Drugs, Oil and Regime Change: Venezuela and the US Drug War Narrative

Recently, the U.S. has increased its military presence in the southern Caribbean to combat drug cartels, with naval ships like the USS Lake Erie patrolling near Venezuela after passing through the Panama Canal. In the midst of his second term, President Trump has focused on the Venezuela-born gang known as “Tren de Aragua” (TdA), using the Alien Enemies Act to push for the deportation of alleged gang members in the US. Washington accuses Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro of having strong ties to local gangs, with Maduro indicted for narcotics trafficking in 2020 and a $50 million bounty placed on him by 2025. U.S. officials claim Maduro and various military and intelligence figures in Venezuela are involved with transnational criminal organisations. However, a May 2025 report from the U.S. National Intelligence Council contradicts Trump’s assumptions, suggesting that while the Maduro regime tolerates the Tren de Aragua gang, it lacks conclusive evidence of direct control over it.

Interestingly, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) 2025 World Drug Report and the European Drug Report 2025 bear minimal mention of Venezuela and mention no role played by this oil-rich South American nation in the international drug trafficking corridor.

Although tensions have drastically escalated between the U.S. and Venezuela, the US drug war narrative to promote regime change in Venezuela is seriously limping. Shortly after deploying U.S. gunboats to South American waters, President Trump announced on Tuesday that the U.S. Navy engaged a vessel in the southern Caribbean, which he claimed was transporting a shipment of drugs from Venezuela. Evidence regarding the origin of the boat and the nature of its alleged cargo is yet to be released.

VIDEO: U.S. Navy destroys what the Trump administration believes to be a Venezuelan boat carrying drugs – 11 alleged TdA narcotraffickers were reported killed (Source: WebInfomil) 

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Recently, the U.S. has significantly increased its military presence in the southern Caribbean, indicating a willingness to use military force against cartels. Warships, including the USS Lake Erie, are patrolling near Venezuela’s coast after passing through the Panama Canal last weekend. Since beginning his second term, President Trump has targeted the ‘Tren de Aragua’ gang, led by Héctor Rustherford Guerrero Flores, or ‘Niño Guerrero.’ Trump has invoked the Alien Enemies Act to deport gang members and accused Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro of links to criminal organisations, even indicting him for narcotics trafficking in 2020.

In 2025, the bounty on Maduro was raised to $50 million, with claims that he and Venezuelan military officials are involved in transnational crime. However, a U.S. National Intelligence Council report from May 2025 stated that while the Maduro regime allows the “Tren de Aragua” gang to operate, there is insufficient evidence to support claims that the government directly controls it.

DOCUMENT: May 2025 US Intelligence MEMO “Venezuela Examining Regime Ties to Tren de Aragua” (Source: New York Times)
US Intelligence Agemcies Memo May 2025

In a recent post on Truth Social, President Trump announced a significant military operation by US forces under SOUTHCOM targeting the “Tren de Aragua” group in international waters, resulting in 11 suspected traffickers’ deaths. This operation highlights the escalating tensions between Caracas and Washington, especially following the deployment of eight US warships to Latin America, which the Trump administration views as a bold move against drug trafficking. The US Navy’s fleet includes three amphibious assault ships, two destroyers, a cruiser, a littoral combat ship, and at least one attack submarine patrolling the Caribbean, plus an additional destroyer in the eastern Pacific. Experts in narcotrafficking suggest this operation aims more to pressure Venezuelan President Maduro than to truly combat drug trafficking. Maduro has accused Trump of seeking regime change, favouring controversial opposition leader Maria Corina Machado. Amid these tensions, Maduro stated that Venezuela is ready for ‘a period of armed struggle’ if attacked, raising the stakes in this evolving situation.

A declassified April 2025 memo from the National Intelligence Council — representing a joint consensus of 18 U.S. intelligence agencies — found no coordination or direction between President Nicolás Maduro or other senior Venezuelan officials and the Tren de Aragua gang.… https://t.co/Ubi1HYOgUG

— Drop Site (@DropSiteNews) September 3, 2025

On Tuesday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ruled against President Trump’s attempt to use the Alien Enemies Act, a law from 1798 designed to allow the president to detain and expel individuals from hostile foreign nations. Trump sought to deport Venezuelans linked to the Tren de Aragua gang, but a 2-1 decision by a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit stated the law did not apply, citing a lack of evidence for an ‘invasion or predatory incursion.’ This ruling is a significant setback for Trump’s immigration policy and may soon be reviewed by the Supreme Court. Additionally, on January 20, 2025, the White House issued a Global Terrorists executive order designating Tren de Aragua as a ‘transnational organisation that poses threats to the United States,’ underscoring the complex legal issues surrounding immigration and national security.

