The Ilyushin Il-76, operated by the Russian government-affiliated airline Aviacon Zitotrans, made several stops on its way to Cuba, including in the Dominican Republic, Mauritania, and Algeria, after departing from St. Petersburg by way of Sochi, Russia, in late January. It landed at the San Antonio de los Baños Air Base in Cuba, about 50 kilometers south of Havana, on Sunday evening local time.

The same aircraft, registered RA-78765, flew to Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Cuba in late October 2025 amid brewing tensions between Caracas and Washington. After the U.S. military intervention in Venezuela on Jan. 3, Cuba has increasingly found itself in the crosshairs of U.S. President Donald Trump. The pressure intensified on Jan. 29, when Trump issued an executive order declaring Cuba a “national emergency” and imposing tariffs on any country supplying Cuba with oil unless Havana aligns with U.S. national security and foreign policy.

An Il-76 can transport up to 50 tons of cargo or up to 200 people. Aircraft of this type are known to have delivered small arms, military supplies and even mercenaries on Russia’s behalf in the past. Aviacon Zitotrans is well-documented as flying military cargo and has been sanctioned by multiple countries for these activities. The U.S., Canada and Ukraine have all sanctioned the company for its role in supporting Russia’s military adventures.

“Aviacon Zitotrans has shipped military equipment such as rockets, warheads, and helicopter parts all over the world,” the U.S. Treasury Department said in January 2023, when it added the company to the American sanctions list. “Aviacon Zitotrans has shipped defense materiel to Venezuela, Africa, and other locations,” the agency continued. It has also been involved in exporting Russian-made weapons to buyers globally for the state-owned company Rosoboronexport.

It is unclear what cargo the aircraft is carrying on its current journey. When the same aircraft flew to Venezuela in advance of the U.S. strikes, it delivered Pantsir-S1 short-range and Buk-M2E medium-range air defense systems to Caracas, according to Russian lawmaker Alexei Zhuravlev and Russian state-owned media. Dimensions and weight of both systems make this plausible, although the Buk would likely have to be disassembled due to its height.

The Il-76’s current mission has striking similarities to its earlier flight to Venezuela, including several stops along the way in northern Africa and the backdrop of rapidly rising geopolitical tensions surrounding a Russian-aligned country in Latin America.

In Venezuela, Russian-made air defenses failed to protect against the U.S. raid that captured strongman president Nicolás Maduro, which experts have attributed to user error, lack of preparation and overwhelming U.S. capabilities.

Russia and Cuba signed and ratified a new military cooperation agreement in March 2025, which established the legal framework for joint military operations, training exercises, the exchange of military specialists, consultations, and the supply of military equipment.

The Jan.3 U.S. raid to capture Venezuelan strongman president Nicolás Maduro was over before dawn, drawing praise from military leaders in Washington for its flawless execution.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy watched from Kyiv and didn’t bother to hide the message Ukrainians heard.

“If you can do that with dictators,” Zelenskyy told reporters later, “then the United States knows what to do next.”

He again dared the West to act against the Kremlin in his speech on Thursday at the World Economic Forum in Davos, where he said: “Maduro is on trial in New York. Sorry, but Putin is not.”

Trump’s decision to snatch Maduro and intercept Venezuelan tankers is the decisive power Ukrainians once hoped he’d use against Russia — and the sphere-of-influence move that makes them wonder how fast any U.S.-drafted peace deal could shift under their feet.

Retired U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges has been arguing for months that Washington has been underselling its sway with Russia.

Hodges commanded U.S. Army Europe from 2014 to 2017 — through Russia’s first invasion of Ukraine and the start of the war in Donbas — and has since become one of NATO’s sharpest critics of Western hesitation.

“President Trump has enormous leverage over Russia,” Hodges told Military Times. “He just has never used it.”

“American dominance in the Western Hemisphere will never be questioned again,” Trump declared in a White House statement on Jan. 3. “We’re going to run the country,” he said, referring to Venezuela, according to NPR.

