What Just Happened in Venezuela? And What Comes Next?

This transcript is from a CSIS event hosted on January 5, 2026. Please cross check quotes against the event recording here.

Ryan C. Berg: Good morning, everyone, and welcome to this event, “What Just Happened in Venezuela? And What Comes Next?” My name is Ryan Berg. I’m the director of the Americas Program here at CSIS. I also head our Future of Venezuela Initiative. In fact, that’s what we’re here to talk about this morning.

What is the future of Venezuela after the early morning hours of Saturday this past weekend, when the United States launched an extraordinary attack, Operation Absolute Resolve, capturing the erstwhile dictator Nicolás Maduro and his wife from his compound and bringing him to the United States to serve justice on the 2020 indictment out of the Southern District Court of New York. There are so many things to unpack in the unfolding situation in Venezuela, from the geopolitics of it all to what’s going on on the ground in Venezuela. And of course, what exactly happened in those early morning hours of Saturday in the operation itself.

I’m joined here by an esteemed panel, all folks who work here at CSIS. It’s always great to be with colleagues to showcase just how much talent we have in this extraordinary building. Let me introduce our panel, and then we’ll get straight away into some discussion about what happened and what is likely to unfold in the days and the weeks ahead.

Here in the studio with me is Emily Harding. She’s the vice president of the Defense and Security Department. She’s also the director of the Intelligence, National Security, and Technology Program. And has a long history and expertise in many topics that will prove extremely relevant to this morning’s conversation.

Also here in the studio with me is Chris Hernandez-Roy. He’s senior fellow and deputy director with us at the Americas Program here at CSIS.

Joining me virtually is Clay Seigle. He’s the senior fellow and James R. Schlesinger chair in energy and geopolitics with the Energy Security and Climate Change Program.

And joining us imminently here is Mark Cancian, who’s a senior advisor with the Defense and Security Department as well.

Thank you all very much for being here on short notice to provide analysis in this truly dramatic and unfolding situation.

Let’s start with you, Emily. And I want to start with a question that goes directly to your wheelhouse. It’s on the intelligence preparation that went into this mission, Operation Absolute Resolve. Saturday morning we saw a press conference at Mar-a-Lago where Dan Caine, the joint chief of staff, described a very carefully constructed intelligence operation going into Operation Absolute Resolve. He said, we had built what’s called a pattern of life for Maduro. He mentioned that we knew where he slept, we knew what he ate, he knew what he wear – what he wore. Months of rehearsal based on information gathered. CIA teams have been inserted into Venezuela. Talk about the importance of intelligence to the overall success of this mission.

Emily Harding: Yeah. This was a real stellar success for intel, from top to bottom. The folks at the agency and inside the intelligence community should be exceptionally proud of what they accomplished here. I think, starting at the very bottom, to make an operation like this work you have to have sources on the ground who have intimate knowledge of the inner circle of one of the hardest targets to get to in the world. You have to have people who know, as you pointed out, where Maduro was sleeping, where he was eating, what his patterns of life were. You had to know where he was going to be, not just in that moment but two days from now when you had to actually execute on the operation.

And that’s probably not just one source. That’s probably layered intelligence gathered from a bunch of places. If you take it up a level, it means that you had analysts who were doing really excellent work taking all these bits of information and creating a real picture, that pattern of life. And then you have special operators working very closely with operators at the agency who can put this whole package together and really develop an intelligence operation you can then hand to Delta Force and say: Here you go. We’ve painted you a very comprehensive picture. We’ve built you a house that’s just like the one that Maduro is going to be in. (Laughter.) Go practice.

And I think it’s not overstating it to say that the great work the intelligence community did here is why we saw so little, by way of U.S. casualties. They knew exactly where to go. They knew exactly what to do. They knew how much time they had to get to Maduro before he got to the safe house. And they knew how to get out. On top of that, we have some interesting cyber effects we can talk about. But we’ll get to that when you’re ready. (Laughs.)

Dr. Berg: Yeah. So just I think that’s an important point to emphasize. Several U.S. Army Delta Rangers, we assume, were hit in the operation, but no KIAs. And the president said, I think, one helicopter was hit, but was still flightworthy. And so that’s an important point to make about the success of the mission.

Let’s go to the cyber aspect, before I turn to Mark on some other operational aspects. You’ve got expertise in cyber. I would commend to our listeners your excellent report from September where you wrote a very comprehensive report on winning the cyber war. Dan Caine also mentioned CYBERCOM and all the work that it did throughout this operation. President Trump mentioned that Venezuela was dark during the option. What does he mean by that? What role did CYBERCOM likely have in the success of this mission?

Ms. Harding: Yeah. There were definitely two meanings of what the president said in his press conference. He said it was the middle of the night. It was dark. Well, it was dark because it was night, but apparently it was also dark because it seems CYBERCOM turned off all the lights. This is the way that modern wars are fought, especially if you’re the United States. And we operate very well in darkness. Because of that really fabulous intelligence picture, we didn’t need to see where we were going. We had all the technology we needed and we had it all mapped out. So it really helps us to have Caracas, or at least parts of Caracas, be literally dark.

There also may have been some internet outages. That’s really important. As you may remember with the Bin Laden raid, one of the very first indications that got out that a raid was underway was an engineering students who just happened to be sitting outside studying saw the helicopters go over and posted it on Twitter, so he literally broke the news to the world about the Bin Laden raid. If you want that to not happen, you try to shut off parts of the internet around an operation. So it’s a very smart thing that they did as well.

This kind of operation where you layer so many things at the same time, it’s truly joint operations. I know my colleague Mark will talk more about this, but you had SPACECOM involved; you had CYBERCOM involved; you had intelligence involved; and then you had all the military forces involved, too. A joint operation like that is really quite difficult to do. And from the CYBERCOM perspective, setting that operation up would have taken quite a long time and an incredible skill level in order to make all those pieces come together at the right moment.

