The Trump administration has opened up a new war front. This time it is against narcotics and DTOs, which the administration has labeled as terrorist organizations. Labeling DTOs as terrorist organizations initially made it possible for the Trump administration to go after their assets. Recently, the Trump administration took the terrorist designation a step further by seeking congressional permission to use military force on DTOs by literally declaring war on them.
The Trump administration has made Venezuela its primary focus. According to Trump, the US Navy has destroyed three boats the administration alleged were carrying narcotics—specifically fentanyl. After reading and taking some time to digest the situation, several problems emerge with the administration’s actions.
First and foremost, the administration has provided no evidence that the boats it has destroyed were drug boats. The videos presented by the US government showed boats that looked like fishing pangas. If the panga was carrying drugs, that type of boat could not make it to the US on its own. It could have been trying to make a rendezvous with a mother ship, or it might have been headed towards Trinidad, islands in the Caribbean, or the Central American coastline, which is dotted with innumerable bays and islands such as those found along the Panamanian, Nicaraguan, or Honduran coastlines.
By blowing it up we won’t have the intelligence to know where it was headed. If it was carrying drugs or linking up with a mothership, it would have been better to track it so that the US could bag a bigger enchilada. David Westrate the former assistant administrator of the DEA once told me that the DEA has intelligence on a drug shipment, they follow it to its conclusion so they can roll up a whole network. It also must be noted that the first panga that was destroyed by the US Navy had turned around and was headed back towards Venezuela when it was destroyed in international waters.
Another problem that I have noticed is that the administration has claimed they were carrying fentanyl. Yet, a little fentanyl goes a long way as far as narcotics go. Usually, it is not transported in large bales like marijuana or even in the same quantity that cocaine is transported. So, from looking at the video of the panga being destroyed using the plain eye, it seems unlikely that the panga was transporting fentanyl. Moreover, Venezuela has not been considered a center for the processing of fentanyl, at least until now.
Some commentators say the Trump administration’s actions in the Caribbean are a distraction from the other international conflicts in which the US finds itself embroiled. Trump has failed to extricate the US from the Ukraine and continues to allow Israel to continue its genocide against the Palestinian people. Trump continues to follow the neoconservative playbook, which his base specifically voted for him to reject. The Neocons seek to impose full spectrum dominance in the form of global hegemony. This means they pursue conflict with Russia and China and seek to extend US influence over the heartland as defined by Halford Mackinder. The Neocons are also unquestionably bought and sold by Israel or are Israeli agents. As a result, the administration and Congress continue to condone Israel’s genocide of the Palestinians. Yet, the conflict in Palestine (of which there are questions about how October 7 occurred and what actually happened on that day, specifically in regard to the Hannibal Directive) is being used so that Israel may pursue the Greater Israel Project. The Greater Israel Project seeks to expand Israeli territorial control in the Middle East while at the same time turning its neighbors into failed states. One motivating factor for the neoconservatives is the fact that Israel’s conflict is being used to stop Russia and China’s Silk Road initiative up through the Caspian Sea. At the center of this operation is Iran, which connects Russia and China. Israel has long sought to overthrow Iran, claiming Iran is a nuclear proliferator when Israel itself is the actual nuclear proliferator.
This essay is not about the global conflict, yet it is a mess that is now Trump’s mess. Trump recognized that Biden’s war, put US dollar hegemony at risk. Yet, in his failure to extricate the US from Ukraine (one of the most corrupt countries in the world being used to impose the globalist agenda against nationalist Russia, first by launching a coup d’état in 2014, arming it for war during Trump’s first presidency and then extending NATO and nuclear weapons along Russia’s border—a red line for Russia—during Biden’s presidency), his policies have alienated a large part of the world, such as India and Brazil, and have strengthened BRICS rather than weakening it. Moreover, Trump’s blind support for Israel has not benefitted the US internationally. The US can no longer claim to be a “City on a Hill” while it actively aids Israel’s genocide. Israel is not America’s ally. From the USS Liberty to Jonathan Pollard to the sale of American technology to both Russia and China, Israel serves itself. Israel has figured out how to buy the US political system using US dollars, which are funneled to Israel in the form of US aid, which Israel then funnels back to AIPAC, which works in association with other pro-Zionist interests and institutions that buy the US political system. This fact is irrefutable and has totally corrupted the United States’ political system.
Returning to the Venezuelan ‘drug boats,’ critics have described their destruction as targeted assassinations. The question is whether or not the actions of the administration were even legal. By claiming it was Tren de Aragua on the boats, the administration justifies its actions by claiming they are alleged terrorists. Tren de Aragua started out as a prison gang—not a major cartel—and really has little connection to the Venezuelan government. Since its inception in 2016, the Tren de Aragua converted itself into an international gang that dabbles in petty crime, kidnapping, human trafficking, and limited narcotics smuggling. It cannot be considered a cartel on the level of the Sinaloa cartel or the CJNG. Tren de Aragua can be compared to the MS-13 which is an auxiliary to the major Mexican cartels that also has a transnational network.
The Cartel de Soles did exist. Knowledge of its existence came from Leamsy Salazar, a lieutenant colonel in Venezuela’s Navy and also Hugo Chavez’s chief of security. Salazar accused Diosdado Cabello, the speaker of the Venezuelan National Assembly of organizing the “cartel” (the use of the word “cartel” is a misnomer) with the tacit support of Hugo Chávez. Some members of the Venezuelan military were involved in trafficking cocaine through Venezuela from Colombia with the help of the former FARC and the ELN. This information was confirmed by prosecutors from the Southern District of New York, who presented documents and affidavits in September 2019.
