The Caribbean Gambit: Deconstructing the Pretext for Regime Change in Venezuela
This article argues that the “war on drugs” is just a cover story.
Editorial | AbkhazWorld
There’s a massive US naval fleet in the Caribbean, supposedly to fight drug cartels in Venezuela. This article argues that the “war on drugs” is just a cover story. It digs into evidence suggesting the real goal is to overthrow Venezuela’s government, control its oil, and reassert American power in the region.
The placid waters of the Southern Caribbean have become the stage for a geopolitical drama of immense scale and uncertain consequence. Since August 2025, the United States has amassed a naval force of staggering proportions in the region, including the world’s largest warship, the aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford. This deployment, which accounts for an astonishing 8% of America’s entire global naval fleet, features guided-missile destroyers, F-35 fighter jets, MQ-9 Reaper drones, and a nuclear-powered submarine, bringing the total number of military personnel in the area to over 10,000. The official justification for this overwhelming show of force is a renewed “war on drugs”, a campaign to interdict cocaine smuggling by what the Trump administration has labelled Venezuelan “narco-terrorist” cartels.
Yet, the sheer disparity between the means and the stated ends is profoundly telling. As one commentary astutely observes, such a formidable armada cannot possibly be intended merely to target “three or five speedboats”. This raises the crucial question: Is this a genuine counter-narcotics operation, or is it a carefully choreographed and dangerously transparent pretext for achieving the long-held US foreign policy objective of regime change in Venezuela? The evidence strongly suggests the latter; that the war on drugs is merely a convenient “marketing strategy” for a high-stakes geopolitical gambit aimed at deposing President Nicolás Maduro, securing access to Venezuela’s vast resources, and reasserting American hegemony in its historical sphere of influence.
Deconstructing the Narcoterrorism Narrative
The foundation of Washington’s justification crumbles under even cursory scrutiny of its own data. President Donald Trump has reframed allegations that Maduro leads a narcotics organisation into the claim he heads a “narco-terrorist cartel” , thereby justifying a sharp departure from traditional law enforcement to direct military action. However, the drug trafficking patterns cited do not align with the administration’s narrative.
Regarding fentanyl, the primary driver of the US opioid crisis, experts and government data are unequivocal. The substance is overwhelmingly produced in Mexico and trafficked directly across the southern land border. According to US Customs and Border Protection, a staggering 94% of all seized fentanyl is intercepted there. The Caribbean route is, for this particular drug, a negligible factor.
The case for cocaine is similarly weak. While Venezuela does serve as a transit country for some cocaine produced elsewhere in South America, the primary destination for these shipments is Europe, not the United States. The US Drug Enforcement Administration’s (DEA) own reporting shows that 84% of cocaine seized in the US originates from Colombia, with another 4% from Peru. Venezuela is not even named in the remaining mix, a fact that fundamentally undermines the indictment of its government as a primary threat to American streets. This pattern is not new; for those familiar with the history of “America’s dirty wars in Latin America,” the drug issue is simply a “new excuse”, a modern substitute for the Cold War pretext of anti-communism.
The Regime Change Blueprint
With the counter-narcotics claim exposed as a thin veneer, the administration’s true intentions become clearer. The military build-up is not an operation but a performance, designed to “ratchet up the intimidation” in the hopes of sparking a palace coup or mass defections within the Venezuelan military and ruling circles. This strategy gained significant traction in mid-October when President Trump confirmed he had authorised the CIA to conduct covert operations inside Venezuela , a move that could entail anything from intelligence gathering and support for the opposition to “direct assassinations” or “kidnappings” of senior officials.
Washington’s preferred successor appears to be María Corina Machado, the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize laureate and opposition leader whom the Maduro government barred from contesting the 2024 election. Hailing from a powerful oligarchic family in the steel sector, she is characterised by critics as an “American puppet” and has been praised by key administration figures like Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Machado has actively urged the US to pressure Maduro from office , and her controversial associations, including with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and parties on the European far-right, align with the Trump administration’s ideological leanings.