Dr. Berg: Terrific.

I want to bring in Mark, who’s with us now, and talk about the complexities of Operation Absolute Resolve before we get into some of the politics of Venezuela, the geopolitics, and of course the energy scenario. Mark, this was a capture operation. Talk about some of the complexities of the – of a so-called snatch-and-grab or capture operation. And also comment for a second, if you can, on what President Trump tends to like to say – he said it after Operation Midnight Hammer and he said it again after Operation Absolute Resolve – no other military on Earth could have pulled off this operation, especially in terms of its complexity. Do you – do you agree with that assessment? And why?

Mark F. Cancian: This was a brilliant operation. The execution was flawless. It’s something that probably only the United States could pull off. Conceivably in other circumstances the Israelis, they’ve been quite amazing. It’s something the Chinese could not pull off on Taiwan. I know there’s a lot of concern out there about whether that would be possible.

And the reason it was so extraordinary, there were a number – we’ve heard about the intelligence side, but on the military side there were 150 aircraft of all kinds from different services – the Navy, there was Air Force, there was Special Operations – and they all worked together, meshed on schedule so that their effects compounded. That kind of jointness is rare around the world. Many countries try to achieve that; the United States has finally achieved it after, you know, many decades of hard work.

Remember that two other efforts like this failed. One was 1980, when the United States tried to rescue hostages in Iran. That failed badly. That led to the creation of SOCOM. And then there was the 2003 effort to find high-value targets in Iraq. That also failed. The United States did not have the kill chain set up well enough, the intelligence combined with the shooters. Here we’ve been able to pull that all together.

And it’s not just the aircraft; you know, it was missile strikes to take out Venezuelan defenses. Keep in mind that the Venezuelan army, military forces, are quite formidable. Their air defenses had something like a hundred medium- and long-range air defenses, missiles, some of them quite modern, provided by the Russians; they had dozens, maybe hundreds of short-range missiles; and then something – over 400 anticraft guns. So the air defense system was quite formidable. And the United States not only took that on, but took it on in its most concentrated area – that is, around the capital – was able to get in there. That is an extraordinary achievement.

Dr. Berg: Mark, let me just do a quick follow-up with you because you mentioned Venezuela’s air defense systems. And we’ve talked about this in previous events with you, Mark, the Russian origin of those – mostly Russian origin of those defense systems, but also Venezuela’s purchased a lot of Chinese systems over the years. We didn’t see a formidable air defense at all in Venezuela’s case here as Operation Absolute Resolve got underway. What message do you think that sends to the Russians and the Chinese? And also, what message do you think it sends to prospective buyers of that equipment thinking that it’s going to be functional and effective?

Col. Cancian: I think prospective buyers have to wonder whether these systems are really capable of standing up to the highest level of attack. Now, the United States, of course, is the most demanding scenario that these systems would face, but if I were a purchaser I’d be scratching my head about just how good these systems are.

Now, to be fair to the Russians, in the Ukraine war they’ve been reasonably effective because they aren’t facing a(n) adversary as sophisticated as the United States. And there will be a lot of investigation and a lot of analysis about how we were able to do this. Maybe a big piece was cyber, breaking down their command and control. Some pieces certainly were our anti-radar missiles that probably took out some of their search radars, targeting radars. Some of it may have just been the fact of surprise, that they didn’t know we were going to be there until we were there and then it was too late. But the fact that they may not have even got a shot off and they certainly didn’t get a good shot off is quite extraordinary.

Dr. Berg: Thanks, Mark. We’ll come back to you in a bit for some more analysis on the geopolitics of this all.

But I want to go to Chris and then to Clay, first to Chris about something that the president said at the press conference I’ve mentioned Saturday morning describing the events of earlier that day. He said that the U.S. would run Venezuela, and that left a lot of people calling me on the weekend and I’m sure you saying: What does this actually mean? What does this arrangement look like? The secretary of state clarified on the Sunday morning talk shows that this meant that he was an integral part of forming Venezuela policy, and that in conjunction with Delcy Rodríguez, the de facto vice president of Venezuela, who was the decision-maker and will be the decision-maker in Caracas, that the United States would continue to use its leverage against Venezuela to get pro-U.S. policies.

The way I read it is that the U.S. chose immediate-term stability over the uncertainties of a potential long-term, maybe even drawn-out and slightly chaotic transition. How do you read it? Can you provide more detail in your assessment of what exactly it means to run Venezuela?

Christopher Hernandez-Roy: Yeah. Sure. And I think there’s various angles to this that we can – (clears throat) – excuse me – unpack.

But to begin with, I think I was struck when I was frantically looking at, you know, anything that was available publicly at about five a.m. when I was up on Saturday morning, struck that it was just Maduro who was captured and taken out – taken out of the country.

Dr. Berg: Maduro and his wife.

Mr. Hernandez-Roy: Maduro and his wife, yes, and not the broader cupola of power that basically is a criminal regime in Venezuela. And I think the administration probably did that knowing, you know, the president’s longstanding criticism of the Iraq invasion, that he would never have done that, and the subsequent sort of decapitation of the power structure in Iraq. They wanted to avoid – and the resulting sort of chaos that that brought, and eventually, essentially, a civil war. And I think the administration wanted to avoid that, as you’ve just said, by working with the remnants of the regime that offer stability over legitimacy. This is the same regime; it’s just not headed by Nicolás Maduro. It’s the same criminal regime. It’s the same people that run the military who have backed Maduro, and now have formally backed Delcy Rodríguez. So they’re going to work with her and they’re going to run the country, as you say.

