On Tuesday, President Donald Trump announced that U.S. forces deployed in the southern Caribbean Sea had attacked a “boat” he claimed was transporting drugs from Venezuela. “Over the last few minutes, we literally shot out  a boat — a drug-carrying boat” Trump declared, flanked by officials in the Oval Office. Shortly afterward, a video was released showing a small vessel at sea exploding and catching fire, killing its crew.

The government of Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro dismissed the destruction of the vessel. Through the Minister of Communications, it declared that the video was an artificial-intelligence fabrication orchestrated by Marco Rubio to escalate the already tense relations between the United States and Venezuela. 

The White House’s version of events raises several questions: How did it determine who was on board? How was it confirmed that it was carrying drugs? The released black-and-white video is not clear enough to establish whether the vessel carried up to 11 people — whom Trump claims were killed — nor does it show any visible drugs.

In any case, the decision to blow up the boat in the Caribbean — rather than seize it and arrest its crew — is highly unusual. It suggests that the true objective was to send the Venezuelan government an aggressive message, and constitutes a serious human rights violation and act of brutal imperialist military violence, with several people murdered in cold blood without any armed confrontation. Those killed could have been drug traffickers, migrants, or victims of human trafficking. As Colombian President Gustavo Petro has pointed out, if the Trump administration’s version of events are true, the act amounts to murder.

Trump Is Escalating Military Tensions in the Caribbean

Tuesday’s attack is the first time Trump has openly referred to the escalating military tensions in the region, following the deployment of warships and troops to the southern Caribbean. By positioning warships near Venezuela, the U.S. is displaying imperialist arrogance, wielding its military might to assert dominance in its own backyard.

What is known so far is that the U.S. operation deployed to the southern Caribbean includes three destroyers, two landing ships, an amphibious assault ship, a cruiser, two nuclear submarines, helicopters, military aircraft, and nearly 6,000 personnel. Under the guise of fighting “drug trafficking,” Washington claims the operation aims to dismantle the so-called “Cartel of the Suns,” allegedly led by high-ranking Venezuelan officials and President Maduro himself. 

Yet in this case, the inconsistency is evident: in his announcement, Trump claimed the vessel was linked to the “Tren de Aragua,” without mentioning the “Cartel of the Suns,” the organization U.S. officials insist is headed by Maduro. Not only does this raise the issue of attributing ownership of the small boat and its crew without any evidence or due process, but it also underscores the carelessness and contradictions with which imperialist officials invoke the names of criminal organizations — real or fabricated — to arbitrarily tie them to the Venezuelan government. Such narratives serve as justification for imperialist interference and military threats, just as the United States has previously invoked the “war on drugs” or the “fight against terrorism” to invade countries and secure geopolitical and economic control.

The Maduro Government Is Not on the Side of the Venezuelan People

Maduro, for his part, claims that Venezuela will resist any military action, and has issued lofty declarations while trying to present Trump’s policies as distinct from those of Secretary of State Rubio — as if they were not part of a unified imperialist offensive. “Mr. President, Donald Trump, watch out, because Mr. Rubio wants to stain your hands with blood,” Maduro declared. 

In reality, both the White House’s maneuvers and Rubio’s initiatives form part of the same imperialist strategy: to escalate pressure on Venezuela in pursuit of oil, gold, and other natural resources. What the Maduro government actually seeks is to negotiate with Washington on the basis of the material interests of its political class, not those of the Venezuelan people.

The U.S. military buildup is the largest in the region since the 1989 invasion of Panama, and it has already generated divisions in Latin America. While Brazil and Colombia expressed concern over a possible escalation that could destabilize the region, governments such as Guyana and Trinidad and Tobago openly supported the operation. The U.S. State Department itself admitted these actions are part of Washington’s “unwavering commitment” to protecting its borders and “ensuring a level playing field for American businesses.” This confession makes the real objective unmistakable: defending corporate profits, not sovereignty or human rights.

As we have long argued in the pages of La Izquierda Diario, rejecting U.S. aggression does not mean endorsing the Maduro government. On the contrary, Maduro’s repressive, anti-worker policies brutally target the working class and poor. It is the Venezuelan workers and people who must settle accounts with Maduro — not imperialist powers or their right-wing allies like María Corina Machado. To truly resist imperialism, the working class needs the fullest democratic freedoms of mobilization, organization, and expression — freedoms that Maduro denies by threatening unions and outlawing leftist, anti-imperialist forces.

Fighting Imperialism and Local Capitalist Regimes with Independent Organization

As our comrades of the Venezuelan Workers’ League for Socialism (LTS) have written: 

We are facing a policy of interference and aggression against Venezuela, which must be categorically rejected. We condemn the imperialist arrogance with which the United States seeks to impose its own political ends. In the face of this military deployment, it is necessary to raise a unified voice throughout Latin America to reject interference, denounce military operations, and confront the presence of the Southern Command and U.S. bases. Keep U.S. marines and ships out of the Caribbean and off the coast of Venezuela. We must strengthen an anti-imperialist movement from below that unites the struggle against foreign interference.

In Argentina, the Left Front (FIT-U) bloc presented a bill in Congress to repudiate the U.S. military deployment in the Caribbean. The deputies denounced the operation — involving warships, surveillance aircraft, and special troops — as a grave act of interference against Latin American sovereignty and another attempt to reinforce Washington’s role as the region’s gendarme. 

The bill, signed by Christian Castillo and Alejandro Vilca (PTS), Vilma Ripoll (MST), Mercedes De Mendieta, and Juan Carlos Giordano (IS), emphasized that, despite profound differences with Maduro’s austerity and repression against workers, it is essential to reject this imperialist advance which seeks to secure U.S. geopolitical and economic domination in the region under the pretext of the “war on drugs.”

Trump’s announcement and the U.S. military deployment in the Caribbean once again make clear that beneath the rhetoric of the “fight against drug trafficking” lies a policy of plunder, domination, and geopolitical control. U.S. imperialism seeks to tighten its grip on the region and advance on Venezuela’s resources. Faced with this offensive, the only way forward lies in the independent organization of Latin America’s workers and oppressed — rejecting both imperialist interference and the local capitalist regimes that submit to it or, like Maduro’s government, impose brutal anti-worker starvation policies.

Originally published in Spanish on September 3 in La Izquierda Diario.