What to Do About Venezuela?

President Trump has made Venezuela a special project, presenting Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro as the face of the evil visited on America by drug and human traffickers. Maduro does not personally run the cartel’s transnational criminal operations, of course, but he facilitates. In some cases, he may actively support and protect them. Trump has taken a multi-pronged approach to stopping this.

Trump’s Venezuela Strategy Is Three-Fold

Trump’s strategy regarding Venezuela appears to be three-fold: Apply targeted sanctions, designate and treat the cartels using Venezuela as a sanctuary as Foreign Terrorist Organizations (FTOs), and intimidate the Maduro dictatorship with a clear demonstration of US military might. Combined, the strategy elements aim to isolate Venezuela financially, geopolitically, and militarily.

A series of executive orders applying sanctions on Venezuela during Trump’s first term, re-established in his second term, significantly limited Maduro’s and his government’s financial transaction capability. All US-held assets of designated Venezuelans and enterprises are frozen, including bans on financing and trade. There are secondary sanctions penalizing foreign entities, such as a 25% tariff on exports from countries that import Venezuelan oil. The sanctions are broadly implemented across a wide range of financial markets, including bans on transactions in Venezuelan government-issued digital currencies, prohibitions on US citizens financing Venezuelan debt, and restrictions on access to US markets.

The cartels singled out as particularly troublesome are the Cartel de los Soles, or Cartel of the Suns, and Tren de Aragua. The Suns are a loosely organized alliance of high-ranking military officers and regime insiders that has turned the Venezuelan military organization into a criminal enterprise. As Insight Crime, a weekly news digest focusing on organized crime activities, explained: “The Venezuelan military’s most frequent role in drug trafficking has been to guarantee the safe passage of cocaine shipments, as well as to authorize the arrival and departure of aircraft carrying the drug to other countries.”

Tren de Aragua (TDA), on the other hand, is a transnational terrorist gang that got its start in Venezuelan prisons and has expanded its crime spree that involves human smuggling, assassinations, and extortion throughout Latin America and into the US.

The US naval presence in the Caribbean just outside Venezuelan territorial waters and the Eastern Pacific has made the “maritime” routes the Suns Cartel thought it protected much more dangerous for drug-runners. As of November, US forces assigned to US Southern Command during Operation Southern Spear have engaged and destroyed 22 drug boats in 21 airstrikes, killing 83 narco-terrorists.

Limit Use of Airspace

Most recently, President Trump has taken the unusual step of establishing what amounts to a modified quarantine of Venezuelan airspace, writing on Truth Social that "all Airlines, Pilots, Drug Dealers, and Human Traffickers" should consider the airspace above and surrounding Venezuela "TO BE CLOSED IN ITS ENTIRETY." Closing the airspace over Venezuela would be a challenge, but the US has accomplished similar aeronautical blockades over Iraq in the late 1990s.

Supporting President Trump’s intentions to close the Venezuelan airspace to all air traffic, the Federal Aviation Administration issued a Notice to Airmen for “Potentially hazardous situation in the Maiquetia flight information region.” It read:

“OPERATORS ARE ADVISED TO EXERCISE CAUTION WHEN OPERATING IN THE MAIQUETIA FLIGHT INFORMATION REGION (SVZM FIR) AT ALL ALTITUDES DUE TO THE WORSENING SECURITY SITUATION AND HEIGHTENED MILITARY ACTIVITY IN OR AROUND VENEZUELA. THREATS COULD POSE A POTENTIAL RISK TO AIRCRAFT AT ALL ALTITUDES, INCLUDING DURING OVERFLIGHT, THE ARRIVAL AND DEPARTURE PHASES OF FLIGHT, AND/OR AIRPORTS AND AIRCRAFT ON THE GROUND.”

If it implements this measure, the Trump administration will have significantly limited Venezuela’s ability to traffic drugs by sea or air. Additionally, extending a no-fly zone over all of Venezuela will curtail commercial air transportation for both passengers and cargo. Not being able to travel by air will make Venezuelans very unhappy, and the Trump administration hopes that the blame will fall on Maduro, resulting in regime change. Consequently, combining financial sanctions, designating the cartels as FTOs, and using the hard power of the US military appears to be the way forward.

The views expressed are those of the author and not of any other affiliate.