Elements of Venezuelan Government Loyal to Chavismo Warn of Possible U.S. Assault

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According to elements of the Venezuelan government loyal to Chavismo, the political movement associated with former President Hugo Chávez, U.S. agencies are developing plans for a “large-scale operation” targeting the well-organized working-class stronghold, said Contreras, a prominent political organizer and parish leader who served as a deputy in the National Assembly between 2010 and 2015. The State Department did not answer questions about the allegations. 23 de Enero is a densely populated, hilly parish characterized by large public housing blocks and a thriving political life. Its proximity to Miraflores Palace and key military posts makes it strategically important, and since 1998 it has served as an ideological stronghold for Chavismo, carrying a legacy of popular struggle from the fall of the Pérez Jiménez dictatorship in 1958 through the armed resistance movements of the 1960s–1980s against police persecution and neoliberal policies. That legacy proved decisive during the 2002 U.S.-backed coup, when residents from the city’s lower income areas helped secure Chávez’s return to power. Today, the parish is home to numerous assembly-driven organizations, including communes that are leading the country’s socialist aspirations. Contreras said the information reached the Coordinator “directly through an internal source linked to patriotic officials” connected to Venezuela’s Bolivarian National Police (PNB). In a communiqué published June 3, the Coordinator warned of the rumored joint operation between the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and the PNB’s Special Tactical Operations Unit (UOTE), operating from command centers in Flores de Catia, a sector geographically contiguous with the 23 de Enero. Since then, according to the Simón Bolívar Coordinator, the information has been corroborated by the group’s longstanding connections inside the Venezuelan state. “To try to neutralize us, they intend to use rotten sectors of the police apparatus in complicity with the DEA, attempting to impose the same infamous narrative and framework they used to justify the act of war on January 3,” Contreras said, warning that Washington may attempt to “falsely link social organizations with drug trafficking and crime.” Contreras said this was the same playbook used when the U.S. branded the Nicolás Maduro government a “cartel” to justify the abduction and transfer of the Venezuelan president and his wife National Assembly deputy Cilia Flores to stand trial in New York on alleged “narcoterrorism” charges. The presidential couple has pleaded not guilty and their trial is scheduled to begin on June 1, 2027. The DEA declined to comment. According to Oswaldo Rivero, a popular communicator who reports on the daily struggles of working-class Venezuelans, the security forces still include officers or sectors who hail from the country’s Fourth Republic (1958–1998), when popular leaders from the 23 de Enero parish were targeted, imprisoned, and tortured. Rivero himself was a political prisoner in the 1980s and 1990s. “Many of those torturers, those who persecuted us back then, remain within the State security forces; they remain within the intelligence agencies,” Rivero told Drop Site. In 2009, Hugo Chávez created the PBN in an effort to reform the security forces of the Fourth Republic, including the Metropolitan Caracas Police and the DISIP intelligence agency, which had a history of human rights abuses involving the persecution, torture and disappearance of guerrilla, left-wing and union activists. Many PNB commanders and officers have since been accused of human rights violations. The abduction of Maduro and Flores has been widely rejected by the Venezuelan Chavista grassroots, calling for their liberation and return to Venezuela. The U.S. justified the military strike on Venezuela on the basis that it was a “law enforcement” operation. “The accusations of narcoterrorism [against Maduro and Flores] are a blatant lie that the U.S. used as an excuse to steal our oil and mineral wealth,” said Contreras, known for his long-standing popular leadership in 23 de Enero, where he grew up and still lives. Some in the 23 de Enero parish fear that the fight against narcotrafficking will now be used as a smokescreen to dismantle decades of community organizing to advance grassroots democracy, community-run production enterprises, political formation, and self-determination within their own territories. These self-organized community organizations now stand as one of the last bastions of resistance to the U.S. agenda inside Venezuela. “They want to strike the cornerstones of the Bolivarian Revolution: the communal councils, the communes, the social movements, and historical organizations like our Simón Bolívar Coordinator and other forces that work on this territory,” Contreras said. What Makes 23 de Enero a Target? The Simón Bolívar Coordinator has a decades-long history