Regardless of the Cartel de Soles’ existence, Venezuela has never been a narcostate like Colombia, Peru, or Bolivia. Coca and coca paste are produced in Peru, Bolivia, and Colombia—not in Venezuela. Venezuela is a transitory route. The fact of the matter is that narcotics follow many different routes. Within Maduro’s regime, there are elements that are part of the government and military who are involved in the drug trade. They do so not only to enrich themselves, but also to control the underground economy. Yet, to say that Venezuela is a narcostate is false. Ecuador is as much of a transit location as is Venezuela. This fact also applies to Mexico, Brazil, and all of Central America. The question then becomes, why isn’t the US blockading Brazil or Mexico? One could argue that Trump might be doing this to pressure Venezuela to take back its criminal elements who arrived in the US illegally. On the other hand, Trump’s actions seem to be about regime change in Venezuela and control over Venezuelan oil/minerals. Trump’s first administration did try to overthrow Maduro previously. Trump has put a bounty on Maduro’s head, claiming that he is some type of drug cartel capo running Venezuela, which is mostly false. Where in the 20th–21st century has the US ever put a bounty on the head of a leader of another nation? We have killed leaders like Trujillo and Lumumba and tried to kill Castro with Operation Mongoose, but the targeted assassination of political leaders was made illegal after the Church and Tower hearings in the 1970s. Not even Noriega had a bounty on his head. And to note, Venezuela is not Panama, where we had a significant military presence during our invasion of Panama in December 1989.
The real danger regarding the US naval presence off the coast of Venezuela is that US military pressure or US support for a coup attempt (from Guyana, for example, where there has been a border issue with Venezuela—think Guatemala in 1953, where the coup plotters came from Honduras, or Cuba’s Bay of Pigs in 1961, where they came from Nicaragua) with US military backing would likely provoke a civil war. Venezuela is highly divided politically. It is true that Maduro is autocratic and only adheres to democratic principles when it is convenient for him. Yet, there are better ways to get a country to change its behavior rather than relying on military force—that is, if it is even the US’ business to become involved in the internal affairs of another country. Direct US military action against Venezuela (or any other nation that does not welcome the US military) would provoke a strong nationalist reaction throughout Latin America, which would not serve the US well and could destabilize Colombia and possibly Brazil, not to mention Guyana. Rather than driving Venezuela deeper and deeper into China and Russia’s orbit, the US could try to find areas where the two nations can cooperate. At the same time, the people of Venezuela might see the US as a benevolent power rather than an oppressive hegemon.
Although I voted for Colonel Douglas Macgregor for President, I was hopeful about Trump 2.0. Unfortunately, his administration is increasingly going off the rails. I supported his immigration policies, Robert Kennedy, Musk’s DOGE, and his willingness to fight the culture wars. Unfortunately, the results have been disappointing. He especially fails to see that the real problem in US institutions is Cultural Marxism (not antisemitism) and his administration has become no different than the Biden administration regarding the suppression of free speech. Let us also not forget that he promised that his administration would be the most transparent administration, but then he provides cover up for the rich and powerful by refusing to provide transparency regarding the Jeffrey Epstein files, and Epstein’s (and Ghislane Maxwell’s), potential ties to the Israeli Mossad.
Trump’s economic policy continues to kick US economic problems down the road. It has alienated much of the world which portends poorly for long-term US interests because the world is getting tired of the debt devaluated US dollar. His tariffs were poorly thought out, and there was never a real plan in place to use them to encourage reinvestment into the US. Trump said he would solve inflation, but everything he has done is inflationary. His economic policies are not helping his MAGA base. Rather, Trump pursues financial repression—the very crime he accused Obama of committing—by making the rich richer and the poor poorer. If anything, he should have waited to let the Fed declare victory over inflation, and then implemented his tariffs. Now, he has put the economy and the Fed in-between a rock and a hard place over the issue of employment versus inflation. His endless spending on war does not help US debt levels either. Despite a few good deregulatory measures, Trump’s BBB will balloon US debt. Sadly, everything Trump has done relies on executive orders that can be reversed by the courts or the political opposition, who will further expand the use of executive powers when they return to power.
Trump claimed he was going to be the president of peace. At this point, Trump deserves the Noble Peace Prize as much as Obama did, which is not at all. Moreover, sustained attacks on Venezuelan pangas allegedly carrying narcotics will change nothing in the overall scheme of the drug trade. As pointed out in Narcostates, halting the flow of drugs from South America is like fighting a root fire. Traffickers will change their routes according to where the US applies pressure and there is no possible way the US can intercept all of the narcotics flowing from the Andes or Mexico unless it employed the entire US military, which is not going to happen. To note, the flow of cocaine into the US (especially the West Coast) has increased while the Trump administration has concentrated US naval assets on the small amounts of alleged fentanyl flowing out of Venezuela (large amounts of fentanyl flow out of Mexico though).
I am sure there are a lot of Fudds out there going rah, rah about blowing up the pangas and declaring war on DTO “terrorists.” More people die annually from alcohol than they do from fentanyl. They know nothing about Latin America. In the words of Dean Acheson: “Americans are uninformed people that have opinions on everything, but yet they know nothing. Their political leaders are reflective of the people they represent.”
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