The Nicolás Maduro regime said Sunday Venezuela has captured a group of alleged mercenaries with ties to the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency and accused Washington and Trinidad and Tobago of coordinating military exercises intended to provoke an armed confrontation in the Caribbean.
In a statement released by Vice President Delcy Rodríguez, the socialist government said the arrests revealed what it described as a “false-flag operation” planned from waters bordering Trinidad and Tobago, or from Trinidadian or Venezuelan territory, “to generate a full-scale military confrontation” against Venezuela.
The regime’s announcement comes amid the fast-growing buildup of U.S. forces in the Caribbean launched by President Donald Trump to combat drug cartels. The administration has signaled that it might soon authorize ground incursions into Venezuela to target the so-called Cartel de los Soles, a narco-trafficking organization the U.S. claims is led by Maduro himself.
The Venezuelan government did not release any evidence or details about the alleged arrests, such as the number of suspects, their nationalities, or when and where they were detained.
Caracas also linked the alleged plot to military drills it claims are being carried out this week by Trinidad and Tobago “under the coordination, financing, and control” of the U.S. Southern Command, calling them “a hostile provocation and a grave threat to the peace of the Caribbean.”
Accusations against Trinidad and Tobago
The statement accused Trinidad and Tobago’s Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar of having “renounced the sovereignty” of her country to act as a “military colony subordinated to U.S. hegemonic interests.
“By aligning herself with Washington’s militarist agenda, Persad-Bissessar not only seeks to attack Venezuela and break our historical bonds of brotherhood, but also violates the United Nations Charter, the CELAC declaration of Latin America and the Caribbean as a Zone of Peace, and the principles of CARICOM,” the statement read.
The Maduro government said the alleged military maneuvers are part of an effort to “turn the Caribbean into a space for lethal violence and U.S. imperial domination.”
The Miami Herald could not independently confirm the arrest of any group or the existence of coordinated operations involving the CIA or the Doral-based U.S. Southern Command, which oversees military operations in Latin America.
In its statement, the Caracas regime compared the supposed plan to historical events such as the USS Maine explosion in Cuba in 1898 — one of the causes of the Spanish-American war — and the Gulf of Tonkin incident near Vietnam in 1964, both of which preceded major U.S. military interventions. The government said the alleged provocation follows the same pattern and accused Washington of seeking “a pretext for war” in the region.
The statement also accused Trinidad and Tobago’s government of human rights violations, alleging that “innocent fishermen have been victims of extrajudicial executions in the Caribbean Sea.”
Maduro warned that Venezuela “does not accept threats” and said its armed forces would remain “alert and mobilized in perfect civil-military-police unity” in response.
“Our Republic, heir of Bolívar and Chávez, will always defend its sovereignty, its territorial integrity, and its right to live in peace against foreign enemies and their vassals,” the statement concluded.
Regional tensions and U.S. buildup
The accusations come at a time of strained relations between Venezuela and the United States, following the Trump administration’s decision to amass the largest U.S. military presence the Caribbean has seen in decades to combat drug cartel operations in the region. The task force has launched deadly strikes against boats the U.S. says were transporting drugs to Caribbean islands and into the United States, most of them originating in Venezuela, leaving at least 43 people dead.
The buildup of U.S. forces in the region continues. Over the past two months, the Pentagon has deployed close to 10,000 troops — most of them based in Puerto Rico — along with a contingent of Marines aboard amphibious assault ships. The U.S. Navy has positioned at least 10 warships and a submarine in the Caribbean as part of the expanded presence, and last week Trump directed the world’s largest aircraft carrier, the USS Gerald R. Ford, into the region.
In addition, Trump has indicated that the U.S. is now considering ground operations, while his administration has quietly granted the CIA new powers to conduct covert activities in the South American country.
“We are certainly looking at land now, because we’ve got the sea very well under control,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office earlier this month. “We’ve almost totally stopped it by sea. Now we’ll stop it by land.”
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