❓WHAT HAPPENED: Venezuela’s Defense Minister, Vladimir Padrino López, has announced the mobilization of an estimated 200,000 military personnel in the country as part of military exercises.
👤WHO WAS INVOLVED: Vladimir Padrino López, Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro, Venezuela’s military, pro-Maduro militias, the USS Gerald R. Ford, the U.S. Navy, and President Donald J. Trump.
📍WHEN & WHERE: The Ford entered the area of control of the Southern Command in the Atlantic on November 11, 2025, sparking Venezuela’s call-up of 200,000 military personnel.
🎯IMPACT: While President Donald J. Trump has not given an indication as to when—or if at all—he might order strikes against Maduro, there is increasing speculation that military installations in the country used by drug cartels will be targeted.
Venezuela’s Defense Minister, Vladimir Padrino López, has announced the mobilization of an estimated 200,000 military personnel in the country as part of military exercises. The move comes as the increasingly sizable U.S. naval presence near Venezuela is about to be joined by the USS Gerald R. Ford and its carrier strike group. Notably, the Ford is not just the largest aircraft carrier in the world, but the largest warship ever built.
The carrier strike group, which recently crossed the Atlantic after a tour of duty in the eastern Mediterranean during heightened tensions in the Middle East, will participate in ongoing U.S. counter-narco actions in the Caribbean. While President Donald J. Trump has not given an indication as to when—or if at all—he might order strikes against Venezuela’s dictator Nicolás Maduro, there is increasing speculation that military installations in the country used by drug cartels will be targeted.
Importantly, the Cartel de los Soles (Cartel of the Suns)—which has been directly tied to Maduro—is believed to use Venezuelan military installations as bases of operation. In conjunction with other criminal gangs, like Tren de Aragua, Soles is able to move deadly narcotics out of Venezuela and into the United States, where the drugs are sold and line the pockets of Maduro.
For months, the Trump administration has conducted military strikes against drug boats moving narcotics from mainland Venezuela into the Caribbean for eventual transport to the U.S. On Sunday, the United States carried out the 18th of such strikes, killing six aboard two boats.
Already, the U.S. Navy has positioned significant assets off the coast of Venezuela. The National Pulse reported on October 31 that satellite images show the USS Iwo Jima and her Arleigh Burke-class destroyer escort heading westward after being spotted off the coast of Grenada. This places the Iowa Jima and destroyer escort around 124 miles from Venezuela’s La Orchila Island—home to one of the country’s key airbases and radar facilities.
Image by Xavier Granja Cedeño / Cancilleria Ecuador / Ricardo Patiño.
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