Moscow seemed to know what was coming. Kremlin officials began evacuating the families of Russian diplomats in Venezuela days before the U.S. launched its attack, the AP reported on Dec. 23. The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs later denied in an X post that it was sending its representatives home, but did not address whether diplomats’ families had been asked to leave.

The Kremlin had advance warning — and didn’t seem to warn Maduro or take any serious defensive action. Putin’s foreign ministry protested after the fact; Putin himself stayed silent.

At the same time, the domestic pushback to Trump’s attack on the oil-rich South American nation has been fierce, even among some in his own party.

“Bombing another nation’s capital and ousting their leader constitutes an act of war, plain and simple,” said Sen. Rand Paul, per CNBC. “The Constitution does not grant such authority to the presidency.”

But Trump has kept going.

Vice President JD Vance announced on Fox News that the U.S. now “controls the energy resources” of Venezuela and tells the regime what oil it can sell so long as it serves “America’s national interest.”

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt declared that Venezuelan authorities’ decisions would “continue to be dictated by the United States of America,” Euronews reported.

Venezuela proved Trump could move fast, confront Moscow, and bulldoze Congress when he wants to. For officials across Europe and Ukraine, it confirmed what Hodges had warned: Trump has the leverage. He just hasn’t decided Kyiv is worth using it.

What this means for Kyiv

Analysts at Chatham House warned that allies “will be far from reassured,” noting Trump’s “willingness – indeed, as displayed during his press conference, exhilaration – to use US military power is clear.” Experts at the Brookings Institution put it more bluntly: “Ukrainians are likely watching in grim recognition” of how little leverage they have when Washington decides to move.

Meanwhile, earlier this month French President Emmanuel Macron gave voice to the fear that global norms are beginning to crumble. In his annual address to French ambassadors, he warned that the United States was “breaking free from international rules” and “gradually turning away” from its allies.

“We are living in a world of great powers,” Macron said, “with a real temptation to divide up the world,” according to France 24.

Days earlier, Macron had convened 35 participants in Paris to address the messy peace negotiations — including ceasefire monitoring, armed forces support, and long-term defense cooperation.

Instead of Secretary of State Marc Rubio, Trump sent Steve Witkoff, his special envoy and longtime real estate friend with no diplomatic experience, and son-in-law Jared Kushner.

For Kyiv, it was a signal: Venezuela has the secretary of state’s attention. Ukraine gets the B-team.

Ukrainians are watching the new dynamics closely. In December polling by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology, only 21% of Ukrainians said they trusted the United States — down from 41% in December 2024. Distrust rose from 24% to 48%. The phrase that kept surfacing in interviews: “bargaining chip.”

A senior European diplomat with knowledge of the peace negotiations, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said there is a bigger picture at play for American leaders.

“Trump doesn’t see Ukraine in isolation,” the diplomat told Military Times. “He sees it as one lever among many — from sanctions to oil to troop deployments — and that is terrifying if you live inside the theater he is trading over.”

Where this is heading

“It’s a shame that the erstwhile leader of the free world has decided to withdraw to the Western Hemisphere when our European allies are facing the greatest security threat since World War II,” Ian Kelly, who served as U.S. ambassador to Georgia and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, told Military Times.

“But that’s the world Europe has now. It’s not the world they want, but it’s the world they’re dealing with.”

Zelenskyy seems to agree. Days after Caracas, he offered a dare to the newly war-ready American president: If Trump could topple a dictator in 90 minutes, when would that firepower point east?

“Let them carry out some operation against Kadyrov, this murderer,” Zelenskyy said, Ukrainska Pravda reported. Ramzan Kadyrov, the Chechen strongman who has ruled the republic since 2007 with Putin’s blessing, commands forces accused of war crimes in Ukraine and runs what human rights groups call a personal fiefdom built on torture and disappearances.

“Maybe Putin will see that and stop to think.”

