Skulduggery and window dressing in the Caribbean

From Nat South :

Summary of article: This is a follow up on previous articles on the U.S. and Venezuela, with updates, commentary and some background information.  The question is: is it another re-run of “wag the tail”, some contrived window dressing, (smoke and mirrors) by Washington or ultimately “feeding the U.S. public a line” (*) or a mix of all these?

• U.S. posturing in the region
• Fishing boats
• Trinidad and Tobago

Wag the tail continues… the Caribbean version 2025. 

Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodríguez criticised the deployment of U.S. naval vessels and stated that the U.S. government should redirect its recently deployed maritime force to the Pacific, where aircraft, speed boats and container ships have long carried Colombian cocaine into Central American hubs for onward transhipment to the U.S. (See previous article for details).

“Those ships that are trying to intimidate Venezuela today should be there in the Pacific if they truly wanted to fight and prevent cocaine from reaching the United States of America,” she said, citing the United Nations and the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration reports, (previously mentioned).  She added that

“They have a GPS location problem. They’re where they shouldn’t be. They need to calibrate their GPS.”

“There’s a lot of hypocrisy, a lot of double standards, a lot of political manipulation of this issue to attack, to intervene, to aim for regime change in countries that aren’t sympathetic.”

Delcy Rodríguez also:

• highlighted that Venezuela destroys 70% of intercepted drugs;
• asserted the country is not a producer;
• stated that the U.S. is using drug trafficking as an excuse for regime change.

Venezuela’s Minister of Defence, Vladimir Padrino López, denounced this Sunday that U.S. military aircraft frequently fly over the Caribbean Sea, day and night.

“Most of the time they violate operational rules, because they do not notify their flight plan, which could cause accidents,” he said at a press conference. He added that the flights have tripled in August and have changed from daytime single mission flights, to nocturnal and early morning ones.

It just happens that Washington had sent in August 2025, a US Navy P-8 aircraft to the Southern Caribbean as part of a broader military buildup in the area.  However, it won’t be the only U.S. military aircraft flying in the area.  Other aircraft reported include the visible backbone of intelligence gathering and operational monitoring:

• RC-135 ‘Rivet Joint’: ELINT and SIGINT long-range gathering intelligence, (article and infographic). They have been used in supporting counter-narcotics operations in the region for decades.
• E-3 ‘Sentry’ AWACS — Air command and (air/sea/ land) surveillance, ELINT, (article).
• P-8 ‘Poseidon’, Maritime patrol , electronic intelligence and ASW, (infographic).
• KC-135 Air refuelling tankers provide the support for long-distance missions.

Then there is the invisible intelligence gathering, satellites and electronic eavesdropping, as well as the eyes and ears on the ground.

I wouldn’t be surprised if there aren’t any RQ4 Global Hawks flights in the region as well, since they have apparently not been reported by the Venezuelan authorities.  I would have thought that they would do so.

According to the latest sitrep by Rybar, there are long-distance MQ-9 ‘Reaper’ drones based at San Juan, Puerto Rico.  The Venezuelan authorities ought to mention these, given their notoriety, and highly questionable and controversial use in the Middle East, Pakistan, Afghanistan, their widespread use raised concerns by the UN,  concerning extra-judicial killings of civilians.

Another aircraft, an MC-130J, is also in Puerto Rico.  This aircraft is a special operations used for infiltration /exfiltration clandestine operations.  The U.S.A. is flexing its military muscles and making sure that Caracas notices. Combine these aircraft with the U.S. Marine USS Iwo Jima ARG group, as well as the U.S. warships, it is somewhat over the top for just a “counter narcotics” operation. The inclusion of military aircraft and a submarine lend itself more to a special operation configuration.

Having spent years looking and analysing these flights off the borders of Russia, the heightened sense of hostility has certainly shifted to the Caribbean. Rivet Joints and P-8s are not strangers to the Caribbean, they have been deployed many times, but usually on single missions, (2019), however the timing of such flights, their frequency is somewhat different, especially the addition of an E-3 AWACS.

Venezuela is under close scrutiny, day and night, from space, air and sea, and it is not just military units that are under observation. All of these U.S. military resources underpin active and wide-spectrum intelligence-gathering, potentially in support of designating targets.

After many years of Washington and Pentagon officials grousing about those “unsafe and unprofessional interactions” with the Russians, Chinese and Iranians, (in the Black Sea, Mediterranean, the Gulf, Sea China Sea and Barents Sea), now there is seemingly the reverse situation taking place off the Venezuelan coast.  The English expression: “the pot calling the kettle black” is rather apt.

Some things change but other aspects don’t. The Monroe Doctrine revisited, except for this time, it isn’t the European countries that are of concerns to U.S. exceptionalism, but China and Russia.

