The successful execution of Operation Absolute Resolve reflected a rare fusion of military precision and covert intelligence planning. U.S. forces reportedly used over 150 aircraft, including stealth helicopters and support bombers, and executed the raid under cover of darkness to minimize resistance. The assault was preceded by extensive surveillance and rehearsals on a full-scale replica of Maduro’s compound and was supported by cyber operations intended to paralyze Venezuela’s defenses. After brief firefights, Maduro and his wife were subdued at their Caracas residence, relocated first to a U.S. warship, and then flown to New York to face U.S. criminal charges. Subsequent reporting indicates that the operation also relied on months of political and intelligence preparation, including quiet engagement with opposition figures and contingency planning for elite defections, underscoring that this was not a spontaneous strike but a carefully sequenced decapitation operation.
Security Rationales: Narco-Terrorism, Illicit Networks, and U.S. Threat Perception
The legal and strategic justification offered by Washington centers on a national security narrative that frames Maduro as a nexus of narco-terrorism and transnational crime. U.S. officials and lawmakers emphasized that Maduro had been indicted in U.S. courts not only for narco-terrorism conspiracy but also for conspiracy to distribute and import cocaine into the United States, as well as possession and use of machine guns and destructive devices in furtherance of drug-trafficking operations, portraying his leadership as that of an armed criminal enterprise rather than a legitimate government. US Attorney General Pam Bondi has repeatedly stressed that these charges treat Maduro as a criminal defendant operating under the cover of state authority, thereby framing his capture as a law-enforcement and national-security action rather than a conventional act of war.
This securitized framing is embedded in the 2025 U.S. National Security Strategy, which elevates the Western Hemisphere as a core strategic arena, connects cartel activity to homeland security, and asserts a “Trump Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine that sanctions coercive measures against narco-terrorist networks when necessary. This language reflects a clear revival of Monroe Doctrine–style thinking, recasting hemispheric security as a domain of heightened U.S. responsibility rather than one managed primarily through multilateral mechanisms.
That narrative, however, is contested on multiple fronts. Critics argue that drug trafficking, serious as it is, does not constitute the kind of armed attack necessary to lawfully trigger international self-defense under Article 51 of the UN Charter. The UN Secretary-General and legal experts described the action as a dangerous precedent and a clear violation of Venezuelan sovereignty, noting that narcotics deaths and trafficking alone do not rise to the threshold of an armed attack justifying cross-border military force. More broadly, the episode highlights an enduring tension between power-based enforcement approaches and rule-based international order, a dynamic increasingly visible in contemporary great-power competition. Much of the U.S. reasoning thus reflects a blending of criminal law logic with a securitized interpretation of national interest that stretches traditional boundaries of justifiable force.
Beyond Narco-Security: Strategic, Economic, and Power-Projection Motives
The Trump administration’s decision must also be understood within a broader strategic context that extends beyond the narco-terrorism justification. First, the capture of a head of state underscores an assertion of American primacy in the Western Hemisphere, a signal not only to regional governments but also to extra-regional powers like China and Russia that Washington remains prepared to use force to shape outcomes close to its borders. The operation aligns with a wider shift toward explicit spheres-of-influence thinking, in which major powers act decisively within regions they define as strategically vital. This This action also shattered a long-standing assumption in Latin America that direct U.S. military intervention against sitting leaders had become politically unthinkable in the post–Cold War era.
Second, energy and economic leverage appear increasingly intertwined with the operation’s political messaging. President Trump publicly asserted that the United States would temporarily run Venezuela and “fix” its oil industry, promising contracts to U.S. oil companies and asserting a stronger U.S. role in oil production and export. This rhetoric coincides with reporting highlighting the severe decay of Venezuela’s oil infrastructure, once the world’s largest proven reserves, which has suffered from years of underinvestment, sanctions, corruption, and mismanagement. At the same time, longer-term assessments suggest that the success of external engagement in Venezuela will depend less on oil output alone than on institutional recovery, governance reform, and political legitimacy. The implication is that regime disruption could be paired with economic restructuring under U.S. and allied oversight, further blurring the line between security intervention and economic statecraft.
