Venezuela MOBILIZES ARMY **against** Trump

See the advanced weaponry the US is

deploying to the Caribbean. Oh snap.

Yep. Here's Trin Trinidad. Uh you've got

Venezuela, Venezuelan flight monitoring

area. Ooh, a lot of uh uh equipment

outside of Puerto Rico. Special

operations vessels, destroyers,

cruisers, landing helicopter docks,

ospreys. Oh, these are sick. When I did

flight training, I'd see these land next

to it around me. They're so cool. Uh

some a subscriber flew one over my house

and I'm like, "Oh, that'll make you

shake in your boots. That was awesome."

Anyway, Reaper drones, Globe Master 3s,

Poseidons, F-35s.

These are awesome. Even just the

outlines of them, this is this is pretty

big. We are moving equipment

over to Maduro. US troops deployed in

the Caribbean versus the estimated

requirements for a Venezuelan ground

invasion. We're not going to stop

fear-mongering the Wall Street Journal.

We're not going to ground invade

Venezuela. This is ridiculous. Like, I

don't know about you, but this is the

kind of stuff that always makes me a

little nervous when I see stuff like

this. Venezuela mobilizes troops and

militias as US military looms offshore.

US military with Blackhawks is doing

quite a bit of training in the

Caribbean, uh, you know, sort of like

off the coast of Trinidad and otherwise.

in part because Donald Trump has

suggested he authorized the CIA to

conduct ground strikes inside of

Venezuela. He obviously refused to say

whether or not he would authorize any

kind of strikes on Maduro, whom he

thinks is illegitimate. Uh but you know,

Trump's argument is, hey, we're going

after the drug cartels because they're

bringing you drugs into America, whether

it's fentanyl or otherwise, and they're

killing Americans. And so now you've got

Blackhawks doing training missions off

the coast essentially of Venezuela, you

know, off the coast of Trinidad as well.

Uh, and so now Venezuela is escalating

apparently by moving troops into

position on the Caribbean coast and

mobilizing what Maduro is asserting is a

strong is is a millions strong militia

in a display of defiance against the

American buildup in the Caribbean, the

largest since the 1980s. I mean, this is

part of Donald Trump's peace through

strength plan. And you have to give them

credit for what's going on with with

Hamas. Now, of course, you've got

splinter cells of Hamas because they

don't have unified leadership doing

stupid things. They're they're a dumb

terrorist group. But understand that

Donald Trump's strikes on Iran were so

ballsy that they did shake the boots of

Iran. Now, I I have to say I was

questioning. I'm like, okay, how much

did we actually shake the boots of Iran?

We didn't hit Pickax Mountain. You know,

construction is continuing at Pickax

Mountain. There are reasons to believe

that Iran moved their highlyenriched

uranium and that they can rebuild. But

the fact that Iran didn't support Hamas

in this peace deal in in rejecting the

peace deal suggests that Iran has been

humbled. So, Donald Trump's strategy

here worked for now. Now, is Iran

potentially going to rebuild? I don't

know. How many more nuclear scientists

do they have left? Israel took out quite

a lot of them and coordinated attacks

using US weapons. Remember, we can send

weapons up into the sky that float

around and circle and they all strike

us. It's insane the weaponry he has.

Absolutely insane. This is why Putin's

shaking over the idea of tomahawks going

to Ukraine and Zilinski's like, "Give me

my tomahawks. I'm coming to pick up my

I'm coming to Door Dash my tomahawks."

And that's why Putin had to give Trump

another history lesson yesterday for two

hours on the phone. But anyway, this is

this is Donald Trump's MMO. The

strongman regime has cracked up its

propaganda machine on state television.

Announcers are telling Venezuelans that

the US is a Nazilike state and wants to

dig its claws into the country's oil

wealth. Aha. But the Venezuelan but that

the Venezuelan military are positioning

to repel any invasion. And it's unlikely

that there would be any kind of like

larger invasion from the United States.

Typically what happens with with with

these Blackhawk training missions is

that usually you're delivering Delta

Force or Spec Ops forces, Navy Seals or

otherwise or even CIA assets uh and and

you're dropping assets into the country

whether through stealth or or otherwise.

Uh and so there's really no expectation

that the United States is like going to

go to war with Venezuela here. This this

is you know really just I mean as the

Wall Street Journal here puts it,

propaganda by by the Venezuelan media.

Uh but it is true that you know Donald

Trump is going very aggressive

and after uh whether these the drug

facilities, drug making facilities, the

distribution networks inside of

Venezuela. At the same time, it's

convenient because he doesn't love the

leader. So what you really do is you

undermine the leader credibility. So on

one hand, you're fighting the drug war.