But I think what it really means is they’re going to direct policy, and they’re going to expect Delcy and her government to follow the U.S.’s lead. And I think these are going to be sort of very headline, very sort of big-picture items that the United States is going to want to measure progress on.

So one is going to be less criminal activity and, importantly, seeing less drugs come to the United States. Venezuela’s not the primary source of drugs to the United States, but it is – it is a supplier. So that’s one.

More cooperation on migration – preventing flows out, accepting more deportees in – is another thing that I think can be measured relatively well.

And a third is, clearly, the president’s interested in the Venezuelans’ resources, oil, opening up the oil sector to, in addition to Chevron, which is still there and has been for over a hundred years, bringing back in other oil majors – Exxon, ConocoPhillips – that were – that essentially chose to leave the country about 20 years ago when they were forced to enter – or, they would have been forced to enter into joint ventures with the government which they balked at, and which now they have been seeking and won in U.S. courts compensation for a long time. That’s another one, I think, where the regime can probably deliver on.

And a third one – or, a fourth one, I should say, that they’ll want is to see some measurable distancing from the U.S.’s adversaries that have been using Venezuela as a platform: Russia, China, Iran, and Cuba. I think, for instance, ending oil shipments to Cuba will be a strong message and a strong thing that the United States will want to see, in particular given also the secretary of state’s interest, natural interest, in Cuba. So I think “running the country” means forcing the administration under the threat of further military action to do these headline items.

Ms. Harding: I know we’re going to talk more about Cuba in a minute, but I do want to point out that the intelligence ties between Cuba and Venezuela have been extensive. And I would expect the Cubans at this point to be very much looking inward to figure out if they have any gaps in their intelligence services as well. But on the Delcy question I would love to put Ryan on the spot too, and ask both of you this question. Is she in an impossible position right now? Because if she is being told from the United States, like, we’re the ones giving the orders, and, you know, President Trump has said that publicly. But then inside the country she’s saying, this was a violation of sovereignty, you know, I’m in charge, Maduro is still the president. Can she keep things together on the home front at the same time that she is seen to be perhaps working with the United States of America? How is she going to walk that balance?

Dr. Berg: Well, the first thing I would say is that Cuba, the ties are deep, as you mentioned. And we can get into that in a bit. Thirty-two Cubans were killed in this operation. They are and were Maduro’s bodyguards.

Ms. Harding: Which is astonishing.

Dr. Berg: They are the folks that he trusted. Cubans were protecting a regime that was not Cuba. (Laughs.) And those ties we’ve been – we’ve been talking about for decades now. President Trump has mentioned Cuba explicitly. He mentioned again on the flight back from Mar-a-Lago to D.C. last night that Cuba may be next. And I think what he meant by that is not necessarily a military operation, but it could be next to have – to fall or to have some kind of regime transition, given how battered the regime is there.

Quickly on Delcy, and I’m on record now publicly saying this, I think it’s going to be very difficult for her to thread that needle. On the one hand, she needs to be outraged that this happened, that this was allowed to happen. The armed forces didn’t put up, seemingly, any fight. And she also needs to move herself away from what happened because there are significant rumors within the country that she may have played a role in giving up Maduro. While at the same time, she needs to be open to pushing pro-U.S. policies that are going to be very difficult for her regime to swallow, given that they have a 27-year history of seeing the United States as the greatest enemy and the greatest threat to their policies.

And so I don’t think that this is a long-term fix or a long-term solution to Venezuela. As I commented in a few different outlets, I think we’re – to paraphrase Churchill – we’re not at the beginning of the end, but the sort of the end of the beginning. And the end of the beginning is perhaps a series of transitions where eventually we move towards elections in Venezuela, and we get something that looks more like a full democratic transition.

Mr. Hernandez Roy: Can I just add, I think that’s right, Ryan. The other thing that Delcy doesn’t have is she’s not part of the men with the guns. Diosdado Cabello is the interior minister, remains the interior minister, runs the Bolivarian National Guard. Vladimir Padrino remains the minister of defense. He runs the armed forces. These are the guys that will be key to supporting Delcy or not. She does have control of the intelligence apparatus within the country, but she doesn’t have the force necessary or the support within that without either Padrino or Cabello. And it remains to be seen – they’ve – at least Padrino has come out publicly supporting her for now. But whether, you know, different parts of the regime start to squabble with each other as a result of Delcy maybe taking stances that they find are just too far in the U.S.’ interest remains to be seen.

Dr. Berg: I want to get Clay in on this. Clay, thanks for your patience as we’ve sort of set the foundation for this conversation. You’ve been super busy over the last couple days answering questions about what this all means for the energy picture in Venezuela. Of course, you cannot separate conversation on Venezuela from oil. Oil is indeed the lifeblood of Venezuela’s economy. It always has been. And one of the stated interests, as Chris mentioned, for Venezuela, is to get Venezuela to increase its production. Simple question, but probably a complex answer to you, Clay. What is it going to take to get Venezuela’s production up from its current figures?

Clayton Seigle: Hi, Ryan.

Well, there are a lot of things on the list that would go into a trajectory of production growth for Venezuelan oil output. They range from restoring reliable electricity, electrical power access, to stable fiscal and legal terms offered by the government that are credible to international operators and companies. But I think that the oil companies will look at the huge potential in entering Venezuela through one litmus test. Kind of the preeminent requirement is political stability. And a lot of people are talking about that this week because the events of this weekend haven’t really clarified what the outlook for political stability in Venezuela is going to be.