of armed resistance within 23 de Enero. Founded in 1993, it united Marxist-Leninist guerrilla groups to prioritize a more cohesive political organization mobilizing the popular vote that eventually saw the victory of the Chávez-led Fifth Republic Movement. Today, the Coordinator represents one of the few remaining sources of independent political power in a country firmly in the grasp of Washington. It runs social programs, political education, territorial organizing and defense, and supports communities building self-governing collectives. With the 23 de Enero’s and the Coordinator’s history and proximity to power, controlling or destabilizing the territory would directly pressure the Venezuelan government. According to Contreras, the government of acting President Delcy Rodríguez, in office by Constitutional mandate since January 5, is aware of the Coordinator’s public concerns about the community’s safety and recently sent a top political representative “who formally committed to thoroughly investigating the situation.” The Rodríguez government did not respond to questions for this article. “We understand this is also part of the cognitive warfare intended to instill fear and demobilize,” said Contreras, hinting that the U.S. may be trying to create friction between the government and its political grassroots, which remain an important pillar of support. In Venezuela, the communal project and popular movement has its own ministry, electoral processes, and leverage over political and economic decisions, making them a likely target of U.S. action. The Simón Bolívar Coordinator and other collectives have reinforced community surveillance to monitor unusual police or vehicle movements at parish entry points. Security committees from community councils and communes are holding regular assemblies and have increased protection for communal spaces such as radio stations, soup kitchens, cultural centers, and organizational headquarters. Following Maduro’s removal, the Trump administration began enforcing a strict naval blockade and operational control over Venezuela’s oil exports, with the proceeds being deposited into U.S.-controlled accounts overseen by the U.S. Treasury Department. The Trump administration has collected more than $13 billion from Venezuelan oil sales, according to a Financial Times estimate, but has not disclosed how that money is being used. Secretary of State Marco Rubio told Congress in June that the money is being held in a Citibank account and that disbursements are audited by the accounting firm KPMG. Caracas must submit specific requests to Washington to receive allocations of its own oil revenue, and disbursements are reportedly limited to essential civic functions. Washington has reiterated that a “three-phase process” of “stability, recovery, and transition” is underway. The Rodríguez administration, balancing U.S. pressure and a desire to survive, has begun extensive domestic and economic reconfiguration. Under the unequal partnership, Rodríguez has restored diplomatic ties with Washington and carried out reforms to key legislation, such as the historical hydrocarbon and mining laws, allowing for long-term concessions for the entry of private and foreign capital, establishing new tax and royalty schemes, and international dispute resolution mechanisms. The changes have undermined Venezuelan sovereignty over its natural resources. These overtures fall under the new cooperation agenda ushered in since January 3. But in this context, cooperation becomes a “relative term” because the Rodríguez administration “has very little choice” in the matter, according to Daniel DePetris, a fellow at Defense Priorities. “Washington now effectively controls Venezuela’s oil revenue and decides how, when and where it will be allocated. Caracas simply cannot afford to ignore Washington, let alone defy it, because doing so would jeopardize much of its national budget and further strain an economy that is as vulnerable today as it was when Nicolás Maduro was in power,” DePetris told Drop Site. This dynamic is ultimately one-sided, DePetris explained. “The Trump administration will continue to use control over Venezuela’s oil revenue as a pressure tactic, both to reward the Venezuelan government when it complies with U.S. demands and to punish it when those demands aren’t met.” U.S.-Venezuela Military Cooperation The newly established cooperation between the U.S. and Venezuela covers a wide range of issues and has recently involved military and intelligence cooperation to counter alleged drug trafficking. This makes the warnings from 23 de Enero even more urgent. On June 12, the Venezuelan government announced that it had carried out a joint operation with the U.S. military to strike and dismantle criminal groups operating in the mineral-rich southeastern Bolívar state, where illegal mining has increased amid the economic crisis in recent years. Venezuela’s Communication Ministry announced that clashes had resulted in the death of Héctor “El Niño” Guerrero, the leader of an unspecified criminal organization, while President Donald Trump claimed on Truth Social that Guerrero was the leader of the defunct Tren de Aragua gang—a group the administration has falsely linked to President Maduro and to migrant and drug trafficking operations targeting the United States. Caracas said the operation involved intelligence-sharing and technological cooperation. The Washington Post, citing a senior U.S. administration official, reported that the CIA provided the intelligence leading to the strike. Prior to the operation, General Dan Caine, the U.S. