In a single pre-dawn announcement that reverberated across continents before many people had even opened their eyes, Donald Trump claimed responsibility for what he framed as one of the most consequential U.S. operations in Latin America in decades. Posting on his Truth Social platform, he asserted that American special operations forces and federal law enforcement agencies acted in coordinated fashion, striking select Venezuelan military targets before an elite unit allegedly seized President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, removing them from the country under cover of darkness. The language of the post was characteristically blunt and triumphant, offering few operational details but emphasizing decisiveness, secrecy, and what Trump described as “justice finally catching up” with a leader he has long denounced as a dictator and criminal. Within minutes, screenshots of the message flooded other social platforms, cable news producers broke into scheduled programming, and journalists scrambled to verify claims that, if true, would represent a dramatic escalation in U.S. involvement in Venezuela. Yet even as the announcement spread, it raised immediate questions: who authorized the operation, under what legal framework it occurred, and whether the claims themselves were accurate or exaggerated. In Washington, former officials privately expressed shock at the scope of what was being alleged, noting that the capture of a sitting foreign head of state by U.S. forces would mark an extraordinary departure from decades of established norms. Abroad, diplomats began urgently calling counterparts, seeking clarity in the fog created by a single social media post that seemed to upend an already fragile regional equilibrium. Continue reading…