These international energy companies have global portfolios. And when they evaluate opportunities around the world, they look at all kinds of operating conditions and fiscal and legal conditions. But the first thing that they have to ask is, is their operation – are their people going to be safe and secure, reasonably so? And in Venezuela, I think we have a lot more questions than answers at this hour and as we start the new week. And so the political outline that you and the colleagues have described here still has some uncertainty, if we’re going to be working with the previous regime and previous government, just sans Maduro, can that provide the requisite political stability that international investors and corporate strategists want to see before taking big commitments to enter a market?

Now, if you – just sort of the exercise – if we assume, hypothetically, that we have that requisite political stability, and probably the next thing on the list, as I mentioned, is fiscal terms. How are the companies and the government going to share revenues through taxes, through royalties, through production sharing agreements, et cetera? Then we can talk about the potential for Venezuela to increase output. And I think there’s basically two stages to think about. There’s kind of the first phase, which is sort of low-hanging fruit to amplify Venezuela’s oil output. And then there’s the longer-term stuff.

I think that the low-hanging fruit could probably bring another half million barrels per day to the market from Venezuela. And remember, we’re starting at a baseline, recently at least, of around a million barrels per day, a little bit less. So I think that in the short term it could increase by close to 50 percent. And by short term, I mean somewhere between one and two years. Let’s just take the midpoint and call it 18 months right now. And that would basically involve an initiative around oil well workovers. Workovers, for those who haven’t been watching “Landman” and are not from here in Texas – (laughter) – it’s basically just, right, the maintenance programs and restoration programs that oilfield services companies do on existing and producing wells. It’s everything from replacing well casing to adding stimulation to the well formation to get more out, improving artificial lift, and a lot of other technical things.

But it would basically require oilfield services companies to come back to Venezuela and employ their expertise on existing oil wells, the ones that have been so dilapidated in these fields that we’re all reading about, and bring them back up to speed and producing more than they have been in recent years. And I think from a program like that, at relatively low cost, right, only hundreds of millions of dollars, you could, over a period of a year or two, increase production by several hundred thousand barrels per day. And from an oil planning standpoint, that’s probably worth doing. And I think that companies will be dusting plans off the shelf and considering the options there.

The bigger tranche for Venezuela to really ramp oil production and get back to, or at least toward, their high-water mark of about 3 ½ million barrels per day, that is a much higher hurdle. That is a program of investing tens of billions of dollars into sophisticated, modern facilities that we call upgraders and upgrading equipment. It’s sort of a pretreatment of this super viscous, extra-heavy crude oil that Venezuela has, and getting it ready for conventional refining processes. Those facilities, again, cost tens of billions of dollars not just to build new, but probably even to renovate the several that are in Venezuela, but which are not operational. They too are dilapidated. They have been basically shuttered, except for one of the four.

So they’re running at kind of 25 percent of the installed – I don’t even know if it’s the capacity of the upgraders – but one of four, basically. And so if you’re going to undertake a program like that, you would be looking at a very substantial capital investment. And you would also – and this is critically important for planners and policymakers – you’re looking at a long timescale, a long runway. For refurbishing, I estimate you could be looking at three-ish years. For new builds and actually replacing big equipment, you’re talking five, six years-plus. And that’s the real reality.

So Venezuela can do a little bit sooner rather than later. And it’s not even really a little if you think about a million barrels per day today increasing by 500, that’s a 50 percent increase over the next couple of years. But then the big stuff is going to require a lot longer and a lot more money. And before we even get to those later stages of planning, the companies are going to look for that requisite political stability.

Dr. Berg: Clay, this is all really, really useful. Let me ask you a quick follow-up question here on your two scenarios. Your two scenarios are very clear, but I just want to be clear what “political stability” means for you under the current circumstances. So do you think that Venezuela can get to that optimistic scenario that you outlined in the short term, by which you define one to two years, under the current arrangement? Which is to say, under an arrangement where the regime of Chavismo remains in power. We know what the state of the oil industry is in the country. We know it needs a lot of investment. Is that the kind of political stability that would be required to get to an additional, let’s say, half a million barrels of oil per day production increase? Or does that even small increase, the short-term scenario, does that require a greater transition, in your mind?

Mr. Seigle: Well, they’re excellent questions. As you know, we sometimes get paid to give the bad news too. We don’t know at this hour and this super early stage, first side of the first inning, probably, in this – in this saga. But you are asking the right questions that I think corporate strategists and executive leadership teams at energy companies are going to be asking. So the first one, as I mentioned, is physical security. And even that one, I think, is an open question right now.

We had a military operation, that the colleagues described. We also have the Trump administration saying very clearly that there could be more military action forthcoming depending on how things go. So I think it’s way premature for energy companies and outside investors to already be derisking the physical security environment. They want to know that their people are going to be secure, that their Venezuelan partners and host communities are going to be secure, and that assets and investments that they make so as well.

And then the second piece of that will be the arrangements, contractual arrangements, particularly legal and fiscal terms. And so, right, a big open question right now is can the current government in Venezuela credibly guarantee new fiscal terms and legal terms that those companies are going to need before undertaking big investment decisions? And we just don’t know at this early stage.

Dr. Berg: Terrific, Clay. Thanks very much. I would also add one more thing, which is that the regime – again, many of the remnants are still there, the security apparatus is still in place – has a long history of kidnapping Americans and taking them political prisoner to try to play games with and exercise leverage against Washington.

Mr. Seigle: And, not to mention the whole history of resource nationalism and expropriation, which the colleagues referred to earlier. So some of the companies that would ostensibly be interested in a future phase in Venezuelan development have long experience with having their stuff, as the Trump administration has characterized it, stolen, or at least we can agree undercompensated at the time of their exits and the write downs that they had to take. So they’ve – international energy has seen this movie before, specifically in Venezuela, with this regime. And so they’re really going to want to derisk those prior problems before thinking about the future.

