Donald Trump’s telling of a very large attack against Venezuela and claims that the U.S. will now be running the South American country are at odds with the limited and precise “apprehension mission” in the pre-dawn hours of Saturday as detailed by Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Dan Caine meant to assist the Department of Justice in arresting Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores on narcoterrorism charges filed in Manhattan federal court.

Caine, a career Air Force officer, is probably more reliable than the notorious liar and exaggerator Trump.

Trump said it was“It was an assault like people have not seen since World War II,” which saw the movements of millions of troops in a global conflict, while Caine said the Defense Department flew in undetected, landed helicopters, seized the Maduros (who surrendered to the FBI) and departed with the prisoners, who were brought to New York. The total time from arrival in Caracas to being back out of the country over international waters was less than two hours.

As described by Caine, reading carefully from a bright blue binder, Operation Absolute Resolve was not an invasion or an act of war or a regime change, where congressional involvement is required, but helping in an arrest of a wanted foreign fugitive, with a $50 million reward on his head.

Maduro, who oversaw crooked elections in 2018 and 2024, which he lost, had lost any legitimate claim on being president, but held power nonetheless. He has been indicted since 2020 and additional charges were unsealed yesterday by Manhattan U.S. Attorney Jay Clayton for running a drug cartel.

Maduro should have taken the easy way out and packed some trunks with gold and cash and headed for a villa in Switzerland or some other comfy exile and retirement. Instead, he was bundled off in the middle of the night to the USS Iwo Jima steaming offshore in the Caribbean and then a flight to Stewart Air National Guard Base in the Hudson Valley on his way to a New York jail cell to await his trial. He will need some warmer clothes for our frigid weather.

Maduro had many chances to depart peacefully and avoid prison, including in direct phone calls with Trump in recent weeks. But the dictator thought he could avoid a U.S. courtroom. He thought wrong.

As to who is in charge in Caracas, Maduro’s vice president, Delcy Rodríguez, might be even though Trump says that U.S. will be running the country during the “transition,” despite there apparently not being any American troops remaining in Venezuela after the arrest of Mr. and Mrs. Maduro.

In his press conference from Mar-a-Lago on Saturday, Trump was dismissive of opposition leader and Nobel Peace Laureate Maria Corina Machado, who has been hiding from the Maduro forces.

So maybe all that’s changed is the location of the Maduros, who tried to enter a reinforced safe room with a heavy steel door, but were captured.

If Caine is correct, that this was a quick in-and-out to arrest two fugitives, then Trump has done a service in the name of justice, but if Venezuela is now thrown into anarchy or if U.S. troops will be needed to maintain order, than it’s the kind of foreign entablement that Trump has long railed against.

Trump’s Washington doesn’t need to run Venezuela, it can’t even run the United States very well.

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