U.S. Southern Command said in a social media post that U.S. forces apprehended the Motor Vessel Sagitta “without incident” and that the tanker was operating in defiance of President Donald Trump’s “established quarantine of sanctioned vessels in the Caribbean.”

The military command did not say whether the U.S. Coast Guard took control of the tanker as has been the case in prior seizures. The Pentagon did not immediately respond to a request for more details. Southern Command said it had nothing to add to its post.

The Sagitta is a Liberian-flagged tanker and its registration says it is owned and managed by a company in Hong Kong. The ship last transmitted its location more than two months ago when exiting the Baltic Sea in northern Europe.

The tanker was sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department under an executive order related to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

The post from U.S. Southern Command indicated the ship had taken oil from Venezuela. It said the capture of the tanker “demonstrates our resolve to ensure that the only oil leaving Venezuela will be oil that is coordinated properly and lawfully.”

The military command posted what appeared to be aerial footage of the Sagitta sailing on the ocean, but unlike in prior videos the clip did not show U.S. forces flying toward it in helicopters or landing on the deck of the ship.

Since the U.S. ouster of Venezuela President Nicolás Maduro in a surprise nighttime raid on Jan. 3, the Trump administration has set out to control the production, refining and global distribution of Venezuela’s oil products.

Officials in Trump’s Republican administration have made it clear they see seizing the tankers as a way to generate cash as they seek to rebuild Venezuela’s battered oil industry and restore its economy.

Trump met with executives from oil companies nearly two weeks ago to discuss his goal of investing $100 billion in Venezuela to repair and upgrade its oil production and distribution. He said at the time that the U.S. expected to sell at least 30 million to 50 million barrels of Venezuelan oil.

Trump told reporters on Tuesday that the U.S. already has taken 50 million barrels of oil out of Venezuela.

“We’ve got millions of barrels of oil left,” he said at the White House. “We’re selling it on the open market. We’re bringing down oil prices incredibly.”

The first tanker was seized off the coast of Venezuela on Dec. 10. Most of the other tankers also have been captured in the waters near Venezuela, with the exception of the Bella 1, which was captured in the North Atlantic.

The Bella 1 had been cruising across the Atlantic and nearing the Caribbean when on Dec. 15 it abruptly turned and headed north, toward Europe. The ship was ultimately captured on Jan. 8.

Trump put intense pressure on five Republican senators who joined with Democrats to advance the resolution last week and ultimately prevailed in heading off passage of the legislation. Two of the Republicans — Sens. Josh Hawley of Missouri and Todd Young of Indiana — flipped under the pressure.

Vice President JD Vance had to break the 50-50 deadlock in the Senate on a Republican motion to dismiss the bill.

The outcome of the high-profile vote demonstrated how Trump still has command over much of the Republican conference, yet the razor-thin vote tally also showed the growing concern on Capitol Hill over the president’s aggressive foreign policy ambitions.

Democrats forced the debate after U.S. troops captured Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro in a surprise nighttime raid earlier this month

“Here we have one of the most successful attacks ever and they find a way to be against it. It’s pretty amazing. And it’s a shame,” Trump said at a speech in Michigan Tuesday. He also hurled insults at several of the Republicans who advanced the legislation, calling Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky a “stone cold loser” and Sens. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine “disasters.” Those three Republicans stuck to their support for the legislation.

Trump’s latest comments followed earlier phone calls with the senators, which they described as terse. The president’s fury underscored how the war powers vote had taken on new political significance as Trump also threatens military action to accomplish his goal of possessing Greenland.

The legislation, even if it had cleared the Senate, had virtually no chance of becoming law because it would eventually need to be signed by Trump himself. But it represented both a test of GOP loyalty to the president and a marker for how much leeway the Republican-controlled Senate is willing to give Trump to use the military abroad. Republican angst over his recent foreign policy moves — especially threats of using military force to seize Greenland from a NATO ally — is still running high in Congress.

