Trump’s Venezuela Gamble Could Devastate Regional Security
The Trump administration’s brazen and potentially illegal strikes on alleged drug trafficking boats in international waters off the coast of Venezuela this month, reportedly killing at least 14, represent a major escalation in the Washington’s military posture toward the Western Hemisphere.
As the US ratchets up its crusade against regional drug cartels by launching its first unilateral air strikes in Latin America since 1989, a potential follow-up attack within Venezuelan waters or against human or material targets on Venezuelan soil is a possibility Trump officials have left on the table.
This abrupt build-up poses a serious challenge to regional security, most immediately to Colombia, a close US ally whose 1,378-mile border with Venezuela is a largely porous binational region home to 12 million people. It is also mostly controlled by irregular armed groups like the National Liberation Army (ELN) and Segunda Marquetalia, a dissident faction of the dissolved Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC).
Trump has downplayed the prospect of regime change. At the same time, US military action in Venezuela — an option sources say Trump is currently weighing — could have a potentially disastrous spillover effect into Colombia. Such an attack would likely trigger mass displacement and exacerbate the severe security vacuum on the border. This scenario could grow even more dire if Colombia’s formal drug “decertification” this week, despite carveouts for security assistance, further weakens state presence through reduced US aid, investment, and trade.
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