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President Donald Trump said this week that the United States had struck a boat successful the Caribbean that helium claimed belonged to Tren de Aragua, a notorious organised transgression gang, and was smuggling drugs to the US.
The Trump medication has agelong claimed that cocaine shipments from Venezuela are fuelling a cause overdose occupation that plagues the US.
Here is what is happening betwixt the US and Venezuela, and what facts connected the crushed archer us:
What enactment is the US taking against Venezuelan cause cartels?
The US onslaught connected the Venezuelan vessel connected Tuesday came conscionable a fewer days aft quality reports circulated astir US warships advancing into Venezuelan waters.
Last month, The New York Times reported that Trump had signed a concealed directive instructing the Pentagon to usage subject unit against definite Latin American cause cartels designated by the US arsenic overseas violent organisations.
Earlier successful August, aggregate quality agencies reported that 3 US Aegis-class guided rocket destroyer ships had headed to the Caribbean alongside different warships to antagonistic narcotics trafficking.
The Reuters quality agency, quoting 2 anonymous individuals who had been briefed connected the deployment, reported that USS San Antonio, USS Iwo Jima, and USS Fort Lauderdale were headed towards the Venezuelan coast, carrying 4,500 US work members, including 2,200 Marines.
The US Fleet Forces Command published a quality merchandise connected August 14, saying sailors and Marines assigned to the Iwo Jima Amphibious Ready Group had departed from Norfolk, Virginia and Camp Lejeune, North Carolina. The merchandise did not explicitly authorities details of the ngo oregon specify wherever the radical is being deployed.
What happened successful the US attack?
In his Truth Social station connected Tuesday, Trump said 11 people, whom helium deemed “terrorists”, had been killed successful the strike. “Please fto this service arsenic announcement to anybody adjacent reasoning astir bringing drugs into the United States of America,” Trump wrote.
The US did not supply further details connected those killed.
Salvador Santino Regilme, an subordinate prof astatine Leiden University successful the Netherlands, told Al Jazeera that lethal unit successful maritime interdiction indispensable comply with the close to beingness and the instrumentality enforcement necessity and proportionality standards.
“UNCLOS and the 1988 UN Drug Trafficking Convention emphasise cooperation, boarding and consent mechanisms astatine sea, not summary destruction. Any onslaught that kills suspected traffickers should trigger a prompt, independent, and transparent investigation,” Regilme said, referring to the United Nations Convention connected the Law of the Sea.
However, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio told the property aft a gathering with Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum connected Wednesday that strikes connected drug-carrying boats similar the 1 connected Tuesday would continue. He added that the US has tried to intercept specified boats, but that attack has not deterred them. “What volition halt them is erstwhile you stroke them up,” Rubio said.
— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) September 4, 2025
How has Venezuela responded?
In effect to the US deployment of warships, President Nicolas Maduro urged his supporters to articulation militias to support the country, saying, “No empire volition interaction the ineffable ungraded of Venezuela.”
One specified equipped radical is the Bolivarian Militia, which is named aft Simon Bolivar, who was a Caracas-born independency person who liberated the modern-day Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Panama, and Bolivia from the Spanish Empire.
What does the US impeach Venezuela of?
The Trump medication claims Venezuela’s left-wing president is straight moving with cause cartels and is progressive successful cocaine trafficking. It has accused Tren de Aragua of serving arsenic a “front” for the Maduro government. Trump designated Tren de Aragua arsenic a “foreign violent organisation” connected his archetypal time successful the Oval Office connected January 20.
In 2020, during Trump’s archetypal term, Maduro was indicted by a US national tribunal connected cause charges, including narcoterrorism and conspiracy to import cocaine.
On August 7, the US Department of Justice and the State Department doubled a reward for accusation starring to Maduro’s apprehension to $50m, accusing him of being “one of the largest narco-traffickers successful the world”.
“Officially, Washington frames the enactment arsenic a counter-narcotics onslaught against Tren de Aragua and different ‘narco-terrorist’ networks,” Regilme said.
“The determination besides extends a years-long coercive strategy toward the Maduro authorities that dates to US narcoterrorism charges successful 2020, and it serves a home messaging extremity – linking a hard-edged overseas argumentation to cause power astatine home.”
Maduro was elected for a 2nd word aft winning past year’s disputed election. The US has not had a ceremonial diplomatic narration with Venezuela since 2019 and does not recognise Maduro’s presidency arsenic legitimate.
The US has besides accused Maduro and his curate of interior, justness and peace, Diosdado Cabello, of collaborating with the Cartel de los Soles (Cartel of the Suns), which Washington has besides designated arsenic a “terrorist” group. Like Maduro, Cabello is simply a subordinate of the ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV).
In March, Trump invoked the 1798 wartime Alien Enemies Act, allowing him to detain and deport radical from a “hostile federation oregon government”. On the aforesaid day, the Trump medication deported much than 230 Venezuelan men to a maximum-security El Salvador prison, the Center for Terrorism Confinement (CECOT).
On Tuesday, a US national appeals tribunal ruled that Trump could not use the 1798 Act to deport suspected pack members.
Are the Trump administration’s allegations against Venezuela true?
The Trump medication has not provided immoderate grounds linking Maduro to Tren de Aragua oregon immoderate different cause cartel, and the Venezuelan person has denied the allegations.
The US quality assemblage has besides contradicted the Trump administration’s claims that determination are links betwixt the Venezuelan authorities and Tren de Aragua.
A classified appraisal by the National Intelligence Council released successful April repeatedly stated that determination was nary grounds of coordination betwixt Tren de Aragua and immoderate elder leaders successful the Maduro administration, though it did authorities that the permissive situation successful Venezuela allowed cause gangs to flourish.
The study drew input from each 18 agencies that comprise the US quality community. All agencies, but the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), agreed with the findings.
How overmuch cocaine comes from Venezuela?
According to the World Drug Report, published by the UN Office connected Drugs and Crime (UNODC) this year, the planetary accumulation of cocaine reached a grounds precocious successful 2023, exceeding an estimated 3,708 tonnes – an summation of astir one-third compared with the erstwhile year.
The UNODC study shows that a bulk of the coca bush, from which cocaine is derived, was cultivated successful Colombia, followed by Peru and Bolivia. The study besides shows that astir of the main routes of cocaine trafficking successful 2023 and 2024 into the US passed done Colombia, Peru and Ecuador, alternatively than Venezuela.
Venezuela is utilized arsenic a “transit corridor” for immoderate Colombian cocaine moving into the eastbound Caribbean, Regilme said. “But the ascendant maritime pathway for US-bound cocaine remains the Eastern Pacific into Mexico and Central America, wherever the largest interdictions occur. Recent seizures underscore that pattern.”
The US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) released an yearly cocaine study successful 2024, which identified Colombia arsenic the superior root of cocaine seized by the US. About 84 percent of the cocaine seized successful the US was recovered to beryllium originating from Colombian coca. The study does not notation Venezuela.
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