Two Republicans reconsider

Hawley, who helped advance the war powers resolution last week, said Trump’s message during a phone call was that the legislation “really ties my hands.” The senator said he had a follow-up phone call with Secretary of State Marco Rubio Monday and was told “point blank, we’re not going to do ground troops.”

The senator added that he also received assurances that the Trump administration will follow constitutional requirements if it becomes necessary to deploy troops again to the South American country.

“We’re getting along very well with Venezuela,” Trump told reporters at a ceremony for the signing of an unrelated bill Wednesday.

As senators went to the floor for the vote Wednesday evening, Young also told reporters he was no longer in support. He said that he had extensive conversations with Rubio and received assurances that the secretary of state will appear at a public hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Young also shared a letter from Rubio that stated the president will “seek congressional authorization in advance (circumstances permitting)” if he engaged in “major military operations” in Venezuela.

The senators also said his efforts were also instrumental in pushing the administration to release Wednesday a 22-page Justice Department memo laying out the legal justification for the snatch-and-grab operation against Maduro.

That memo, which was heavily redacted, indicates that the administration, for now, has no plans to ramp up military operations in Venezuela.

“We were assured that there is no contingency plan to engage in any substantial and sustained operation that would amount to a constitutional war,” according to the memo signed by Assistant Attorney General Elliot Gaiser.

Trump’s shifting rationale for military intervention

Trump has used a series of legal arguments for his campaign against Maduro.

As he built up a naval force in the Caribbean and destroyed vessels that were allegedly carrying drugs from Venezuela, the Trump administration tapped wartime powers under the global war on terror by designating drug cartels as terrorist organizations.

The administration has claimed the capture of Maduro himself was actually a law enforcement operation, essentially to extradite the Venezuelan president to stand trial for charges in the U.S. that were filed in 2020.

Paul criticized the administration for first describing its military build-up in Caribbean as a counternarcotics operation but now floating Venezuela’s vast oil reserves as a reason for maintaining pressure.

“The bait and switch has already happened,” he said.

Trump’s foreign policy worries Congress

Lawmakers, including a significant number of Republicans, have been alarmed by Trump’s recent foreign policy talk. In recent weeks, he has pledged that the U.S. will “run” Venezuela for years to come, threatened military action to take possession of Greenland and told Iranians protesting their government that “help is on its way.”

Senior Republicans have tried to massage the relationship between Trump and Denmark, a NATO ally that holds Greenland as a semi-autonomous territory. But Danish officials emerged from a meeting with Vance and Rubio Wednesday saying a “fundamental disagreement” over Greenland remains.

“What happened tonight is a roadmap to another endless war,” Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said at a news conference following the vote.

More than half of U.S. adults believe President Donald Trump has “gone too far” in using the U.S. military to intervene in other countries, according to a new AP-NORC poll.

How Republican leaders dismissed the bill

Last week’s procedural vote on the war powers resolution was supposed to set up hours of debate and a vote on final passage. But Republican leaders began searching for a way to defuse the conflict between their members and Trump as well as move on quickly to other business.

Once Hawley and Young changed their support for the bill, Republicans were able to successfully challenge whether it was appropriate when the Trump administration has said U.S. troops are not currently deployed in Venezuela.

“We’re not currently conducting military operations there,” said Senate Majority Leader John Thune in a floor speech. “But Democrats are taking up this bill because their anti-Trump hysteria knows no bounds.”

Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine, who has brought a series of war powers resolutions this year, accused Republicans of burying a debate about the merits of an ongoing campaign of attacks and threats against Venezuela.

“If this cause and if this legal basis were so righteous, the administration and its supporters would not be afraid to have this debate before the public and the United States Senate,” he said in a floor speech.

Kaine vowed to force votes on war powers resolutions that would apply to a number of potential military conflicts, including Greenland. House Democrats have also filed a similar war powers resolution and can force a vote on it as soon as next week.

Associated Press writers Josh Goodman, Lisa Mascaro, Mary Clare Jalonick and Joey Cappelletti in Washington and Bill Barrow in Atlanta contributed to this report.

