Over the past two months, the U.S. military has steadily amassed large numbers of troops, naval forces, and air forces in the Caribbean, conducting training missions off the coast of Venezuela, reopening a military base in Puerto Rico that had been closed for decades, and attacking speedboats carrying suspected drug traffickers from Venezuela and Colombia.
As of Tuesday, a significant percentage of all U.S. naval assets deployed around the world were also located at U.S. Southern Command, the U.S. military headquarters responsible for operations in the region, according to fleet tracking information published by the U.S. Naval Institute’s news portal.
This includes the Iwo Jima Amphibious Ready Group and the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit, numbering more than 4,500 Marines and sailors, three missile destroyers, an attack submarine, a special operations ship, a guided missile cruiser, and a P-8 Poseidon reconnaissance aircraft.
At the same time, the United States deployed 10 F-35 fighter jets to Puerto Rico, where the U.S. military is based, as part of its increased interest in the Caribbean. The United States has also deployed at least three MQ-9 Reaper drones to the island, according to images taken by Reuters in Aguadilla, Puerto Rico.
Roosevelt Roads Naval Base in Puerto Rico, a U.S. military facility that has been closed since 2004, is now back up and running, according to satellite images and photos taken at the base. At least one AC-130J Ghostrider, a heavily armed aircraft capable of providing air support to ground forces, was photographed equipped with Hellfire missiles at Puerto Rico’s Jose Aponte de la Torre Airport, which the facility uses. Another image taken by a local photographer appears to show another Ghost Rider at the same facility. The airport has been a staging area for U.S. military operations in the region for the past several months.
After reviewing open source flight data, CNN identified more than 200 military flights in the Caribbean during the two-month period from August 15th to October 15th. The mission was carried out by 83 separate aircraft, including intelligence gathering aircraft and tanker aircraft used to refuel jets mid-air.
Some intelligence-gathering assets may also have been diverted from surveillance operations in Eastern Europe to the Caribbean, according to flight data. Since August 22, three Boeing P-8 Poseidon aircraft used for signals intelligence gathering have crossed the Atlantic Ocean and entered the Caribbean theater.
In early October, the Little Bird light attack helicopter first identified by the Washington Post and the MH-60M Blackhawk helicopter were also seen conducting training operations off the coast of Trinidad and Tobago. The Little Bird is a highly specialized helicopter typically used by U.S. Special Forces for covert missions.
This huge accumulation raises questions about the Trump administration’s intentions in the region. The administration has repeatedly said the military presence is part of its efforts to combat drug trafficking, but President Donald Trump is also considering attacks inside Venezuela as part of a broader strategy aimed at weakening leader Nicolás Maduro, CNN reported.
Experts generally agree that the United States does not currently have sufficient assets or troops to launch an invasion to seize Venezuela itself.
Elliott Abrams, who served as the U.S. minister to Venezuela during the Trump administration’s first term, told CNN on Thursday that “the military presence in the Caribbean is too large to attack a few speedboats, but not large enough to invade Venezuela.” “I think somewhere in the middle is a pressure campaign aimed at unsettling Venezuela.”
The United States now has the ability to attack Venezuela from a distance. President Trump could, for example, order Tomahawk missile strikes against guided missile destroyers, cruisers, and submarines stationed in the Caribbean.
“It’s enough to cause pain, but not enough to take control of the terrain,” Peter Singer, a strategist and senior fellow at New America, which focuses on defense issues, told CNN about the military buildup. “We’re not talking about an invasion and an occupying force,” Singer said.
Although Venezuela is not a military power, it is a large country with difficult and varied terrain. Hurricane season is not over yet, and the United States has not fought a tropical war in two generations, said a former U.S. official with deep experience in the region. And at this point, the U.S. does not control the airspace over Venezuela, the former official noted. Venezuela has S-300 anti-aircraft missile systems, anti-aircraft guns, shoulder-fired air defense systems, and F-16 fighter jets.
Like Abrams, Singer said he believed it was “important at this point to send a signal and put pressure on Venezuela.”
To that end, the United States on Wednesday flew a B-52 bomber for four hours near the Venezuelan coast in what appeared to be a show of force. At its closest point, the bomber was 78 miles from Los Roques, a small Venezuelan island archipelago with a few thousand inhabitants.
The bomber remained in part of Venezuela’s International Flight Information Area (FIR), which is controlled by the country’s aviation authorities. Venezuela’s FIR extends far beyond its airspace.
The U.S. military has conducted several training missions in recent weeks, including live-fire training and flight operations near Venezuela, and has conducted at least five flights of T-38 jets used for pilot training in the Caribbean since Sept. 22, according to open-source flight data.
CNN’s Katie Bo Lillis, Thomas Bordeaux, Isa Cardona and Isa Soares contributed reporting.
How was this article reported?
CNN identified more than 200 US military flights in the Caribbean over a two-month period from August 15 to October 15, analyzing data primarily from non-standard signal types. Raw data was archived from thebaldgeek’s airframes.io dashboard, ADS-B Exchange, and FlightRadar24. Additional flight data was shared by LatAmMilMovements. Approximately 48% of the aircraft positions reviewed were MLAT (multilateration) data. This means that some geographic data points are recorded less frequently than other types of signals. Additional ADS-C data was reviewed, but this does not appear on the standard flight tracking dashboard and similarly has a greater margin of error than standard ADS-B flight data.