Furthermore, it is worth noting that the 2025 World Drug Report from the UNODC mentions Venezuela only briefly, indicating that about 5% of Colombian drug production transits through the country to the Caribbean, US, and Europe. Notably, it omits reference to the “Cartel of the Suns” (Cartel de los Soles) term used to describe an alleged drug trafficking cell embedded within the Venezuelan military. Similarly, the EU’s 2025 Drug Report downplays Venezuela’s role in international drug trafficking, focusing instead on Colombia and Ecuador, despite cocaine being the second most used drug in the EU. The UNODC 2025 World Drug Report notes that Venezuela has not engaged in coca cultivation or drug processing in the past 15 years, while the US remains the largest consumer and primary destination for cocaine trafficking.

The US government recently announced a $50 million reward for information on President Nicolás Maduro’s whereabouts. While this seems like a significant incentive, it raises questions since Maduro frequently appears in public. This move continues the ‘maximum pressure’ tactics from Donald Trump’s first term, led by Attorney General William Barr. Maduro is accused of leading the Cartel of the Suns, but this narrative appears to be part of a long-term strategy to change Venezuela’s regime, which so far has yielded no results. No US security agency has provided solid evidence of cartel activities, and transnational criminal organisations have not acknowledged any ties to it. Reports from the UN and EU show that serious drug trafficking hotspots are mainly in the US, Mexico, Colombia, and Ecuador, which are key for production, trafficking, and consumption, as well as being centres for money laundering, arms trafficking, and cartel violence. Recent findings from global organisations suggest that the so-called Cartel of the Suns mainly resides within the offices of certain U.S. political figures, serving as a strategy in the ongoing efforts against President Maduro and the oil-rich Venezuela. 

Pino Arlacchi, a former Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations and the Executive Director of the UN’s Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), recently wrote an op-ed for L’antidiplomatico. In this piece, he describes the ‘Cartel de los Soles’ as a product of Trump’s imagination, emphasising the more pressing issue—Ecuador—where real drug trafficking networks function with minimal interference…

Pino Arlacchi reports for L’Antidiplomatico…

Pino Arlacchi – The Great Hoax Against Venezuela: The Geopolitics of Oil Disguised as a War on Drugs

During my tenure as head of UNODC, the UN’s counter-drug and crime agency, I was at home in Colombia, Bolivia, Peru, and Brazil, but I never visited Venezuela. There was simply no need. The Venezuelan government’s cooperation in the fight against drug trafficking was among the best in South America, rivalled only by Cuba’s impeccable record. This fact, in Trump’s delusional narrative of “Venezuela as a narco-state,” sounds like a geopolitically motivated slander.

But the data—the real ones—that emerge from the World Drug Report 2025, the organisation I had the honour of directing, tell a story opposite to the one being peddled by the Trump administration. A story that dismantles piece by piece the geopolitical fabrication constructed around the “Cartel de los Soles,” an entity as legendary as the Loch Ness Monster, yet suitable for justifying sanctions, embargoes, and threats of military intervention against a country that, coincidentally, sits on one of the largest oil reserves on the planet.

Venezuela, according to the UNODC: A marginal country on the drug trafficking map

The UNODC’s 2025 report is crystal clear, which should embarrass those who have built the rhetoric demonising Venezuela. The report makes only a cursory mention of Venezuela, stating that a marginal fraction of Colombian drug production passes through the country on its way to the United States and Europe. Venezuela, according to the UN, has consolidated its position as a territory free from the cultivation of coca leaf, marijuana, and similar products, as well as from the presence of international criminal cartels.

The document merely confirms the 30 previous annual reports, which fail to mention Venezuelan drug trafficking because it doesn’t exist. Only 5% of Colombian drugs transit through Venezuela. To put this figure into perspective: in 2018, while 210 tons of cocaine passed through Venezuela, a full 2,370 tons—ten times more—were produced or traded by Colombia, and 1,400 tons by Guatemala.

Yes, you read that right: Guatemala is a drug corridor seven times more important than the fearsome Bolivarian “narco-state” supposedly is. But no one talks about it because Guatemala has historically been short—it produces 0.01% of the global total—of the only unnatural drug Trump is interested in: oil.