Trump seems intent on remaking the global order in the wake of the U.S. military raid on Venezuela and his subsequent declaration that Washington would “run” the South American nation.

Hours after Operation Absolute Resolve — a mission that saw U.S. forces capture Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, from their compound in Caracas — the White House posted a black-and-white photo of Trump with a caption that read, “No Games. FAFO.” The acronym stands for “f— around and find out.”

Trump’s first instinct “is always diplomacy,” White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly told Military Times, noting it’s the president’s “dealmaking expertise” that helped him end wars. But she underscored that Trump “always has a host of options at his disposal, and all of his actions have put America First while making the entire world safer.”

Here are the countries Trump has put on high alert.

Greenland

The United States has renewed its pursuit of Greenland, which the Trump administration deems vital for the protection of U.S. national security interests in the Arctic — specifically, to counter China and Russia. The White House said the president is considering “a range of options” to acquire the island, including the possible use of force.

Trump ramped up his rhetoric over Greenland on Friday, saying he would “like to make a deal the easy way, but if we don’t do it the easy way, we’re going to do it the hard way.”

Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen proclaimed that a U.S. attack on Greenland, a self-governing territory within the Kingdom of Denmark, would spell the end of NATO. Trump’s approach to Greenland has also caused broader consternation among European allies.

Iran

Anti-government protests have erupted across Iran in recent weeks, fueled by crippling economic conditions and political discontent.

Trump has stopped short of endorsing regime change in Tehran, but has suggested the U.S. would intervene if Iranian authorities resort to egregious use of lethal force against demonstrators — as they have done in previous episodes of unrest in the country.

“If they start killing people, which they tend to do during their riots … we’re going to hit them very hard,” Trump said Thursday, adding that the Islamic Republic would “have to pay hell” for violent repression.

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, in a speech broadcast on state TV Friday, vowed to “not back down,” and accused protesters of acting on behalf of Trump.

Mexico

U.S. land strikes on Mexico targeting drug cartels could be imminent, according to Trump.

“We are going to now start hitting land with regard to the cartels,” Trump told Fox News on Thursday, framing the military campaign as his war on drugs.

He previously said that drugs are “pouring through Mexico” and indicated that the cartels are running the country, not President Claudia Sheinbaum.

Nigeria

Trump said he could authorize additional U.S. strikes on Islamic State militants in Nigeria if attacks on Christians continue unabated.

“I’d love to make it a one-time strike. … But if they continue to kill Christians, it will be a many-time strike,” Trump said Thursday.

Last month, Trump ordered lethal Christmas Day strikes, which he called “a Christmas present,” after a series of warnings that the U.S. military would go “guns-a-blazing” into Nigeria if the government continued to “allow the killing of Christians.”

The degree to which violence in Nigeria is primarily motivated by religion is disputed, however, with struggles over land and water rights — and general criminality — among the other factors at play.

Colombia

Tensions between the U.S. and Colombia showed signs of thawing Wednesday following a phone call between Trump and Colombian President Gustavo Petro.

Trump, in a post on Truth Social, wrote that his Colombian counterpart called “to explain the situation of drugs and other disagreements that we have had.” Trump said he “appreciated his call and tone,” and suggested that he invited Petro to meet at the White House “in the near future.”

The apparent rapprochement between the two countries came days after Trump told reporters an invasion of Colombia “sounds good to me,” and disparaged Petro as a “sick man” who “better watch his a–.”

Petro, who criticized the U.S. military operation to depose Maduro, said he would “take up arms” against the United States if it were to attack.

Venezuela

The president announced on Friday a “previously expected” second wave of attacks on Venezuela has been canceled, citing the South American nation’s cooperation with the United States.

“The U.S.A. and Venezuela are working well together, especially as it pertains to rebuilding, in a much bigger, better, and more modern form, their oil and gas infrastructure,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “Because of this cooperation, I have cancelled the previously expected second Wave of Attacks, which looks like it will not be needed, however, all ships will stay in place for safety and security purposes.”

