Overview

• U.S. officials say three Aegis guided‑missile destroyers are operating off Venezuela for counternarcotics operations targeting Latin American cartels.
• The Justice Department accuses Nicolás Maduro of leading the Cartel de los Soles, has designated it a terrorist group, seized hundreds of millions in assets, and doubled the reward for information leading to his arrest to $50 million.
• Maduro calls the deployment an illegal regime‑change attempt, announces a nationwide militia mobilization, and thousands of Venezuelans queued in Caracas to volunteer over the weekend.
• His claim of 4.5 million militia members contrasts with an independent 2020 estimate of about 343,000 from the International Institute for Strategic Studies.
• China and the ALBA bloc publicly condemned U.S. actions as violations of sovereignty, while separate reporting points to additional U.S. naval and Marine elements and alleged NORTHCOM target‑package planning that has raised concerns about wider escalation.