Mr. Hernandez-Roy: Can I just add really quickly? I mean, the stock market is notoriously fickle and responds to events one day and then changes course the next. But, you know, all the major oil companies that would have interest in Venezuela are, you know, as much as 4 percent higher today, at least as of about half an hour ago – (laughs) – in the stock market. So there are some bets that this arrangement will benefit the oil companies.

Dr. Berg: Before we get to the geopolitics of this, and there’s a lot to unpack on the geopolitics on it and I want to get all of your opinions in on this, I want to ask Mark one quick question. Which is – it’s something that we’ve been talking about in a number of Venezuela events. And, Mark, you’ve been – you’ve been part of some of those. Where are the Venezuelan armed forces in all of this? There hasn’t been much indication throughout the weekend in terms of where their loyalty lies. I mean, I can tell you, sort of by process of elimination, the one place that they weren’t on Saturday morning was defending the nation, as the U.S. seemed to have complete air supremacy and also significant operational maneuverability on the ground.

But throughout all of this we’ve discussed at length the importance of loyalty. So where is the loyalty of the FANB as far as we can tell? Are they still with the regime? Are they kind of putting their finger up in the air and seeing which way this thing is going to blow? What’s your assessment?

Col. Cancian: Well, let me start first by saying that these forces are quite powerful. I talked about the air defenses earlier. The ground forces number about 93,000 when you put all the pieces together, and for Latin America that’s a pretty sizeable armed force. Of course, there are militias that are specifically tied to the regime. You see that often in authoritarian countries; that is, you have an official armed force and then you have this militia that’s tied to the ruling party.

The Trump administration has clearly wanted to have some sort of crack in the security forces. As it has increased pressure since September, it’s hoped that either Maduro would decide to leave or that some part of the security forces would decide to push him out, a coup or a soft coup. No doubt we’re telling the Venezuelan security forces: You know, when we went into Iraq we disbanded the military forces; do you really want that to happen to you?

On the other hand, I haven’t seen any indication that there is a crack in the armed forces. They were not very effective in defending the country. There may be a bunch of reasons for that. Maybe command and control broke down and they would have defended. But there’s no indication that they, you know, wanted to change sides. You don’t hear about white flags going up and Venezuelan armed forces getting ready to surrender, which is, for example, different from Iraq in 2003 where, you know, the frontline Iraqi soldiers were just very anxious to surrender. I mean, sometimes they even prematurely surrendered. So we don’t know. And in fact, I would turn to you and our other panelists to get a sense about what the internal dynamics of the regime are.

Mr. Hernandez-Roy:

 I can add something there.

Dr. Berg: Chris, why don’t you go ahead on the internal dynamics of the – of the regime.

Mr. Hernandez-Roy: Well, just staying with the men with the guns again for a minute, in addition to the army and to the militia that Mark mentioned, of course the regime has long relied on the “colectivos,” which are basically armed gangs that ride around on motorcycles and are the regime’s shock troops for controlling internal dissent. And typically, they are armed with pistols, revolvers, basically small sidearms. And what we’ve seen in the last 24 hours is they’ve now been armed with assault rifles and have been deployed to different parts of the city in Caracas.

Dr. Berg: That’s also a state of commotion that’s been declared in Venezuela.

Mr. Hernandez-Roy:

 Correct.

Dr. Berg: So there is the emergency decree that’s been emitted by the –

Mr. Hernandez-Roy: Exactly. And I think this is all part of a strategy to prevent any spontaneous protests for democracy, for María Corina Machado, for Edmundo González, for a broader change in the regime than just simply the departure of Maduro. So there is an element there, at least on the part of the “colectivos,” to ensure that the regime is safe against any protests.

Dr. Berg: Let’s move to a round of discussion on geopolitical questions. And I’ll probably start with you, Emily. I mean, there’s just so much to unpack here I’m not sure we’ll get to all of it, but massive geopolitical implications for adversaries such as China, Russia, Iran, even North Korea in a – in a Venezuela without Nicolás Maduro and a Venezuela where the United States seemingly had its way militarily speaking. Can I just ask the simple question, which is, of that kind of axis of authoritarians I just mentioned, who’s up and who’s down after this operation? How do you look at it?

Ms. Harding: I guarantee they’re all scared at the moment.

Dr. Berg: (Laughs.)

Ms. Harding: They’re all also checking their internal security procedures, and checking them twice, and checking them a third time, and being sure that this cannot happen to them.

I mean, sort of starting from home and then moving out in concentric circles, if you – if you think about what – the messaging the administration is putting out right now, it’s very much the “we told you so.” Like, we said we were coming, and we did it.

Dr. Berg: This was an operation foretold.

Ms. Harding: This was an operation foretold. You know, we made very clear what we were about to do, and then we followed through on it. And that, I think, is going to send some moments of pause to both allies and enemies alike. The kerfuffle over Greenland has kicked up again.

Dr. Berg: I want to get to that. (Laughs.)

Ms. Harding: Very concerning. But if you are definitely in the crosshairs of this administration, you’ve got to be very concerned. If you are Cuba, you have got to be very concerned right now. Not only – I mean, I defer to you all on this one, but not only did they just lose a bunch of their oil and potentially an economic hit; they’ve also got the potential that now, you know, Rubio may be turning his eyes towards them.

If you are China, I mean, the meeting with the Chinese envoy and Maduro was, what, four hours before this happened?

Dr. Berg: The last official Maduro met with before being captured in his home was the Chinese special envoy who was visiting from Beijing. It’s my understanding they were not able to get out of Venezuela before the operation began. What a message. (Laughs.)

Ms. Harding: Right. So they were sitting here and watching this come in over their heads.

Now, I would assume, having served in government for a very long time, that that’s a coincidence; that they did, in fact, have to wait for the right period of weather and period of darkness to make this happen, and they didn’t plan to embarrass the Chinese delegation. But, boy, they did anyway.

