MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
Venezuela has yet to respond after President Trump announced a U.S. strike on what he called a, quote, "drug-carrying boat" from the country. The only pushback came from a Venezuelan minister who claimed the video of the incident shared by Trump was AI-generated. Meanwhile, President Nicolas Maduro warns the strike could be a prelude to an attack on his government. For now, many Venezuelans are left holding their breath, unsure of what comes next. Manuel Rueda reports from neighboring Colombia.
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MELANIO ESCOBAR: (Speaking Spanish).
MANUEL RUEDA: Melanio Escobar is a human rights activist and social media influencer who fled Venezuela five years ago. Now he lives in Orlando, where he makes a daily Venezuela YouTube show.
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ESCOBAR: (Speaking Spanish).
RUEDA: Lately, he's been talking about the arrival of eight U.S. warships in the southern Caribbean. The Trump administration says the ships have been deployed to fight drug cartels. Escobar is hoping that includes capturing Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro, who has been widely accused of stealing last year's election and jailing hundreds of his opponents. U.S. officials have repeatedly claimed that Maduro is the leader of a, quote, "narco-terror cartel."
ESCOBAR: It's my hope for a free Venezuela and democracy.
RUEDA: Escobar points out that the Trump administration has already made big efforts to capture Mexican drug traffickers and have them extradited to the U.S.
ESCOBAR: They got El Chapo Guzman. They got El Mayo, his partner in el Cartel de Sinaloa. Why not Nicolas Maduro?
RUEDA: The ships that were deployed to the Caribbean carry missiles that can strike targets hundreds of miles away. And they're also transporting a landing force of around 4,000 marines. Eric Farnsworth, an analyst at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, says that the flotilla gives Trump several options.
ERIC FARNSWORTH: It could be a minimalistic-type approach where you throw some cruise missiles at the country and its leaders.
RUEDA: He says the flotilla could also just be a show of force.
FARNSWORTH: To convince the Venezuelan regime that if, indeed, it does not acquiesce to U.S. wishes, that there is the capability in using these assets against the regime.
RUEDA: The Trump administration has offered few details about the ships' mission, though President Trump claimed Tuesday they had already destroyed a, quote, "drug-laden speedboat" with 11 alleged drug traffickers on board. On the streets of Caracas, some people say they don't expect the flotilla to do more than that.
LUIS ALFREDO AGUERO: (Speaking Spanish).
RUEDA: "It's theater," says Luis Alfredo Aguero, the owner of a shop that sells car parts in the Venezuelan capital. He says that efforts to oust Maduro, including elections, haven't worked.
AGUERO: (Speaking Spanish).
RUEDA: "Only God can save us," he says. Tony Frangie Mawad, a political analyst in Caracas, says that during his first administration, Trump tried to generate chaos within Maduro's ruling circle by sanctioning Venezuelan oil exports and backing protests.
TONY FRANGIE MAWAD: It's the idea of what they call here el quiebre, or the break-up.
RUEDA: Mawad says the deployment of ships to Venezuela's coast could be a new way of putting the Venezuelan military under pressure and testing its loyalty to Maduro.
MAWAD: The idea would be to generate a certain level of high pressure to have people in the government or in the army either hand Maduro or force a sort of negotiation with the U.S. or the opposition to engage in a transition.
RUEDA: Back in Orlando, Escobar says Venezuelans like him are watching closely.
ESCOBAR: We all Venezuelans want is a free country to go back. If it's Trump who delivers that, we're going to be really grateful. If it's God, we're going to be really grateful. That's the only thing that we care and we want.
RUEDA: For NPR News, I'm Manuel Rueda in Bogota.
(SOUNDBITE OF RENE AUBRY'S "THE DESERT, PT. 2") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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