Donald Trump appeared to give nonchalant confirmation of the first US land strike in Venezuela during a radio interview last week that received little attention.
The President said that the Christmas Eve strike was on a facility ‘where the ship comes from’ – seemingly referencing the origination location of the alleged drug vessels that the US military has been targeting in the Caribbean and Atlantic over the last three months.
Speaking on WABC on December 26, Trump made the bombshell suggestion that US forces have already started conducting land operations in Venezuela.
‘I don’t know if you read or you saw, they have a big plant or a big facility where they send the – where the ships come from,’ the President said during a call-in with radio host and billionaire John Catsimatidis, who was filling in for Sid Rosenberg.
‘Two nights ago we knocked that out – so we hit them very hard,’ Trump confirmed.
The President has been saying since late November that the US is shifting away from maritime attacks on drug boats and will ‘soon’ be conducting land strikes in Venezuela.
It’s part of a continued campaign to put pressure on Nicolas Maduro, as boat strikes don’t appear to be working to deter the so-called narco regime.
But his under-the-radar comments on the radio call-in indicated that the escalation of land strikes has already started.
The exact target of the operation was not clear, and neither was which US forces were involved.
However, a video did emerge on X showing a large explosion in the Zulia state of Venezuela near the second-largest city in the country, Maracaibo.
The state’s San Francisco municipality sits on the western shore of the strait that connects Lake Maracaibo to the Gulf of Venezuela.
Zulia-based journalist Jhorman Cruz posted a video of a massive fire with resulting explosions in the early hours of December 24, but has since downplayed that it could have been a US military strike.
‘It is prudent to say that we still do not know what started the fire,’ Cruz wrote on X, according to a translation of his original post. ‘Residents DID NOT see anything unusual, nor drones, nor cars, nor the presence of foreigners.’
‘Be careful with strange hypotheses,’ the El Público TV director warned.
The White House and Pentagon did not immediately respond to the Daily Mail’s request for clarification of the President’s comments.
Starting on September 2, the Department of War has been conducting strikes against suspected drug ships in the Caribbean and Atlantic.
The operations have killed more than 105 people and are aimed at trafficking routes the US says are to blame for a huge spike in overdose deaths.
But Trump has said that land targets are ‘much easier’ and has hinted at the shift with statements like: ‘land strikes will start very soon’ and ‘soon we will be starting the same program on land.’
He has also warned Maduro it would be ‘smart’ to step down, but has not gone as far as to confirm that the US military operations are to force regime change.
