Early Saturday morning, after cloud cover lifted, elite Army Delta Force commandos moved in. With support from CIA covert operators and other military, intelligence, and law enforcement personnel, they carried out the Trump administration’s audacious regime-change project in Venezuela, upending global order and shattering what remains of geopolitical norms.
As the day wore on, the full scope of the operation became clear: The U.S. had attacked a sovereign nation with which it was not at war and did so without congressional authorization; kidnapped its leader Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, and rendered them to the United States; announced plans to “run” that country as a de facto colony; and threatened further attacks and military occupation unless the acting president does America’s bidding.
“We’re in charge,” Trump said of Venezuela on Sunday night, speaking to reporters on Air Force One. “We’re going to run everything.”
Reflecting on the operation, dubbed Absolute Resolve, a senior defense official called America a “rogue state” and pronounced dead the liberal rules-based geopolitical order which U.S. administrations, of both parties, have championed since World War II.
“His powers are rooted in the fearmongering post-9/11 decisions creating emergency powers that were never reined back in.”
“It’s crazy how we are following the old, failed scripts: Topple government. Make no plans for the aftermath,” the senior defense official said. “We must face the reality Trump has no limits. His powers are rooted in the fearmongering post-9/11 decisions creating emergency powers that were never reined back in.”
The administration has justified Absolute Resolve by citing the president’s authority under Article II of the Constitution to protect U.S. personnel from an actual or imminent attack.
Sarah Harrison, who previously advised Pentagon policymakers on issues related to human rights and the law of war, said that the attack was a clear violation of international law and the administration’s justifications are baseless.
“Countries cannot go around the world using force against other states merely due to criminal activity. On this point the administration has put forward one of the most groundless legal arguments,” Harrison told The Intercept. “What happened on January 3 was clearly an offensive, not a defensive, mission, and an act of aggression in violation of the U.N. charter and customary international law.”
“Countries cannot go around the world using force against other states.”
“There’s a pervasive corrosive fear in the Pentagon among those of us opposed to Trump and his policies,” the senior defense official told The Intercept. “We have supported the country and the institutions for decades and now watch as they are being dismantled.”
Pentagon press secretary Kingsley Wilson did not reply to repeated requests for comment concerning the statements by the senior defense official.
Forever Wars
Over the weekend, Trump repeatedly threatened continued war in Venezuela, as the U.S. maintains a massive military presence in the Caribbean, including the largest naval flotilla in the region since the Cold War. “We’re prepared,” Trump said of possible follow-up strikes on Venezuela. “You know, we have a second wave that’s much bigger than the first wave.”
He also threatened that the “American armada remains poised in position, and the United States retains all military options until United States demands have been fully met and fully satisfied.”
Trump also left the door open to a full-scale military occupation. “We’re not afraid of boots on the ground,” he said.
Trump said that the U.S. intends to employ Delcy Rodríguez, Maduro’s vice president, as a puppet under threat of further U.S. attacks.
“If Maduro’s vice president — if the vice president does what we want, we won’t have to do that,” he said of a military occupation. Trump told The Atlantic on Sunday that if Rodríguez “doesn’t do what’s right, she is going to pay a very big price, probably bigger than Maduro.”
Rodríguez, who had initially struck a defiant tone, expressed a willingness to “collaborate” with the U.S. following Trump’s menacing comments.
Experts raised the issue of blowback, which has haunted foreign U.S. interventions since before the CIA coined the term for the unintended, negative effects of covert U.S. operations.
“The United States learned this the hard way during previous regime change operations in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya, where early tactical achievements failed to produce strategic success and instead paved the way for expensive occupations and unintended consequences,” said Daniel DePetris of Defense Priorities, a research institute that favors restraint in foreign policy. “A split in the Venezuelan military, an expansion of criminal groups in the country, civil war, and the emergence of an even worse autocrat are all possible scenarios. None of these would bode well for regional stability or U.S. interests in its sphere of influence.”
Military contracting documents revealed by The Intercept also show that the War Department has plans to feed a massive military presence in the Caribbean until almost to the end of President Donald Trump’s term in office. A 2023 study by the RAND Corporation warned that “overt military intervention in Venezuela is likely to become messy very quickly and is likely to become protracted.”
