Facessa oli tÀmmönen.
Sori jos on ollu jo tÀÀllÀ.
Rachel Hurleyn seinÀllÀ. NÀytti olevan paljon muutakin.
Something about Venezuela is not sitting right with me.
This is a long one.
And take this all with a grain of salt, because who the hell am I? I could be overthinking this whole thing.
Hereâs what can be backed up by reporting:
14 days before the U.S. captured NicolĂĄs Maduro, Russia evacuated the families of its diplomats from Venezuela. December 20th. Wives and kids. Quiet, organized, done.
Then on January 3rd, Delta Force drops in, grabs Maduro and his wife, and itâs over in under thirty minutes.
That doesnât seem like a coincidence.
Russia publicly condemned the whole thing - called it armed aggression, demanded a UN Security Council meeting, the whole performative outrage routine. But you donât evacuate your people two weeks in advance unless you know somethingâs coming. And if you know somethingâs coming, someone told you.
Hereâs where it gets weirder.
Cuba - Venezuelaâs other major ally - didnât evacuate anybody. Cuban doctors are still there, confined to their quarters, families back in Havana losing their minds because nobody warned them this was happening. China? Same thing. No evacuation, just reactive condemnation after the fact.
So Russia knew. Cuba and China didnât. Or at least they didnât foresee any consequences from a US intervention - because sure;y they knew that Russians were leaving.
Now letâs talk about how the operation actually went down.
Venezuela spent two billion dollars on Russian S-300 air defense systems - the kind that are supposed to turn the Caribbean into a no-fly zone for the U.S. military. On paper, these things track 24 targets simultaneously, knock cruise missiles out of the sky at 250 kilometers. Caracas should have been a fortress.
The U.S. neutralized all of it in under twenty minutes.
Either American military tech is so vastly superior that we can casually dismantle a Russian-backed air defense network before anyone even knows weâre there, or those systems were ordered not to fire. Maybe both. But the speed of it - the totality of it - thatâs what doesnât add up.
And if we can do this - why is the Ukrainian war with Russia still happening?
Anyway - one helicopter took minor damage. Thatâs it. No U.S. casualties. No significant Venezuelan casualties that anyoneâs bothered to specify. Vice President Delcy RodrĂguez went on TV and said âinnocent people diedâ but never gave numbers, never gave details, and hasnât brought it up again.
For a surprise military raid on a hostile capital city, thatâs remarkably clean.
And then thereâs Maduro himself.
He and his wife both surrendered. Not fought to the death, not tried to escape, not holed up for a siege. Surrendered. The FBI Hostage Rescue Team was part of the extraction force - not just Delta, but FBI HRT, the guys who specialize in cooperative extractions. You bring HRT when youâre expecting the target to come willingly.
The whole transport route screams pre-arrangement.
Maduro goes from his compound to the USS Iwo Jima, then Guantanamo, then a nice clean flight to New York where a 25-page indictment is ready to unseal the same day he lands.
That indictment was prepared. The grand jury had already done its work. Jay Claytonâs signature was on it before Maduro ever got on that helicopter.
They knew exactly when heâd be in custody.
Hereâs what I think happened - and again, Iâm speculating here, but the pieces fit.
Maduro was cornered. His economy collapsed. He lost the 2024 election and the international community recognized his opponent. His former intelligence chief, Hugo Carvajal, pled guilty back in June and started cooperating. That guy would have known everything - security details, schedules, which officers were loyal, which ones would fold. Maduroâs wife was indicted. His son was indicted. He was facing life in prison if the U.S. ever got him.
I actually watched a video of a recent interview that Maduro did where he said that he was ready to work with the US - he was just waiting for them to call.
So what if he made a deal?
What if Maduro, through back channels, offered to surrender in exchange for a reduced sentence? Maybe witness protection, maybe unfrozen assets, maybe immunity for his kid. The U.S. gets him in custody, gets control of Venezuelan oil, gets a clean regime change without a prolonged war.
Russia gets advance warning, pulls their people out, avoids an international incident. And everybody gets to maintain their public positions for domestic audiences.
Maduro looks like a victim - kidnapped by imperial aggression, not a guy who cut a deal to save his own ass. The U.S. looks strong - tough on dictators, military dominance, America first. Russia looks outraged - standing up to American hegemony. And Venezuelaâs power structure stays mostly intact because Trumpâs not working with the democratic opposition, heâs working with Maduroâs own vice president.
That last part is what really cinches it for me.
MarĂa Corina Machado won the Nobel Peace Prize. She won the opposition primary. Her guy, Edmundo GonzĂĄlez, won the actual presidential election by a two-to-one margin and got international recognition as Venezuelaâs legitimate leader.
Seventy percent of Venezuelans support the opposition.
Trump dismissed her. Called her a nice woman who doesnât have support or respect in the country. Then said the U.S. would work with Delcy RodrĂguez - Maduroâs second-in-command, who is also under U.S. sanctions, who was appointed acting president by Venezuelaâs Supreme Court literally while Maduro was being transported to New York.
Why would you capture a dictator on narco-terrorism charges and then immediately partner with his deputy whoâs part of the same regime?
Unless she was part of the arrangement.
Look, I get it. This sounds like conspiracy theory territory.
Maybe the U.S. military is just that good. Maybe we walked into Caracas, deleted their air defenses, grabbed their president, and walked out without breaking a sweat purely through overwhelming technological superiority and brilliant tactical execution. Maybe Russiaâs evacuation two weeks prior was just really good intelligence gathering and risk management.
Maybe all the weird coincidences - the immediate indictment, the cooperative surrender, the FBI involvement, the decision to work with the existing regime - maybe thatâs all just efficient planning.
But 14 days?
Russia evacuated 14 days before the operation. Thatâs not a coincidence. Thatâs not good intelligence. Thatâs advance notice.
And if Russia knew, someone told them. And if someone told them, this wasnât a surprise raid.
The real question is what everybody got out of the deal.
Maduro probably gets a reduced sentence if he cooperates, maybe stays alive instead of getting killed by his own people or spending the rest of his life in supermax. The U.S. gets Venezuelan oil back online - Trump literally said American companies will âspend billions of dollarsâ fixing the infrastructure and âstart making money for the country.â
Russia cuts its losses on a failed investment in Venezuela, maybe gets some Ukraine concessions we donât know about yet. And Venezuelaâs regime structure stays in place with a new face at the top whoâs already signaled sheâll play ball.
Everyone wins. Except the Venezuelan people, obviously. And the pro-democracy movement that actually won the election.
But when has that ever mattered when oil and geopolitics are on the table?
Weâll know more Monday when Maduro shows up for his arraignment. If he pleads guilty immediately, if he takes a cooperation deal, if this whole thing resolves quickly and quietly - thatâs your confirmation. You donât get that kind of efficiency in the U.S. criminal justice system unless the defendantâs already made a deal before he walked in the door.
Like I said. Maybe Iâm overthinking it.
But if youâre not convinced - think about this - how massively bad would it have been for Trump if even one person died on this mission? If they had made a single mistake?
Thatâs a fucking crazy chance to take if you donât already have the odds stacked in your favor.
#ratcclips
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