Third, domestic political incentives likely shape the administration’s posture. Senior U.S. officials, including Senator Marco Rubio, have since laid out explicit conditions for engaging with Venezuela’s post-Maduro leadership, including commitments to market reforms, energy-sector restructuring, and cooperation on migration and security, suggesting that the intervention is already being leveraged to extract political and economic concessions. Portraying the U.S. as decisively combating narco-terrorism, restoring regional order, and protecting American communities from drug-related harms cultivates a “peace through strength” narrative that resonates with core constituencies even as it raises critical legal and ethical questions.
Comparative Context: U.S. Interventions and the Case of Noriega in Panama
Historically, the United States has intervened militarily in Latin America when strategic interests were deemed existential or central to U.S. security. The most salient precedent is the 1989 invasion of Panama (Operation Just Cause), in which U.S. forces arrested General Manuel Noriega, a former CIA asset, following drug-trafficking indictments. Though Noriega argued that his forcible removal violated national sovereignty and international law, U.S. courts rejected this claim and proceeded with prosecution. Unlike Panama, however, the Venezuela operation was executed without large troop deployments or long occupations. Instead, it was a highly targeted raid with a limited footprint but profound political symbolism.
Nonetheless, there are deeper continuities: both operations were justified using criminal indictments, both involved direct assaults on sovereign leadership, and both provoked regional condemnation as violations of the UN Charter’s prohibition on the use of force against territorial integrity. What distinguishes Venezuela is its geopolitical scale (a major oil producer and a key South American state), the absence of formal congressional authorization, and the immediate linkage between leadership capture and conditional U.S. oversight of political and economic transition, articulated openly by U.S. leaders.
Legal and Normative Implications: International Law Under Strain
The legal critique of the operation is intense and multifaceted. Most international law experts argue that the U.S. action contravenes Article 2(4) of the UN Charter, which prohibits the use of force against another state’s territorial integrity, and that the invocation of drug trafficking as a security threat does not meet the established criteria for lawful self-defense. The UN Secretary-General has explicitly described the action as a dangerous precedent that undermines the rules-based international order. The case has come to exemplify a broader debate over whether international law meaningfully constrains major powers or primarily serves as a normative reference point for less powerful states.
At the same time, U.S. domestic law. including expansive interpretations of executive authority under Article II and the War Powers Resolution, provides the administration with space it interprets as sufficient to act without prior congressional authorization, particularly when framed as a national-security and law-enforcement hybrid operation. This tension between domestic authority and international illegitimacy is central to understanding the debates surrounding the legality of the operation.
Global Signaling: Iran, Alliance Politics, and Geostrategic Implications
The capture of Maduro sends a complex signal to other countries, including Iran, and to alliance systems worldwide. For Tehran, the episode underscores an American willingness to employ rapid, targeted force against leadership it perceives as hostile or threatening to U.S. interests, even if framed under crime and security narratives. However, the operational feasibility of a comparable intervention in Iran is extremely low due to the vast differences in geography, defensive capabilities, and escalation risks. Unlike Venezuela, Iran possesses layered air defenses, proxy networks across multiple states, and strategic depth that could rapidly transform any such action into a regional war.
Greenland presents a radically different case. As an autonomous territory within the Kingdom of Denmark and a NATO ally, Greenland is embedded in alliance politics and legal frameworks that make unilateral military operations by the U.S. not only unnecessary but politically and legally unimaginable. The broader principle here is that the “precedent” does not consist of a technical template for invading every country. Rather, it lies in the perception that thresholds for decisive action are increasingly shaped by power, geography, and strategic importance, a development that other major powers may interpret through their own regional lenses.
A New Paradigm or an Exception with Consequences?
Operation Absolute Resolve signifies a critical inflection point in U.S. foreign policy and global norms regarding the use of force. It reflects a shift toward a more aggressive, security-centered posture in the Western Hemisphere, one that blends narco-security narratives with strategic assertions of primacy and economic leverage. It also highlights the eroding boundary between law enforcement and military action in contemporary statecraft.
While the operation achieved its immediate objective, the capture of Nicolás Maduro, its broader consequences are uncertain and potentially destabilizing. The legality of the raid remains contested, regional trust has been eroded, and the precedent set by the forcible apprehension of a foreign leader under flexible security rationales challenges long-standing norms that have governed international relations since the mid-20th century.
