Early on the morning of Jan. 3, the U.S. military conducted one of the most daring raids in recent memory, entering Caracas to seize Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, and remove them to New York, where they will be tried on federal drug-trafficking charges. No U.S. troops were killed in the operation, which used over 150 aircraft and involved airstrikes on multiple sites in Caracas and elsewhere in addition to capturing Maduro. Though the targets in Venezuela were hit with fairly precise accuracy, some civilians are among the more than 80 people reportedly killed in the attack. Cuba has announced that 32 of its intelligence and security personnel were killed by U.S. forces.
The ease with which the U.S. accomplished the mission is a testament to the skill of its special operations forces. But it also suggests there was significant help from inside the Venezuelan regime to depose Maduro, who took power in 2013 after the death of his predecessor, Hugo Chavez. While interim President Delcy Rodriguez—who was Maduro’s vice president—will never admit it, this increasingly looks to be as much of a palace coup assisted by the U.S. as it is a regime change operation. In any case, while Maduro is now out, the regime has not yet changed.
There are few certainties about Venezuela’s future. Among the wide range of potential scenarios, we may see a reconsolidation of the dictatorship under the Chavistas, a slow transition to a democratic opposition, an internal insurgency involving high levels of violence, or a chaotic power struggle in the coming years. U.S. President Donald Trump has promised to “run” Venezuela, but his administration does not have a plan to do so, and no U.S. forces are on the ground. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has instead said the administration will use coercion and the threat of military force—a very credible one given the successful rendition operation against Maduro and the ongoing presence of a U.S. armada off Venezuela’s shores—to influence events within the country. In recent interviews, Trump has threatened Rodriguez with a fate worse than Maduro if she does not cooperate.