The United States hit Venezuela with a “large-scale strike” early Saturday and said its president, Nicolás Maduro, had been captured and flown out of the country after months of stepped-up pressure by Washington — an extraordinary nighttime operation announced by President Donald Trump on social media hours after the attack.
Multiple explosions rang out and low-flying aircraft swept through Caracas, the capital of the oil-rich nation, as Maduro’s government immediately accused the United States of attacking civilian and military installations. The Venezuelan government called it an “imperialist attack” and urged citizens to take to the streets.
It was not immediately clear who was running the country, and Maduro’s whereabouts were not immediately known. Trump announced the developments on Truth Social shortly after 4:30 a.m. ET. Under Venezuelan law the vice-president, Delcy Rodríguez, would take power. There was no confirmation that had happened, though she did issue a statement after the strike.
WATCH | U.S. confirms first strike on Venezuelan soil earlier this week:
U.S. President Donald Trump claims the strike targeted a loading facility for drug boats. Tony Frangie Mawad, a journalist in Venezuela, shares the latest on the escalating tensions.
“We do not know the whereabouts of President Nicolás Maduro and First Lady Cilia Flores,” Rodriguez said. “We demand proof of life.”
Maduro, Trump said, “has been, along with his wife, captured and flown out of the country. This operation was done in conjunction with U.S. Law Enforcement. Details to follow.” He set a news conference for later Saturday morning. The legal implications of the strike under U.S. law were not immediately clear.
The White House did not immediately respond to queries on where Maduro and his wife were being flown, but U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Maduro will stand trial on criminal charges in the U.S. Maduro was indicted in March 2020 on “narco-terrorism” conspiracy charges in the Southern District of New York.
The explosions in Caracas — at least seven blasts — sent people rushing into the streets, while others took to social media to report hearing and seeing the explosions. It was not immediately clear if there were casualties. The attack itself lasted less than 30 minutes and it was unclear if more actions lay ahead, though Trump said in his post that the strikes were carried out “successfully.”
The Federal Aviation Administration issued a ban on U.S. commercial flights in Venezuelan airspace because of “ongoing military activity” ahead of the explosions.
The strike came after the Trump administration spent months escalating pressure on Maduro. The CIA was behind a drone strike last week at a docking area believed to have been used by Venezuelan drug cartels.
For months, Trump had threatened that he could soon order strikes on targets on Venezuelan land following months of attacks on boats accused of carrying drugs. Maduro has decried the U.S. military operations as a thinly veiled effort to oust him from power.
Some streets in Caracas fill up
Armed individuals and uniformed members of a civilian militia took to the streets of a Caracas neighbourhood long considered a stronghold of the ruling party. But in other areas of the city, the streets remained empty hours after the attack. Parts of the city remained without power, but vehicles moved freely.
Video obtained from Caracas and an unidentified coastal city showed tracers and smoke clouding the landscape as repeated muted explosions illuminated the night sky. Other footage showed an urban landscape with cars passing on a highway as blasts illuminated the hills behind them. Unintelligible conversation could be heard in the background. The videos were verified by The Associated Press.
Smoke could be seen rising from the hangar of a military base in Caracas, while another military installation in the capital was without power.
“The whole ground shook. This is horrible. We heard explosions and planes,” said Carmen Hidalgo, a 21-year-old office worker, her voice trembling. She was walking briskly with two relatives, returning from a birthday party. “We felt like the air was hitting us.”
Venezuela’s government responded to the attack with a call to action. “People to the streets!” it said in a statement. “The Bolivarian Government calls on all social and political forces in the country to activate mobilization plans and repudiate this imperialist attack.”
The statement added that Maduro had “ordered all national defense plans to be implemented” and declared “a state of external disturbance.” That state of emergency gives him the power to suspend people’s rights and expand the role of the armed forces.
The website of the U.S. Embassy in Venezuela, a post that has been closed since 2019, issued a warning to American citizens in the country, saying it was “aware of reports of explosions in and around Caracas.”
“U.S. citizens in Venezuela should shelter in place,” the warning said.
Reaction emerges early Saturday
Inquiries to the Pentagon and U.S. Southern Command since Trump’s social media post went unanswered. The FAA warned all commercial and private U.S. pilots that the airspace over Venezuela and the small island nation of Curacao, just off the coast of the country to the north, was off limits “due to safety-of-flight risks associated with ongoing military activity.”
U.S. Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, posted his potential concerns, reflecting a view from the right flank in the Congress. “I look forward to learning what, if anything, might constitutionally justify this action in the absence of a declaration of war or authorization for the use of military force,” Lee said on X.
It was not clear if the U.S. Congress had been officially notified of the strikes.
Lawmakers from both political parties in Congress have raised deep reservations and flat out objections to the U.S. attacks on boats suspected of drug smuggling near the Venezuelan coast and the Congress has not specifically approved an authorization for the use of military force for such operations in the region.
Regional reaction was not immediately forthcoming in the early hours of Saturday. Cuba, however, a supporter of the Maduro government and a longtime adversary of the U.S., called for the international community to respond to what President Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez called “the criminal attack.” “Our zone of peace is being brutally assaulted,” he said on X. Iran’s Foreign Ministry also condemned the strikes.
President Javier Milei of Argentina praised the claim by his close ally, Trump, that Maduro had been captured with a political slogan he often deploys to celebrate right-wing advances: “Long live freedom, dammit!”
World monitoring situation closely
The European Union has repeatedly said Maduro “lacks legitimacy,” the bloc’s top diplomat Kaja Kallas said on Saturday, adding that she called for restraint and respect for international law regarding the situation.
“The EU has … defended a peaceful transition. Under all circumstances, the principles of international law and the UN Charter must be respected. We call for restraint,” Kallas said on X, adding she’s spoken with Rubio.
Several additional world leaders, including from Italy, Belgium, Indonesia and Germany, confirmed they’re monitoring the situation on the ground and in touch with relevant embassies.
LISTEN | Will the U.S. invade Venezuela?:
Front Burner29:32Will the U.S. invade Venezuela?
Over the weekend, Donald Trump declared on Truth Social that the airspace around Venezuela should be considered closed. Venezuela’s foreign ministry responded by calling the comments “another extravagant, illegal and unjustified aggression against the Venezuelan people”.
Late last week, Trump also said that land action against alleged drug trafficking networks in the country could start very soon.
All of this is happening amidst a serious military buildup in the Caribbean and escalating threats to remove Venezuela’s president Nicolas Maduro from power.
Is this the buildup to an invasion? And is it really about drugs? Or do Venezuela’s massive oil reserves have something to do with it?
Jon Lee Anderson is our guest. He’s a staff writer with The New Yorker, and has written extensively about U.S.-Venezuela relations and U.S. interference in Latin America.
For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts [https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts]
CBC News reached out to Global Affairs Canada and will update this story when we hear back.
The U.S. military has been attacking boats in the Caribbean Sea and the eastern Pacific Ocean since early September. As of Friday, the number of known boat strikes is 35 and the number of people killed is at least 115, according to numbers announced by the Trump administration.
They followed a major buildup of American forces in the waters off South America, including the arrival in November of the nation’s most advanced aircraft carrier, which added thousands more troops to what was already the largest military presence in the region in generations.
Trump has justified the boat strikes as a necessary escalation to stem the flow of drugs into the U.S. and asserted that the U.S. is engaged in an “armed conflict” with drug cartels.