On the other hand, you're also

undermining the leader's credibility and

you're hoping hoping that people

potentially either overthrow the leader

or vote for a new leader or otherwise

whatever. Okay. Venezuelan armed forces,

which military experts say on paper is

125,000 soldiers, are shown marching in

formation with troops mounting armored

vehicles and boxes of munitions. The

country's Russian-made fighter jets are

featured in footage uh shooting across

the sky. Ooh, people are ready for

combat, ready for battle. It's I don't

think this is really going to go

anywhere, but anyway, uh the US has

moved advanced weaponry into the

Caribbean, uh including eight Navy

warships, attacked submarines, F-35s,

uh Poseidon spy planes, Reaper drones.

Dude, I see these spy planes all the

damn time by the airports, and they

don't turn their transponders on. It

pisses me off so much. Turn your

freaking transponder on when you're in

American soil or over it. Anyway, uh I

know that's not the motus operandi of of

the military and people Kevin, they

shouldn't be seen by enemies. You're not

an enemy when you're over Camaro,

California.

The Pentagon has deployed to lead

special forces operations, including the

Army's 160th Spec Ops Aviation Regiment

called Nightstalkers. Oo, that's hot. Uh

the unit flies missions for commandos

such as the Green Base, Navy Seals,

Delta Force, famous for their

involvement in the raid that killed

Osama bin Laden. Large troop carrying

and attack helicopters are part of the

mix. Damn. The Pentagon also dispatched

bombers. Oh, the B-52. Donald Trump is

obsessed with the bombers. The B-52s.

Absolutely obsessed with them. So far,

the US has carried out at least five

strikes on drug boats, killing 27 and

unusual display of American force

against narot trafficking,

naroterrorism. Some American lawmakers

say these are extrajudicial

executions.

Like what the problem that you have is

people are claiming the Trump

administration does not have any

evidence to say that these were actual

drug traffickers. Uh and so you're

really relying on US intelligence to say

that they are. Now I happen to have a

little bit of a US bias here where I'm

going to make the argument that the CIA

uh and you know our Coast Guard probably

have enough credible evidence to where

I'm not like shaking my boots over

extrajudicial executions. They're

probably right, you know, like, you

know, do we have a two-year court case

to prove it? No. But this is uh, you

know, that's the military and Donald

Trump is licensing them basically to do

what they need to do to get uh their job

done. So, good for the military, you

know, great time for the military

because they can actually get their uh

get done what they what they want to do.

And and ultimately, the goal is to keep

Americans safe, to keep drugs out of

America. and the uh the lower the supply

of drugs, the higher the cost of drugs

and hopefully fewer people are using

them. Of course, then you have, you

know, stupid areas like San Francisco

that almost like encourage this. It's

just sad. But San Francisco's actually

started to get a little bad better parts

of it like you actually go towards the

peers and some of the nicer areas m it's

getting a lot better. Uh so so there's

there's improvement coming. It's almost

like it's coming out of recession. Just

a Reuters update here. Two alleged narot

terrorists were killed and two survived

a drone strike yesterday on a cartel

drug trafficking submersible

semi-submersible off the coast of

Venezuela. The survivors were rescued

last night by the US Navy and

transferred to a Navy vessel. Oh well,

we got two of them now. Apparently

captured. Look at that. Venezuela's

hardly ready for any American action.

The economy is in freefall, predicted to

contract 3% with inflation to hit 682%.

This is very very bad, mind you. When

when you have uh such levels of

inflation, you would rather just go buy

bread at the local grocery store the

moment you get your paycheck because you

don't trust the currency like anything

but this. Uh and and again, I don't

think there's going to be any kind of

actual standoff between the Venezuelan

military. Uh, I I think there's a very

clear, hey, we're going to not respect

your territory here, and we're going to

go in and kill who we need to to fight

the war on drugs. And unfortunately for

you, Venezuela, that's also going to

undermine your Venezuelan credibility.

That's why Maduro Maduro is

wararmongering here going we're ready to

fight because he has to to maintain any

kind of personal credibility otherwise

you know people aren't going to like

have any I mean they probably already

don't have any faith but anyway uh

that's that's important to know. Uh so

so we'll see. You know I I know some

people are worried like hey like you

know these things like you need a jury

to execute people or whatever. But this

is more than that. The way the Trump

administration is branding this is as

naroterrorism. So like if Hamas is

pointing a gun, for example, at uh you

know, US soldiers, they're going to get

shot. They're going to die. There's no

jury involved. It's straight up law

enforcement. And so that's the faith you

have to have in the US military

operations that they're not going and

killing innocent people, that they are

actually killing people that they have

somehow verified are bad or terrorists

to some extent. That's the argument.