Dr. Berg: (Laughs.)

Ms. Harding: And I think China’s got to be looking at this, like, well, OK, if these are the new rules, then we need to think about what this means for us as well.

There are these comparisons to Taiwan. I’m not sure it’s a good comparison. I would defer to Mark to talk more about that.

If you’re Russia, I mean, this has been an ally of the Russian regime. There have been lots of movements between Moscow and Venezuela, and Cuba too. So they have to be looking at this as another chink in their armor, a far-away chink. But as you pointed out, with the S-300s their air defense systems did no good here. And it’s going to look like they don’t have the strength they purport to have, especially in Latin America.

I think that it does also kind of double down on one of the big points in the National Security Strategy. They said – as this administration put out the NSS, it says, look, yeah, democracy, great; however, we’re willing to work with whoever is willing to work with us. They pointed to Reagan, saying, you know, he did this too. I would argue with that comparison.

Dr. Berg: What they call enable and enlist, right? Expand and enlist, yeah.

Ms. Harding: Exactly, expand and enlist. So we’re willing to work with pretty much whoever we need to work with, including somebody who might be just the regime continued. And I think that is a very clear signal about American values and priorities as well.

I, for one, being a big fan of democracy and the rule of law, thought that it was surprising just how fast the administration dismissed our Nobel laureate and the people who won the election last in Venezuela. I would be curious whether that was an intentional policy choice or whether that was just something that wasn’t top of mind at the moment when they were giving the press conference. But that, I think, is going to be the next question about what American priorities are supposed to be.

Dr. Berg: And I think the hope there is that the comment can be interpreted as potentially not just support within the country – because María Corina Machado has all the legitimacy and support she needs; so does Edmundo González Urrutia, having won decisively the election of July 2024 – but that the president meant specifically perhaps within certain institutions of the country that they felt were decisive for any kind of transition. But time will tell whether that’s the proper interpretation or not.

Chris, I want to go to you specifically on the question of Cuba, a country you’ve spent a long time thinking about.

Mr. Hernandez-Roy: Sure. I mean, Cuba – while I agree with everything Emily has said, that this is a wakeup call for them and they’re – (laughs) – going to be checking their procedures and recalibrating, I think they’re still deeply embedded and have still – they clearly still have deep connections because the regime is still there. Padrino has very good connections with the Russians and the Cubans. So does Diosdado. So does Delcy. Now, the U.S. is going to be pushing them to separate, but the connections that our adversaries in Venezuela have, they will be trying to play spoiler. They will do everything they can to pull the regime back. So that’s something, I think, that we need to keep an eye on.

The other thing is you talked about what impacts this have (sic; has) beyond just, you know, the global geopolitics, focusing on the regional beyond Cuba. You know, the president also said, basically, that – excuse my French – the president of Colombia, Petro, has to watch his hiney – (laughter) – because he could be next. And clearly, he – you know, he’s been considering or at least rhetorically considering possible strikes on drug cartels in Mexico. So these other countries, you know, now have an actual event to be worried about when it comes to their own security and what they might do. So profound effects throughout the region.

Dr. Berg: Yeah.

Mark, how do you think about this from the perspective of the National Security Strategy? Tie in a little bit about the NSS and geopolitics here. I mean, this operation comes less than one month after the release of an NSS that led in the regional sections with the Western Hemisphere. That’s rare. It gave four pages of treatment to the Western Hemisphere. As a longtime Latin Americanist, I can tell you we’re used to seeing one page for the Western Hemisphere in NSS documents; this one had four. And I think really importantly, it led with an idea of a Trump corollary to the Monroe Doctrine. And this was I won’t say maligned at the time, but it was – it was doubted by many people. The commentary on the Trump corollary was not particularly kind to the Trump corollary.

I will say one thing we did at CSIS, we published a couple of pieces that said we need to take this corollary idea seriously. We’re looking at the largest military buildup since at least the Cuban Missile Crisis in Latin America.

And so this operation clearly shows, in my opinion, that Operation Absolute Resolve is kind of proving that the Trump corollary idea is a thing; the U.S. wants to be more muscular in the Western Hemisphere. What does that mean for China, Russia, Iran, and others geopolitically if the U.S. is willing to conduct actions and operations that previously I think would have been off the table with many other administrations?

Col. Cancian: Well, this operation highlights some of the tensions that many people had commented on in the National Security Strategy. One tension was between the desire to stay out of other countries’ business, not get involved in conflicts overseas, and to focus on the hemisphere. And at the time it came out, of course, the United States was putting pressure on Venezuela. And you see that now; that is, although there’s a lot of support for what happened in Venezuela, much of the what you might call a classical MAGA wing is very angry. They say that the president had said he’d stay out of these conflicts and now he’s jumped in. So that tension is still in there, but there’s no question, as you point out, that this Trump corollary is real, and that the focus and willingness to use force in the hemisphere is real.

In terms of the other parts of the world, the National Security Strategy was pretty clear, you know, we’re going to turn European security over to the Europeans and we’re going to pull back from the Middle East because we had suppressed Iran and Gaza was settling down, so we’ll be able to pull forces out of there. But there’s another tension on the Western Pacific. Although that focus on China has not changed and there’s a section about Taiwan that is very strong about preserving Taiwan’s current status, it’s not the kind of, you know, pacing threat words/text that we saw in the Biden administration. And this kind of focus on the hemisphere, you know, pulls effort away from the other parts of the world. The administration’s quite happy to do that in Europe and the Middle East, but some of the forces are going to have to come out of the Western Pacific if the United States wants to maintain the level of forces in the Caribbean and in the hemisphere that it has now built up.

Dr. Berg: Thanks.

