The United States Armed Forces expanded on Saturday (30) their presence in the Caribbean by moving the USS Lake Erie missile cruiser through the Panama Canal, according to Reuters. The crossing was informed by international journalists who accompanied the movement of the vessel, which was anchored in the port of Rodman, on the Pacific side.
The movement is part of President Donald Trump’s government strategy to intensify the pressure on the regime of dictator Nicolás Maduro, accused by Washington of leading the Los Soles cartel and being associated with other criminal groups involved with drug trafficking in Latin America.
The ship, equipped with an advanced defense system, is part of an American fleet that already has thousands of military and several large vessels in the region. There are 7 to 8 war ships (including missile -equipped destroyers, a amphibious ship and a nuclear submarine), totaling 4,500 military personnel in the region. According to the Southern Command of the US, it is one of the highest US naval concentrations in the Caribbean since the 1990s.
Washington justifies the operation as part of the war against drug cartels, but also put Maduro in the center of the aim: the week before, the US Department of Justice announced the increase in the reward for capturing the Venezuelan dictator from $ 25 million to $ 50 million. Maduro had already been indicted by the American court in 2020 for “narcoterrorism.”
In response, Venezuela classified the operation as a “direct threat to the sovereignty of the country” and announced the mobilization of civil militias and military forces, which, according to Maduro, total more than 4 million members. The country also announced the strengthening of troops in strategic areas, including the Colombian border. However, independent analysts estimate that only one fraction is effectively active.
