U.S. launches military strikes on Venezuela as Trump escalates pressure on Maduro regime, sources say

President Trump gave the U.S. military the green light to conduct land strikes in Venezuela days before the actual operation occurred, according to two U.S. officials who spoke to CBS News under condition of anonymity to discuss national security matters.

Military officials discussed conducting the mission on Christmas Day, but U.S. airstrikes in Nigeria against ISIS targets took precedence, the sources said.

The days following Christmas opened more potential strike windows to U.S. military officials but the operation was held due to weather conditions. The officials said the U.S. military wanted weather conditions that were advantageous to mission success.

Explosions and low-flying aircraft were reported overnight in the Venezuelan capital of Caracas early Saturday morning, according to the Associated Press.

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President Trump ordered strikes on sites inside Venezuela early Saturday morning, including military facilities, U.S. officials told CBS News.

The Pentagon referred all requests for comment to the White House.

President Trump has been noncommittal on whether the goal of his military buildup is to oust Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. He told reporters on Dec. 22 it would be “smart” for Maduro to leave power, but it’s “up to him what he wants to do.”

White House chief of staff Susie Wiles has been more direct about the president’s intentions, telling Vanity Fair in November: “He wants to keep on blowing boats up until Maduro cries uncle.”

Mr. Trump said in mid-December that Venezuela was “completely surrounded by the largest Armada ever assembled in the History of South America.”

“It will only get bigger, and the shock to them will be like nothing they have ever seen before — Until such time as they return to the United States of America all of the Oil, Land, and other Assets that they previously stole from us,” he posted on Truth Social on Dec. 16.

Since early September, the U.S. military has carried out more than 30 strikes on alleged drug smuggling boats in the Caribbean and Eastern Pacific, killing over 110 people. The first of those attacks, on Sept. 2, sparked additional controversy when it emerged that the military launched a follow-on strike after spotting two survivors. Critics in Congress have called for an investigation into whether that constitutes a war crime.

Then on Dec. 10, the U.S. seized an oil tanker called The Skipper off the coast of Venezuela. The mission was launched from the USS Gerald R. Ford, an aircraft carrier that has been in the area for weeks as part of a broader buildup of U.S. forces in the region,  sources told CBS News. 

Attorney General Pam Bondi posted a 45-second video of the operation on X, showing armed personnel descending onto the vessel’s deck from a helicopter. She said the U.S. executed a seizure warrant on the vessel, and that it was “used to transport sanctioned oil from Venezuela and Iran.”

Less than a week later, President Trump announced a “total and complete blockade” of sanctioned oil tankers entering and exiting Venezuela. The U.S. later seized a second oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela on Dec. 20, and later pursued a third tanker that refused to be boarded and fled.

In what could be the campaign’s first known land strike, Mr. Trump said in late December the U.S. “knocked out” a “big facility” that was allegedly linked to drug trafficking. He described the target as a “dock area where they load the boats up with drugs,” but he didn’t specify its location or offer many further details.

The Venezuelan government has criticized the operations at sea, calling the oil tanker seizures acts of “piracy” and accusing the Trump administration of seeking regime change.

The U.S. has asserted that Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro is complicit with armed criminal gangs smuggling drugs into the U.S. — allegations that Maduro has rejected. 

The Trump administration has officially designated two groups as international terrorist organizations that it says are linked to the Maduro regime: the Cartel de los Soles and the gang Tren de Aragua, which are accused of international drug trafficking and violent attacks.

Some experts have questioned the designations. Analysts say the Cartel de los Soles is not a singular organization, but instead refers to elements within the Venezuelan government accused of colluding with drug cartels.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio told CBS News’ “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan” in May that the administration believes Tren de Aragua is used as a tool of the regime — contradicting an assessment by the National Intelligence Council.

“There’s no doubt in our mind, and in my mind, and in the FBI’s assessment that this is a group that the regime in Venezuela uses, not just to try to destabilize the United States, but to project power,” Rubio said.

Maduro and several of his top lieutenants were charged in U.S. federal court in 2020 with narco-terrorism and drug trafficking, which he denied. “Maduro very deliberately deployed cocaine as a weapon” to harm the U.S., prosecutors alleged. 

Over the summer, the Trump administration doubled the reward for Maduro’s arrest to $50 million.

Over the past few months, the U.S. has ratcheted up the pressure on the Maduro regime in Venezuela in multiple ways, including an extensive military buildup in the region, live fire exercises and deadly strikes on alleged drug boats in the Caribbean and Eastern Pacific.

There are currently about 15,000 U.S. troops in the region. Some 11 naval vessels were in the Caribbean Sea as of Dec. 30, Navy officials told CBS News, including the USS Gerald R. Ford, the world’s most advanced aircraft carrier.

The U.S. naval buildup in the Caribbean also includes five guided missile destroyers, two guided missile cruisers, an amphibious assault ship and two amphibious transport dock ships, officials said.

There are also several dozen U.S. fighter jets stationed in Puerto Rico. And this month, the U.S. moved aircraft to the region that are designed to carry special forces, including CV-22 Ospreys and C-17 cargo planes, a source familiar with the matter told CBS News.