Mr. Hernandez-Roy: Can I just go back real quick? You really wanted me to talk about Cuba and I sort of went on a different tangent, but this also follows with what Mark was talking about in terms of the Monroe Doctrine.

The president has said, basically, he doesn’t need to intervene in Cuba because it’s going to fall apart anyway. The island is in a profound economic crisis, and –

Dr. Berg: And has been for about four or five years.

Mr. Hernandez-Roy: It has been, especially since after COVID, which tanked the country’s tourism industry, which is the primary earner of foreign reserves for the – for the country. It’s going through a massive energy crisis where its electrical infrastructure is basically from the 1950s and it’s falling apart and it can’t get spare parts. A year-and-a-half ago there was a five-day blackout. What little food the average Cubans have spoiled in their refrigerators. And there have been massive protests as a result. If the administration can get the Venezuelans to stop sending oil – and oh, by the way, the Mexicans are also sending oil – but that would just be an additional layer of stress on Cuban society, which could lead to some changes.

Dr. Berg: Clay, I want to go to you on the geopolitics of energy. Couple questions on what the geopolitical ramifications would be if Venezuela is, in fact, able to increase production. Let’s go back to that scenario that you mentioned. In the short term I find it particularly interesting, one to two years you think Venezuela could get about a 50 percent increase, about 500,000 barrels of oil a day additional production. What are the geopolitical implications of that, if we get somewhere near that scenario?

Mr. Seigle: Well, I just, first of all, want to clarify. I was talking about 500,000 barrels per day from the time the initiative were it to begin, or starts. And that’s probably not anytime soon because, again, there are a lot of things on these international energy companies’ checklist that they’re going to want to see in order to derisk investments and operations in Venezuela. So that was kind of a hypothetical timeline, once you get to the point of go, right?

Geopolitical implications of increasing supply from Venezuela might be a bit muted, because 500 or even a million barrels per day in a 103-104 million barrel per day global market is a little bit of a rounding error. And so I think it’s more important to focus on the regional ramifications of increased output from Venezuela and also related to certain coalitions around the world. Venezuela, of course, is one of the founding members of OPEC. And even though it’s been exempt from those production targets and quotas for quite some time, eventually more Venezuelan output is going to have to be factored into OPEC’s supply policies. And so naturally that could create a bit more competition for oil producers generally, and for other producers of that special, extra-heavy blend of crude oil.

And we think about countries like Mexico, Canada, and a few others. It could certainly be advantageous for countries that have the right refining kit to match with Venezuela’s oil. And so that, first and foremost, would be refineries along the U.S. Gulf Coast. Maybe that does pertain to some of the short-term stock market reactions that we observed on the panel. It’s really important when we think, though, about the geopolitical ramifications of what’s happening for energy security and energy security planners globally. Because I think this is going to have an outsized effect way beyond the Venezuelan theater of operations.

Emily was talking before about potential reactions in China. Now, China, of course, has a tremendous oil import burden. It imports, on average, about 11 million barrels per day. It’s been doing even more imports than needed to make its own transportation fuels in its refineries in order to amass strategic inventories of oil in case of future supply disruptions. And so China has to be worried when it sees, over the last few weeks, the Trump administration, first of all, implement a relatively unprecedented naval quarantine of oil exports from an adversary in order to get it to change its ways. And then the capture of a head of state, whether elected or not, of an oil producing country is going to make planners in China and other oil-importing countries, and probably some exporters too, wonder what’s next.

And so here on the panel, we’ve talked about the Trump administration essentially threatening additional action in places like Colombia, about 800,000 barrels per day, potentially some type of involvement in the security of or even intervention in Mexico, 6.3 million barrels per day. Definitely rattling the saber in the last few days with regard to Iran, once again – 1.5 in exports, but about 3 million barrels per day of production. So producers and consumers around the world are going to be wondering what’s next. And so a consumer like China, that depends so much on imports, is probably justified in wondering whether its energy security supply chains are secure.

Dr. Berg: Clay, let me just give you a quick – a quick follow up, and then I see Mark wants to get in on this as well. Let me drill down – sorry, pun intended – (laughter) – here on the China angle. Where does the Venezuelan oil that used to go, or may continue to still go to China, where does it go under the new arrangement that the president outlined, where we are essentially telling the Venezuelans what kind of policies we want to see them pursue, much of that having to do with the oil industry? As you and I have discussed, about 80 percent or so, between 70 and 80 percent of Venezuela’s exports, had been going to China as part of debt repayment. Where does that oil go now? Does China simply get stiffed? Do they not get their debt repaid? Is this part of the geopolitical play and the calculus here by the administration?

Mr. Seigle: Well, it certainly poses those challenges for China in the short term if this oil export stream is throttled or even cut off. It’s only about 4 ½ or 5 percent of that 11 million barrel per day import bill. And China can find substitutes for that oil. It will increase costs, of course. And China was enjoying large discounts for the Venezuelan oil, as it does also with Iranian oil and Russian as well. So all of the kind of the big three sanctioned oil producers. And so China will be wondering how much more it’s going to pay if it has to find substitute supplies. It’s not though yet clear that China won’t be getting similar oil flows as before. The president did at least throw a bone or provide some type of reassurance that China would be able to still get oil from Venezuela. But there’s just no details at this early point.

The United States is justifying what it’s doing in terms of the oil tanker ship seizures on the basis of legal court orders. And so part of the outcome will probably depend on whether the United States has legal authority to seize those oil cargoes and repurpose them for other means. I believe that the president even floated at least exploring the idea about whether some of that oil could find a home in the United States’ Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which can hold well more than 650 million barrels but it’s down to closer to 400 million barrels these days. There’s a lot of potential obstacles to doing something like that. Venezuelan oil doesn’t really match the characteristics that the SPR needs in order to refill. And it can only refill at a really slow rate. But the natural proximal home for a lot of those Venezuelan heavy barrels would be the refining complex of the U.S. Gulf Coast.

