In a stunning military operation carried out in the early hours of Saturday, January 3rd, American forces captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife. As of mid-afternoon Eastern Time on Saturday, the two were en route to New York, where they are expected to face criminal charges stemming from a U.S. indictment issued roughly five years ago.
The operation caps months of escalating confrontation between Washington and Caracas. The Trump administration had already carried out military strikes on vessels accused of drug smuggling and seized oil tankers off Venezuela’s coast. Now, the US has toppled the regime. At a press conference just hours after Maduro’s capture, Donald Trump declared that the United States would “run Venezuela.” He offered few specifics—but repeatedly emphasized one point: the U.S. would soon control Venezuela’s vast oil reserves.
To make sense of what just happened — and what may come next — I’m joined from Bogotá, Colombia by Elizabeth Dickinson, deputy director for Latin America at the International Crisis Group. We begin with what is known so far about the operation itself and Trump’s extraordinary claim that the U.S. is now governing Venezuela. From there, we dig into the immense risks ahead: the political vacuum inside Venezuela, the regional consequences, and the dangers of America’s apparent attempt to exert direct control over another country.
We also explore why this moment bears uncomfortable similarities to the U.S. overthrow of Saddam Hussein and the occupation of Iraq more than two decades ago—and what that history might tell us about Venezuela’s future.
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