“Like President Trump, the Bush administration also promised that Iraqi oil would pay for the occupation.”
“The idea of the United States running or administering Venezuela, even temporarily, should set off every alarm bell in Washington,” said Lora Lumpe, the CEO of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. “It bears an unsettling resemblance to the occupation of Iraq, where promises of liberation quickly gave way to years of insurgency, civilian suffering, and regional destabilization. Like President Trump, the Bush administration also promised that Iraqi oil would pay for the occupation.”
Lumpe added, “While the U.S. invasion of Iraq looked like an initial success, it is now understood, including by President Trump, to be a colossal failure.”
Trump has long advocated seizing foreign oil fields, including those in Iraq and Syria. “I still can’t believe we left Iraq without the oil,” he tweeted in 2013. “It used to be, ‘To the victor belong the spoils,’” he said at a 2016 “Commander-in-Chief Forum.” In 2023, during a speech at the North Carolina Republican Convention, Trump said that, if reelected in 2021, he would have seized Venezuela’s oil. “When I left, Venezuela was ready to collapse. We would have taken it over, we would have gotten all that oil,” he said.
On Saturday, Trump made clear that the U.S. would be cashing in on Venezuela’s petroleum patrimony. “We’re gonna have a presence in Venezuela as it pertains to oil,” he explained. “We’re gonna be taking out a tremendous amount of wealth out of the ground.” He said that both Venezuela and the U.S. would share in those riches, stating that America was entitled to “reimbursement for the damages caused us by that country.”
Trump has pursued an abrasive, interventionist, and ruthless foreign policy during his second term and made war in Iran, Iraq, Nigeria, Somalia, Syria, Venezuela, Yemen, and the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean in 2025, despite claiming to be a “peacemaker.”
Close to Catastrophe
Late on Friday night and into early Saturday morning, Trump and his advisers huddled as scores of U.S. aircraft took off, including attack jets that struck targets in and around Caracas, including air defense systems, a government official told The Intercept.
Helicopters, with troops and “law enforcement officers” on board, skimmed just 100 feet above the water en route to Venezuela, according to chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Dan Caine. (The government official clarified that the law enforcement personnel were FBI agents.)
U.S. forces cleared a path with electronic warfare methods from Space Command, Cyber Command, and others while combat aircraft provided armed overwatch.
Caine said the operation involved more than 150 aircraft launched from 20 bases around the Western Hemisphere, including F-18, F-35, and F-22 fighters; B-1 bombers; and remotely piloted drones.
Around 1 a.m. ET, the soldiers of Delta Force, officially known as 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment–Delta — who specialize in high-risk missions involving the capture or killing of high-value targets — arrived at Maduro’s compound in downtown Caracas. “On arrival into the target area, the helicopters came under fire and they replied to that fire with overwhelming force,” said Caine. “One of our aircraft was hit but remained flyable.”
Caine said that once Maduro and Flores were abducted by U.S. troops, helicopters were called in to retrieve the group.
Fall of the Old Republic
Trump said there were no U.S. deaths in the operation. The government official told The Intercept that about six U.S. personnel were injured, including a member of a helicopter crew who was struck by small arms fire. At least 80 people in Venezuela were reportedly killed, including military personnel and civilians. The government of Cuba reported that 32 Cubans, serving in the Venezuelan armed forces and interior ministry, were among those killed in the U.S. attacks.
The U.S. government official who spoke to The Intercept on the condition of anonymity in order to discuss classified matters praised the “efficiency” of the tactical side of the operation. The official acknowledged that the attack on Venezuela was an act of war but stressed that it was conducted as part of a law enforcement operation.
The senior defense official, by contrast, did not hold back following the attack on Venezuela.
“America is a rogue state,” the defense official said, calling Trump a “tyrant.” The official expressed dismay at the state of America, referencing a film to describe the changing of the political order.
“It feels like the end of the Republic in Star Wars and the ‘Revenge of the Sith,’” the official said, evoking the movie where democracy in the Old Republic was undermined by treacherous forces obsessed with conquest and domination.
The senior official told The Intercept that Trump was now almost completely unrestrained and that the system of geopolitical agreements, norms, and institutions crafted by the U.S. since World War II is finished.
“The liberal rules-based order,” the official said, “is dead.”