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, conducted a one-day visit to Caracas on June 3 while Rodríguez was on an official trip to India. Caine met with U.S. staff and Marines stationed at the U.S. Embassy in the Colinas de Valle Arriba urbanization in Caracas. The general held bilateral discussions with Oliver Blanco, the recently appointed Vice Minister for Europe and North America and a figure who hails from the moderate opposition, on security and strengthening cooperation mechanisms. The Venezuelan government did not issue an official statement. Caine’s visit and the joint military operation in Bolívar state confirmed the close collaboration of U.S. intelligence and military forces with Venezuela’s security apparatus. This follows the controversial U.S. military exercise carried out on May 23, during which two U.S. aircraft flew over the U.S. Embassy in Caracas, and Marines disembarked in the building’s parking lot. “For the [Chavista] militant factions, seeing U.S. aircraft legally flying over the skies of Caracas was received as a very harsh symbolic blow and a capitulation to foreign domination,” Contreras said. Following the deadly double earthquakes that struck Caracas and La Guaira on June 24, Washington deployed approximately 900 military personnel to La Guaira and stationed naval vessels off Venezuela’s coast, citing relief and rescue operations as justification, according to SOUTHCOM spokesperson Steven McLoud. The Rodríguez administration has dismissed the threat of an imminent occupation and stated that Venezuelan authorities maintain command over the country’s emergency response and reconstruction efforts. According to SOUTHCOM, its operations with the U.S. Air Force included assisting Venezuelan aviation officials with air traffic control and ground operations at Simón Bolívar International Airport, with a stated aim of clearing bottlenecks for humanitarian aid cargo. On July 21, as relief operations wound down, the Marine Corps’ Maritime Raid Force (MRF) conducted exercises off the coast of La Guaira to simulate a maritime interdiction. Since September, the U.S. military, operating under the rubric of Operation Southern Spear, has carried out dozens of strikes against small boats in the Caribbean Sea and Eastern Pacific, killing at least 227 people. In a July report, the Washington Office on Latin America described the bombings as “murder under domestic law and extrajudicial killings under international human rights law.” Political Tensions The Rodríguez government has faced strong criticism for its compliance with the Trump administration, the recent military cooperation and the steady stream of U.S. officials, including CIA director John Ratcliffe, and corporate representatives who have visited Caracas to reach energy and mining agreements. More recently, the government has faced scrutiny over the presence of Israeli officials, the reestablishment of diplomatic ties with Israel at a consular level, and an AIPAC-sponsored visit of U.S. lawmakers. In the aftermath of January 3 kidnapping of Maduro, the acting administration forcefully condemned the U.S. for violating Venezuela’s sovereignty, but has since rapidly normalized ties with the U.S. to maintain internal political and economic stability, while calling on the Chavista grassroots not to fall for divisive narratives and rejecting accusations of foreign tutelage. In August, a government delegation led by National Assembly President Jorge Rodríguez began talks with the former opposition-majority parliament elected in 2015, which is still recognized by the U.S. The first agreements centered around judicial reforms and recovering 31 tons of gold withheld by the Bank of England since 2019. The majority of grassroots organizations, especially communes and social movements such as Alba Movimientos, view this period as a necessary strategy: negotiating with the erratic Trump administration to buy time for Chavismo to regroup under more favorable conditions. Contreras described the government’s decisions as a “complex and painful reorganization” undertaken to prevent a full-scale military escalation and to sustain the state apparatus. “The main contradiction today lies between the institutional leadership, which seeks avenues for coexistence and negotiation with the occupying power, and a grassroots community that resents the loss of sovereignty and the surrender of strategic resources, and is seeking autonomous ways to reorganize popular resistance,” he said.