Now, of course, people are going to have

two sides uh on that, but uh other

people in the chat are saying short

fishermen. Yeah, fishing will probably

fall because I think you're you're going

to create a cloud of fear over there. Uh

but anyway, we'll we'll see. So, um

we'll see. That's uh that's what's going

on in Venezuela and what's going on with

the geopolitics.

So, keep a keep an eye on it, but I I

don't expect too much uh too much more

drama out of it. I do expect strikes

deep within Venezuela. I don't know that

I would expect an overthrow of the

government because then you do also risk

a power vacuum. You know, when you when

you take out Maduro, for example, you

you're going to have a power vacuum. You

would have to install a puppet and and

puppet regimes usually don't last. So, I

think the complexities of overthrowing

the government versus just undermining

the government uh don't lead to a

desirable reason to overthrow Maduro. I

think you're better you're better off

having that knucklehead with a crap

economy and then taking out the drug

lords than uh than than you know getting

into some kind of prolonged conflict

trying to reform government and and you

know democracy build. Yeah. See this is

not about replacing the regime. It's

that psychological warfare. I totally

agree with this. There are two

remarkable parts of what President Trump

told reporters in the Oval Office. What

he said and what he didn't say. The

president confirmed a New York Times

scoop published a few hours earlier that

the president had authorized the CIA to

conduct co covert action inside the

country as part of a campaign against

Maduro, the authoritarian leader who

clings to power. That was a remarkable

statement because president don't

presidents typically don't acknowledge

directives that allow spies to

accomplish a secret mission. The whole

idea is having a CIA that is allowed uh

to operate in the shadows and conduct

deniable operations, right? The CIA's

got their hands on so much stuff and

then we're like, "Oh, we don't know

anything about it." Oh, yeah. Yeah. Here

they're used by almost all presidents

since World War II and it's something

along the lines of, "I don't know what

you're talking about, but if I did, I

couldn't comment."

But in this case, commenting may have

been the point. Privately, the Trump

administration has said they want to

drive Maduro for Maduro from power. In

context, warships massing off the

Caribbean coast uh and bombing narot

terrorists are psychological warfare.

Trump hopes to scare Maduro into exile.

Trump added pressure on Wednesday when

he said the next step might be a land

attack. Ah, it's just a game.

Which takes us to the second point. What

Trump has never talked about and he has

declined to explain. What interests are

being served here? How is this America

first? Stopping the flow of cocaine.

Well, that makes sense. But in the case

uh the Navy is on the wrong but in that

case the Navy is on the wrong coast if

it's cocaine. I think he's been pitching

fentanyl. But let's see if they probably

address that too. Drugs headed to the

United States largely come from the

Pacific coast not the Caribbean where

the naval buildup is happening. Access

to oil. That's what Maduro's government

claims. But there are ways of

negotiating over oil short of military

or covert action. All right. Fine.

Reviving democracy. Maybe, but that

doesn't seem to be a big push for Trump.

Uh, interventions passed. Okay. So,

which leaves regime change and all but

certain explanation. Exactly. But you

could accomplish that regime change by

slowly

picking away at the credibility of the

Maduro regime rather than having to, you

know, actually like take him out or uh

go from, you know, go into some kind of

allout invasion, which we don't see

that. The problem for Trump is that his

pretext for action keep failing, falling

apart. Intelligence agencies have

already shot the idea down that the

Maduro government is sending criminals

to the United States to sabot sabotage

them. The analysts were either shut down

or fired. Drugs are an issue, but

Venezuela is not a source of fentanyl,

the most damaging narco import. Its

ingredients come from China and are

brewed in Mexico. And Trump does not

advocate regime change in those nations.

Really good point. It might be helpful

to the president and his aids to

remember that a former Times reporter uh

in in a book called The Mission reminds

readers of what happens when regime

change operations go wrong. Think Iran,

Guatemala, and the violent overthrow uh

in South Vietnam. This is why I'm saying

you don't really want to have, you know,

to replace the leadership because then

you have a vacuum and that's bad because

you get something worse. What you really

want is a weak government. And I think

that's what Trump is doing. He's trying

to weaken him, to make him look uh weak

uh and and to make people doubt Maduro

and to make people inside Venezuela go,

"We like what Trump is doing. We don't

want Maduro. That's what's happening

here. This is a game." Now, I agree. Why

not advertise these things that you told

us here? I feel like nobody else knows

about this.

>> We'll we'll try a little advertising and

see how it goes.

>> Congratulations, man. You have done so

much. People love you. People look up to

you. Kevin Praath there, financial

analyst and YouTuber, Meet Kevin. Always

great to get your take.