Facing growing U.S. pressure on Venezuela, President Donald Trump has once again signaled that he may expand ongoing military actions in Latin America against targets allegedly linked to drug trafficking. In an interview with the American portal Policy On Monday, he avoided ruling out sending US troops to Venezuelan territory as part of efforts to overthrow dictator Nicolas Maduro – whom he accuses of exporting drugs and “dangerous people” – and was blunt in saying the Chavista’s days “are numbered”.
— I neither want to exclude nor confirm. I’m not talking about that — said the Republican. —I want the Venezuelan people to be treated well. I want the Venezuelan people, many of whom live in the United States, to be respected. They were incredible to me, they voted for me. And I have a big business, the Doral Country Club, (located) right in the middle of what they call Little Venezuela (in Florida). Thanks to this, I got to know the Venezuelan people very well, and they are incredible people. Everyone succeeds, it’s impressive.
The American has been mooting the idea of land attacks for months, and the Pentagon has attacked more than 20 suspected drug trafficking vessels on the high seas. Since September, the United States has sent more than a dozen warships and about 15,000 troops to the region. While Washington says the operation aims to combat international drug trafficking, Caracas sees it as an attempt to pressure Maduro to leave power. So far, more than 80 people have died in US bombings – acts that human rights organizations consider unlawful extrajudicial killings.
Last week, Trump had already declared that any country involved in the sale of drugs in the United States could be attacked. During a lengthy Cabinet meeting, marked by praise from his subordinates, he also threw his support behind his Defense Secretary, Pete Hegseth, who was accused of violating military conduct during one of the attacks on ships in the Caribbean. After the meeting, the Republican president also said he could attack land targets, repeating a threat made last month, when he said it would happen “very soon.”
— On land, it’s much easier. And we know the routes they take. We know everything about them. We know where they live. We know where the bad guys live and we’re also going to start these ground attacks very soon, the president said last Tuesday. — When we start this, we will significantly reduce these quantities (of drugs exported to the United States).
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Despite the strong tone of the president’s statements, the Trump administration has been under pressure for the attacks on the ships, and some lawmakers say there is no legal justification for the operations. This criticism intensified after reports indicated that during one of the offensives, on September 2, a second attack was ordered to kill two survivors of the first, at sea. Now, Congress is trying to understand whether the two men were still “in combat” or if they were technically shipwrecked – which would make their killing illegal in a situation of armed conflict.
American senators were able to see images of this operation last Thursday, behind closed doors. Reports on the video shown describe that the survivors were shirtless, unarmed and without any communications equipment. The footage indicates that they were unaware of what had happened, nor did they know that the U.S. military was evaluating whether to strike them again. For nearly an hour, the two men struggled to free part of the hull severed by the initial explosion.
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The Defense Department’s Law of War Manual prohibits attacking incapacitated, unconscious or shipwrecked combatants until they attempt to return to combat. Although Trump posted footage of the initial attack on his Truth Social platform, no footage of the second attack – the one that killed the two survivors – has been made public. The president has promised to release the full video, but the Pentagon has yet to do so. When asked if Hegseth should testify under oath before Congress, Trump responded:
— I don’t care if he does. He can if he wants. It doesn’t bother me. I watched (the video). It looks like they were trying to turn things around, but I’m not getting involved in that. The admiral who carried out this attack is, as you know, a very respected man. And we save 25,000 people every time we overturn a boat. On average, they kill 25,000 Americans. So, you know, I don’t like to do this, but drugs entering the sea have decreased by 92%. No one wants to pilot boats loaded with drugs to the United States. And we’re also going to hit them on land very soon.
Current and former U.S. military and law enforcement officials as well as narcotics experts, however, say that drug cartels operating ships in the Caribbean actually primarily transport cocaine from South America to Europe, not the United States. And the deadliest drug of all, fentanyl, is almost exclusively smuggled by land from Mexico, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). Faced with the data, Trump said:
— Well, they (the Venezuelans) send a lot of drugs. These boats come largely from Venezuela, so I would say it’s important. And you can see the drugs; you can see these bags all over the boat. But let me tell you what they’re actually doing: They’re sending really, really bad people into our country, and they’re doing it better than anyone. They have emptied their prisons in our country and these prisoners are extremely dangerous.
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Speaking to NBC, Vanda Felbab-Brown, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, stressed that U.S. military strikes in the Caribbean targeted boats that were almost certainly carrying cocaine to Europe — and would have no bearing on the serious drug problem facing the United States. According to her, these measures will probably not deter cartels, but will simply cause them to choose different paths or methods, because the profit potential remains a strong incentive. Rahul Gupta, who led the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy in the Biden administration, called the Trump administration’s approach “tactics without strategy.”
— The attacks are symbolic. But tokenism will not treat addicted people. Tokenism will not dismantle the cartels, their logistics networks, their way of making money and the entire system that exists. (With the New York Times and Bloomberg)
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