U.S.-led sanctions contribute to an estimated 564,000 deaths across the world each year, with a significant proportion occurring in Venezuela.

After Hugo Chávez’s death from cancer in 2013, President Nicolás Maduro initially struggled to fill the political vacuum. Between 2013 and 2019, Venezuela saw an 80 percent drop in imports, devastating its import-dependent economy. In 2019, the Trump administration continued the U.S. trend of throwing its weight behind opposition leaders, this time backing Juan Guaidó, who challenged Maduro’s 2018 reelection. Trump’s choice to formally recognize Guaidó as interim president signaled a renewed push by the U.S. to overturn the Bolivarian government.

Former Secretary of Defense Mark T. Esper, in his autobiography A Sacred Oath: Memoirs of a Secretary of Defense During Extraordinary Times, revealed that for Trump, regime change in Venezuela “seemed to be a bucket list item” and that the U.S. should “get the oil.” In addition to holding the largest proven oil reserves in the world — approximately 303 billion barrels, or roughly 17 percent of global reserves — Venezuela also holds significant gold, iron ore, bauxite, coltan, and diamond deposits.

In a 2022 interview with “60 Minutes,” Esper recounted how during his first term Trump repeatedly asked the Department of Defense about taking more aggressive measures to remove Maduro, including direct military action.

Eventually, Trump settled on deploying a U.S. naval fleet to the Caribbean under the supposed auspices of fighting drug trafficking. In March 2020, the Southern District of New York charged Maduro with narco-terrorism and offered a bounty of up to $15 million for information leading to his arrest or conviction. In July this year, the U.S. Department of Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) designated the Cartel de los Soles (Cartel of the Suns) as a terrorist organisation. As of August 7, 2025, the bounty on Maduro stands at $50 million, despite the fact that most international experts — including the authoritative 2025 United Nations World Drug Report — consider Venezuela a minor player in the narcotics trade.

With the Trump administration back in power, the U.S. president appears determined to remove the Venezuelan head of state.

With the Trump administration back in power, the U.S. president appears determined to remove the Venezuelan head of state, potentially through direct military action. María Corina Machado, a right-wing opposition leader who was recently awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, could be seen as a figure acceptable to Washington in a transitional government. Having been an avid supporter of the 2002 coup against Chávez, Corina Machado is a strong supporter of the privatization of Venezuela’s state oil company Petróleos de Venezuela, S.A. (PDVSA). In 2018, Machado wrote a letter to the ex-president of Argentina Mauricio Macri and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insisting they use their “strength and influence to advance the dismantling of the criminal Venezuelan regime,” which, in her view, were connected to “drug trafficking and terrorism.”

In Caracas, Ricardo Vaz, editor of Venezuelanalysis.com, says life continues as normal, though “there is tension and concern with this U.S. military buildup on Venezuela’s doorstep.” He notes that while there is awareness of U.S. military might, “there is also defiance,” particularly among the government’s core supporters. Vaz warns that while the current U.S. presence in the Caribbean is insufficient for a full-scale regime change, it has “a lot of potential for destruction, be that from cruise missiles or aircraft, aimed at triggering some internal collapse.”

Adding to these tensions, the Trump administration has granted the CIA authorization to conduct covert operations in Venezuela, according to The New York Times.

In September, ministers from the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) held a virtual meeting, denouncing the deployment of U.S. military vessels near Venezuela. CELAC, unlike the U.S.-dominated Organization of American States (OAS), provides a forum for regional countries to discuss issues without Washington’s presence, with Venezuela, Brazil, and Mexico playing leading roles.

Should the United States carry out direct attacks on Venezuelan territory, Caracas could expect strong diplomatic support from the region despite no longer enjoying the political influence it held under Chávez.

Venezuela’s economy has grown for 17 consecutive quarters since 2021, aided by liberalization measures that have not always been popular with the government’s base. In early September, China Concord Resources Corp installed the first self-elevating offshore platform in Lake Maracaibo. The Alala jackup rig is expected to increase production from 12,000 barrels per day (bpd) to 60,000 bpd by 2026 in the Lago Cinco and Lagunillas Lago oilfields in the state of Zulia, in western Venezuela. A major U.S. military strike could damage the economy, but China’s significant investments might complicate any potential targeting of infrastructure.

Joel Linares Moreno, a Caracas-based fixer for international media outlets, notes that if the Trump administration deployed full military force, organized resistance might only last a few days given the huge imbalance of power between the United States military and Venezuela’s army, air force, and navy. However, Linares Moreno adds that removing government supporters — known as Chavistas — would likely require a force willing to carry out serious human rights abuses. “They know what awaits them is a Pinochet-style dictatorship, and that’s precisely why they would fight hard, even after the Venezuelan military is neutralized,” he said. He warns that the U.S. could “overplay its hand.”

The coming weeks and months will reveal the Trump administration’s plans for Venezuela and whether Maduro and the Chavistas can remain in power. It will also highlight whether the governments of Venezuela, Colombia, Brazil, and Mexico can gather enough international diplomatic support to halt a U.S.-led war in Latin America, which has not been seen since the U.S. invasion of Panama in late 1989. That military operation, like the current one in the Caribbean Sea, was based on a string of falsehoods.