U.S. posturing in the region

I’ll keep it brief:  The Trump administration still has not provided any evidence whatsoever linking:

•  the Venezuelan president to Tren de Aragua,  or the “Cartel of the Suns”.
• the boat crew killed by the U.S. military strike to the “Tren de Aragua”.

Strong with the weak and weak with the strong.

Given the responses by Marco Rubio and Vice-President Vance on the UN and highly dubious legalities of the military strike, it is safe to say that there won’t be some high visible Venezuelan false flag version of the infamous Colin Powell moment at the UN General Assembly.

In fact, as in recent times with other regime change operations, the U.S. administration has completely skipped the UN. They simply are not bothered to go to any lengths to justify their actions anymore, in their quest for ratcheting up the necessary ingredients needed for a regime change operation. Certainly, the U.S. is trying to tighten the geopolitical thumbscrews to get some leverage out from the Venezuelan authorities.

For starters, Washington pulled out of thin air, several narco-terrorism allegations against the authorities in Caracas and that’s it folks.  Although, at first sight, it seems so dramatic and exaggerated, but it is part of the U.S. playbook on regime changes, but it is also quite hackneyed by this stage, to most people, especially those in the Global South.

Puerto Rican military exercises and U.S. regional presence

5 September: the announcement of the deployment of ten F-35 fighters to Puerto Rico, to conduct combat air patrols in the region and support the Southern Caribbean fleet.

8th September: Following the U.S. Marine amphibious exercises off the southern coast of Puerto Rico, the U.S. Secretary for War, Hegseth told sailors and Marines onboard the USS “Iwo Jima”, flagship of the Iwo Jima ARG: “What you’re doing right now – it’s not training … This is the real-world exercise on behalf of the vital national interests of the United States of America to end the poisoning of the American people.

The regional exercises are still continuing.

10 September: The Temporary Protected Status (TPS) 2021 status for Venezuelans in the U.S. has been revoked by Washington. (I cannot understand the context for this when the 2023 TPS have been extended by the Washington administration).

Fishing boats

The U.S. Navy is still making its presence felt off the coast of Venezuela.  On 12 September, a “Board, Search, and Seizure (VBSS) Team” from the USS “Jason Dunham” (DDG-109)  carried out a 8-hour long boarding of a Venezuelan tuna boat, (photo of the boat in the article).  The small Venezuelan flagged “Carmen Rosa”, was operating 48 nautical miles northeast of La Blanquilla Island, in Venezuela’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ). Fortunately, the fishermen were eventually released under Venezuelan naval escort.

The Venezuelan foreign minister, Yvan Gil, called the action as “as a hostile provocation aimed at justifying military escalation“.  Of course, this plays straight into the U.S. script, as practically every MSM, TV  repeatedly refer to increasing tensions.  The escalation or tension cited is being created is intentionally by the U.S. and every action taken by Venezuela in defence of its sovereignty is labelled as a ‘provocation’.

It doesn’t take 8 hours to carry out an inspection of a small fishing boat, so the 9-man crew were effectively held hostage, probably to coax out the Venezuelan navy or coastguard or even air assets to the area, which did happen.

In a month, the U.S. presence at sea:

• one presumed cartel boat destroyed,
• one boat briefly detained,
• and one case where another boat was intercepted and seized by another country.

It is fair to say that’s a lot of time, resources and money is going quickly down the drain, for a very feeble ‘noisy’ and messy result so far. It feels a lot like a window dressing exercise being played out.

Meanwhile, the destruction of the peñero and now the detention of the tuna boat only serves to strengthen the Venezuelan peoples’ attitude and also unites them in the face of outright U.S. visible aggression, not that the U.S. administration cares.

Just today, the commander buffoon bumbler-in-chief, Trump, at it again, with his ‘quiddities’ about Venezuelan gangs and drugs, stating that “We’ll see what happens” when asked about the possibility of a U.S. military strike on the country, citing the flow of gang members, drug dealers, and narcotics from Venezuela as being unacceptable. He went as far as stating:  “”What’s illegal are the drugs on the boat, and the drugs that are being sent into our country and the fact that 300 million people died last year from drugs, that’s what’s illegal,” (source FOX News). I wonder where he pulled that figure from? 300 million in the U.S. (340 million population), or world-wide? That claim is impossible. There we go, another soundbite bites the dust.

Trinidad and Tobago

Trinidad and Tobago falls in squarely into the U.S. vassal status by mimicking the U.S. stance on Venezuela.  The prime minister, Kamla Persad-Bissessar, recently said that the island would “unhesitatingly” grant access to the U.S. military in the event of an Venezuelan attack on Guyana”.  Furthermore, the authorities have:

• shown aggressive attitudes for years towards migrant boats and Venezuelan migrants,
• recognised “Tren del Aragua” as a terrorist organisation, echoing Washington’s decision.
• exercise and coordinate with the U.S. military in the region,
• ruthlessly praised the destruction of the Venezuelan peñero boat by the U.S. recently.