Dr. Berg: Thanks, Clay.

Mark, you wanted to jump in earlier on some of the geopolitics of energy. Really quickly, and then I’m going to do a final lightning round.

Col. Cancian: Yeah, I just want to put this discussion about oil in Venezuela in the context that I think it’s highly likely that there will be follow-on U.S. strikes. I think the Rodríguez regime will dissemble, they’ll delay, and not follow U.S. direction. And eventually President Trump will launch this second strike. And that will create more of the uncertainty that we heard so disrupts future plans for building oil production.

Dr. Berg: Thanks very much, Mark. I just remembered a quote from General Dan Caine at the Reagan Defense Forum recently. It was about how rare and how unaccustomed Latin America watchers are to seeing military operations in the Western Hemisphere, and how we’re going to have to get accustomed to more of that in the future. Quite a prescient statement that he made at the time.

We have about three minutes left here in the panel. I want to go in the order that we started and just ask each of you for a quick closing reflection, and also to put your analyst caps on. What are you going to be looking for in the days, weeks, and even months ahead? We’ll start with you, Emily.

Ms. Harding: Sure. So, first of all, love Dan Caine. His part of the press conference was –

Dr. Berg: Makes two of us.

Ms. Harding: I mean, fabulous. He was enthusiastic about the great success, but also serious about what was ahead. And I’ve – you know, he’s doing a phenomenal job.

As far as what I’m looking at for the road ahead – now, I do not in any way pretend to be a Latin America expert. Certainly not a Venezuela expert. But having seen regime change-type things happen all over the world, what I would expect to happen next is a lot of very sharp elbows within the regime and for people to be jockeying for position. And then, as an analyst, the question that I would be asking next is the informal structures of power in the country, how are they cementing around a particular power base? We haven’t talked about the cartels much. I would love to know who they are backing, whether they would be willing to make a deal with somebody who is seeking to grab power, that maybe will tamp down our exports for a little while so that you can deliver something to the U.S. How do they factor into this?

And then Mark’s point about the second strike, I think, is a really interesting one. You know, if you’re making promises as the U.S. that, dear Venezuelans, we’re going to turn on your oil revenue, you’re going to have financial, you know, resources in a way you haven’t for a very long time, how on Earth are they going to follow through on that? And what does the domestic picture look like? So those – being fairly new to this issue, those are the questions that I would ask smart folks like you to try to answer very quickly.

Dr. Berg: Mark, what are you looking for in the days, weeks, and months ahead? Put your analyst cap on.

Col. Cancian: I’m watching the U.S. forces and their posture. Of course, we built up to a high level. We have an aircraft carrier in the area. I’m watching to see whether that level of force continues. The Ford will almost certainly go back to Norfolk. And it’s unlikely that it will be replaced. If it were replaced, that would be a huge signal. But there were a lot of other forces too that have been sent forward. I’m going to be watching to see whether some of those go home, or whether they stay in place, which would be a strong indication of possible future attacks.

Dr. Berg: Thank you very much, Mark.

Chris.

Mr. Hernandez-Roy: I’m not sure what I’m looking for. What I think I’d like to see is – or, what I would – yes, what I would like to see, rather than it might – something that might actually happen, is elections, right? The United States has chosen stability over legitimacy. But there’s a risk with that. And the risk is you essentially have a continuation of a dictatorship. It’s the same dictatorship, just with a different head. And at some point that dictatorship, if it’s working with the U.S., will have some association with the U.S. Not to say that the U.S. will have some criminality, but it would just be associated by the fact that they’re working together.

And I think that poses a grave risk to the United States’ reputation. And so I think new elections are absolutely necessary to provide a new regime – a new government in Venezuela that’s legitimate. And it’s more than likely going to be a government by the exiled opposition, which is friendly to the United States. And so with an election you would resolve the problem of legitimacy, and you would still have a pro – more than likely, a pro-U.S. government in Venezuela.

Dr. Berg: Yeah. And to use the president’s own words from the press conference, he didn’t say the word “democracy.” But he did say that he wanted to not do this in vain and give Venezuela the best chance to be great again. You can argue that the means-ends connection there is Venezuela can’t be great unless it has rule of law, democratic legitimacy, et cetera, et cetera.

I’ll give Clay the last word. As an analyst, what are you thinking about and looking at in the days, weeks, and months ahead?

Mr. Seigle: I’m looking for the ripple effects for energy security beyond Venezuela. We have to keep a close eye on Venezuela, but I cut my teeth in oil market intelligence on the trading desks here in Houston. And so I get nervous whenever the conventional wisdom is going to one side and nobody is considering the other. And what I mean by that, in this case, the conventional wisdom is that change in Venezuela means lower oil prices because there’s going to be more supply. I agree with that in the short term, and only in the context of Venezuela. But the question is, now that we have these oil market interventions, you can’t put that toothpaste back in the tube. And where else are we going to see oil supply disruptions that could add up to a big market dislocation?

Dr. Berg: Thank you all very, very much for these rich insights: Emily Harding, vice president Defense and Security Department and director of the Intelligence, National Security, and Technology Program; Mark Cancian, a senior advisor at the Defense and Security Department; Chris Hernandez-Roy, senior fellow and deputy director of the Americas Program here at CSIS; and Clay Seigle, senior fellow and James R. Schlesinger chair in energy and geopolitics, Energy Security and Climate Change Program.

That concludes our event, but continue checking CSIS’s website for up-to-date analysis on this rapidly unfolding and dramatic set of events in Venezuela. Thank you.

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