The Fantastic Sun Cartel: Hollywood Fiction

The “Cartel de los Soles” is a creation of Trump’s imagination. It is supposedly led by the President of Venezuela, yet it is not mentioned in the report of the world’s leading anti-drug organisation, nor in the documents of any European or almost any other anti-crime agency on the planet. Not even a footnote. A deafening silence, which should give pause to anyone with a modicum of critical thinking. How can a criminal organisation so powerful as to merit a $50 million reward be completely ignored by anyone working in the anti-drug field?

In other words, what is sold as a super-cartel to Netflix is actually a hodgepodge of small local networks, the kind of small-time criminality found in every country in the world, including the United States, where—incidentally—nearly 100,000 people die every year from opioid overdoses that have nothing to do with Venezuela, and a lot to do with American Big Pharma.

Ecuador: The Real Hub That No One Wants to See

While Washington raises the Venezuelan spectre, the real drug trafficking hubs thrive almost undisturbed. Ecuador, for example, with 57% of banana containers leaving Guayaquil and arriving in Antwerp loaded with cocaine. European authorities seized 13 tons of cocaine from a single Spanish ship, originating precisely from Ecuadorian ports controlled by companies protected by Ecuadorian government officials.

The European Union has produced a detailed report on the ports of Guayaquil, documenting how “Colombian, Mexican, and Albanian mafias all operate extensively in Ecuador.” Ecuador’s homicide rate has skyrocketed from 7.8 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2020 to 45.7 in 2023. But Ecuador is rarely mentioned. Perhaps because Ecuador produces only 0.5% of the world’s oil, and because its government hasn’t made a bad habit of challenging US dominance in Latin America?

The Real Drug Routes: Geography vs. Propaganda

During my years at UNODC, one of the most important lessons I learned was that geography doesn’t lie. Drug routes follow precise logic: proximity to production centres, ease of transportation, corruption of local authorities, and presence of established criminal networks. Venezuela meets almost none of these criteria.

Colombia produces over 70% of the world’s cocaine. Peru and Bolivia account for most of the remaining 30%. The logical routes to reach the American and European markets are across the Pacific to Asia, across the Eastern Caribbean to Europe, and overland through Central America to the United States. Venezuela, bordering the South Atlantic, is geographically disadvantaged for all three main routes. Criminal logistics make Venezuela a marginal player in the vast theatre of international drug trafficking.

Cuba: The Embarrassing Example

Geography doesn’t lie, but politics can defeat it. Cuba still represents the gold standard of anti-drug cooperation in the Caribbean. An island just off the coast of Florida, it’s a theoretically perfect base for drug trafficking to the United States, but in practice it’s completely outside the realm of drug trafficking. I’ve repeatedly observed DEA and FBI agents’ admiration for the Cuban communists’ rigorous anti-drug policies.

Chavista Venezuela has consistently followed the Cuban model in the war on drugs, initiated by Fidel Castro himself. International cooperation, territorial control, and the repression of criminal activity. Neither Venezuela nor Cuba have ever had large swathes of land cultivated with coca and controlled by major criminals.

The European Union has no particular oil interests in Venezuela, but it does have a concrete interest in combating the drug trafficking plaguing its cities. The Union has produced its European Drug Report 2025. The document, based on real data and not geopolitical wishful thinking, doesn’t even once mention Venezuela as a corridor for international drug trafficking.

Here lies the difference between honest analysis and a false and insulting narrative. Europe needs reliable data to protect its citizens from drugs, so it produces accurate reports. The United States needs justification for its oil policies, so it produces propaganda disguised as intelligence.

According to the European report, cocaine is the second most commonly used drug in the 27 EU countries, but the main sources are clearly identified: Colombia for production, Central America for distribution, and various routes through West Africa for distribution. Venezuela and Cuba simply don’t figure into this picture.

But Venezuela is systematically demonised against every principle of truth. Former FBI Director James Comey provided the explanation in his post-resignation memoir, in which he discussed the unmentionable motivations behind American policies toward Venezuela: Trump had told him that Maduro was “a government sitting on a mountain of oil that we have to buy.” It’s not about drugs, crime, or national security, then. It’s about oil that would be better left unpaid.

It is Donald Trump, therefore, who deserves an international bounty for a very specific crime: “systematic slander against a sovereign state aimed at appropriating its oil resources.”

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Source: https://21stcenturywire.com/2025/09/03/drugs-oil-and-regime-change-venezuela-and-the-us-drug-war-narrative/