Just recently, the Trinidad and Tobago Coast Guard seized 268 kg of marijuana, (yes you read that correctly), from a fishing boat from Venezuela.  This shows quite well that it is possible to carry out interdiction operations without blowing up boats, (more about this aspect later in the article).

Yet, a 20-year agreement, signed in August 2024, allowing BP and Trinidad’s NGC to explore and produce natural gas from the Cocuina field in Venezuelan waters, which extends across the maritime boundary with Trinidad and Tobago.  Earlier, Venezuela granted NGC a 30-year license in December 2023 to develop the Dragon Gas Field, located in Venezuelan waters, with Royal Dutch Shell as the operator. U.S. sanctions imposed on this venture have caused delays to preliminary work to explore and exploit this field.

A nice example of sheer hypocrisy really.

Additional commentary

Fear-mongering

Is it any surprising that local communities are fearful of the U.S.  naval presence, especially in Trinidad and Tobago. President of the All Tobago Fisherfolk Association, Curtis Douglas, warned that local fishermen fear they could be mistaken for traffickers.

“Our fishermen go 40 and 50 miles, very deep, and they could easily be mistaken for doing whatever, drugs or whatever, and being blown into the water,” he said.

Anyone on the water around Venezuela can be suspected, as highlighted by the “Carmen Rosa” incident.

Discreet realpolitik

There are other aspects that needs mentioning to get a glimpse of the overall geopolitical comings and goings. Other than the noise generated by the U.S. Navy presence, other events carry on relatively unhindered, especially the Venezuelan “Plan Vuelta a la Patria”, in which dialogue, discussions and flights do take place, between Venezuela and the U.S., through intermediaries, Camilla Fabri Saab, who heads the programme and Melania Trump who was involved in the negotiations, among others.

A very recent example of this where 300 migrants were flown home and also four children were reunited with their family back in Venezuela on 12 September, after being flown from the U.S.  Around 60 children that were forcibly separated from their parents are still in the U.S. So far, in 2025, around 12 000 migrants have been repatriated back mostly from the U.S.

This shows that some back channels still operate discreetly between Venezuela and the U.S. despite the visible wall-to-wall negative and aggressive coverage by the U.S. administration and MSM alike.

Business as usual

The Trinidad and Tobago drug seizure shows very well the real tried and tested framework for drug interdiction operations, from intelligence gathering –> track, monitor, intercept, seize and detain. No big media fuss, just an official statement or two. So this shows quite clearly that the destruction of the peñero off Trinidad and Tobago at the beginning of September was a macabre publicity stunt, probably for a domestic audience. In fact, Marco Rubio confirmed this in a chilling way: “Instead of interdicting it, on the president’s orders, we blew it up — and it’ll happen again.” (Link).

Moreover, the brutal U.S. administration deterrence message against drug cartels has not been heeded by the drug traffickers themselves, given the latest marijuana seizure in the same area.

It is unmistakably clear that it is a show of force by Washington, showcasing its ability to enforce its military power, both as a threat and as an instrument of power to wield, while at the same time offering meagre reassurance to proxy countries such as Trinidad and Tobago and Guyana.

The question: how long will this last? The Monroe Doctrine is still “alive and well”(^).

More mimicry

Several days ago, the European Parliament urged the EU to designate armed groups in Colombia and also Venezuela’s supposed Cartel de los Soles as terrorist organisations. The resolution was supported by the Spanish party ‘Vox’, Renew Europe, ECR and the French party, Patriots for Europe, and and was approved with 355 votes for. The reasoning behind it: “the proliferation of organised crime and terrorist activity on the borders between Colombia and Venezuela“. I am baffled as how this actually affects Europe countries in any serious way, but cynically, it is again window dressing, as a bootlicking exercise, in other words, to get on the right side of the U.S. administration, by mimicking the actions.

Conclusion

Further exchanges of heated words will happen from time to time, while other U.S. proxies will also fall into lockstep over designating Tren de Aragua and Cartel de los Soles as terrorist organisation, just to appease Washington.

It remains to be seen if there is a limited clash on the seas between Venezuela  military and a U.S. warship, although it is a remote possibility, since the Venezuelans are being very cautious.

Certainly, the U.S. administration’s accusations and rhetoric will continue for the foreseeable future. So will the occasional cringeworthy volley of hostile words and soundbites,  all part of Washington’s guessing game.

The latest outbreak of the revamped version of the Monroe Doctrine is ultimately aimed at China, Russia and also BRICS on whole, because Washington has a sore point about them buying Russian oil and gas, but also seeing U.S. hegemony being undermined by BRICS and SCO initiatives.  Thus, the U.S. sees countries that are supporting others trying to pull away from U.S. exceptionalism, such as Venezuela, as a major threat.

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Notes: (*): Idomatic expression to tell someone something that is not completely true, often as an excuse.