The escalation path seems clear. Should the naval presence fail to dislodge Maduro, the next logical step for regime change advocates would be a limited intervention under the guise of counterterrorism. This could involve missile strikes against land-based targets plausibly linked to drug trafficking or, more dramatically, a “decapitation strike on Maduro himself”, a scenario made worryingly plausible by Trump’s demonstrated preference for such actions against figures he labels “terrorists”.
Venezuelan Resilience and the Perils of Escalation
The assumption that a simple show of American military might will cause the Venezuelan state to collapse, however, may be a grave miscalculation. The U.S. and its allies in the Venezuelan opposition risk underestimating the cohesion of the regime, just as they did during the “maximum pressure” campaign of 2019. Under Hugo Chávez and later Maduro, the armed forces were deliberately restructured to be “coup proof,” with command and control fragmented to foment internal competition based on political loyalty.
Furthermore, the bonds between the civilian government and the military are “cemented in part by the profits of illicit economies” that enrich both. For a senior officer, the risks of plotting a coup are immense; failure carries the certainty of imprisonment, torture, and asset confiscation for them and their families. In the face of this external threat, Venezuelan leaders have grown increasingly paranoid, frequently changing locations and mobilising a popular militia that could potentially serve as a “human shield” against missile strikes.
Should Washington succeed in toppling Maduro, the ensuing power vacuum would be fraught with peril. The risk of widespread violence cannot be overstated. Parts of the security forces could rebel, waging a guerrilla war against any new authority. Moreover, powerful armed groups like the Colombian rebel ELN, which maintains several thousand hardened fighters in Venezuela and has pledged to defend the Maduro government, would likely exploit the chaos. This could precipitate a protracted, low-intensity conflict, destabilising the entire region and unleashing a new wave of refugees to add to the nearly 7.8 million who have already fled since 2014.
A Regional Rebuke Led by Colombia
The Trump administration’s unilateral military action has shattered decades of multilateral cooperation in Latin America, sending a “chilling message” across the region. The most forceful opposition has come from an unlikely source: Colombia, historically the United States’ staunchest security partner in the hemisphere.
Colombian President Gustavo Petro, a former member of the M-19 guerrilla movement, has become a direct target of Trump’s ire, even being labelled a “drug baron” himself. Petro has vehemently condemned the U.S. strikes, declaring “solidarity with Venezuela” and framing the entire campaign not as a fight against trafficking, but as a “war for oil” that threatens the entire continent. In a profound shift in regional dynamics, Petro has announced that Colombia will no longer serve as a launchpad for attacks on its neighbour and will begin sharing military intelligence with Caracas. His stance reflects a growing regional consensus that Washington’s actions are arbitrary, dangerous, and motivated by interests far removed from regional security.
Conclusion: The High Cost of a Fabricated War
The evidence is overwhelming. The massive U.S. military deployment in the Caribbean is not a proportionate response to drug trafficking; it is the overture to a regime change operation built on a demonstrably false pretext. This strategy is not only based on a flawed assessment of Venezuelan political and military realities but also wilfully ignores the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of a potential state collapse. A military intervention is highly unlikely to produce a smooth political transition and could instead plunge the nation into a protracted civil conflict, triggering a refugee crisis of unimaginable proportions and destabilising its neighbours.
The overwhelming majority of Venezuelans voted for change in 2024, only to see their democratic will denied by the incumbent government. Their desire for a new direction is undeniable. However, achieving that change at the barrel of a gun, through an external intervention predicated on a fiction, is a path laden with peril. Regional leaders like Gustavo Petro have rightly identified the immense dangers of this approach. A diplomatic route, one that harnesses the collective will of Latin America to forge a political solution, remains the only viable path to a stable and democratic future for Venezuela. To pursue a military adventure instead is to court a catastrophe that will be measured not in barrels of oil seized, but in human lives shattered.
References
Center for Preventive Action. (2025, October 21). U.S. Confrontation With Venezuela. Global Conflict Tracker.
Epstein, K., & Cheetham, J. (2025, October 24). Venezuela’s Maduro says US ‘fabricating war’ as it deploys world’s largest warship. BBC
International Crisis Group. (2025, October 23). Beware the Slide Toward Regime Change in Venezuela.
First published on AbkhazWorld.com