At a meeting with more than a dozen oil companies at the White House on Friday, Trump said Venezuela has “been very smart in the way they have dealt with us” after the U.S. ousted Maduro.

“That whole place could have been obliterated with one more strike and we didn’t want to do that.”

Democrats and five Republicans voted to advance the war powers resolution on a 52-47 vote and ensure a vote next week on final passage. It has virtually no chance of becoming law because Trump would have to sign it if it were to pass the Republican-controlled House. Still, it was a significant gesture that showed unease among some Republicans after the U.S. military seized Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro in a surprise nighttime raid.

Trump’s administration is now seeking to control Venezuela’s oil resources and its government, but the war powers resolution would require congressional approval for any further attacks on the South American country.

“To me, this is all about going forward,” said Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley, one of the five Republican votes.

“If the president should determine, ‘You know what? I need to put troops on the ground of Venezuela,’ I think that would require Congress to weigh in.”

The other Republicans who backed the resolution were Sens. Rand Paul of Kentucky, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Susan Collins of Maine and Todd Young of Indiana.

Democrats had failed to pass several such resolutions in the months that Trump escalated his campaign against Venezuela. But lawmakers argued that now that Trump has captured Maduro and set his sights to other conquests such as Greenland, the vote presents the Republican-controlled Congress with an opportunity.

“It’s time for Congress to assert its control over military action of this kind, and it’s time to get this out of secrecy and put it in the light,” said Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., who forced the vote.

Lawmakers’ response to the Venezuela operation

Republican leaders have said they had no advance notification of the raid early morning Saturday to seize Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, but mostly expressed satisfaction this week as top administration officials provided classified briefings on the operation.

The administration has used an evolving set of legal justifications for the monthslong campaign in Central and South America, from destroying alleged drug boats under authorizations for the global fight against terrorism to seizing Maduro in what was ostensibly a law enforcement operation to put him on trial in the United States.

Republican leaders have backed Trump.

“I think the president has demonstrated at least already a very strong commitment to peace through strength, especially in this hemisphere,” said Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D. “I think Venezuela got that message loudly and clearly.”

A vote on a similar resolution in November narrowly failed to gain the majority needed for passage. Paul and Murkowski were the only Republicans voting in favor then.

Paul, an outspoken proponent of war powers resolutions, acknowledged that Maduro is seen as a “bad guy” and “a socialist and an autocrat.” But, Paul added, “The question is about who has the power to take the country to war?”

Some progressive Democrats have suggested inserting language in a defense appropriations bill to limit certain military actions, but that idea met resistance from more pragmatic members of the caucus. Democratic leaders have tried to cast Trump’s foreign ambitions as a distraction from the issues that voters face at home.

“The American people are asking what the hell is going on in Venezuela and why is this president, who campaigned on ‘America First,’ now spending all his time and energy on escapades overseas?” Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York said in a floor speech.

House Democrats were also introducing a similar resolution on Thursday.

The rarely enforced War Powers Act

Congress was once again left in the dark during the military operation in Venezuela, with Trump later confirming that he talked to oil executives but not leaders on Capitol Hill. That reflects a broader pattern in Trump’s second term, unfolding under a Republican-controlled Congress that has shown little appetite for reasserting its constitutional authority to declare war.

Under the Constitution, Congress declares war while the president serves as commander in chief. But lawmakers have not formally declared war since World War II, granting presidents broad latitude to act unilaterally.

Congress attempted to rein in that authority after the Vietnam War with the War Powers Resolution, passed over Republican President Richard Nixon’s veto. The law requires presidents to notify Congress within 48 hours of deploying forces and to end military action within 60 to 90 days absent authorization — limits that presidents of both parties have routinely stretched.

Democrats argue those limits are being pushed further than ever. Some Republicans have gone further still, contending congressional approval is unnecessary altogether.

Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, a close Trump ally who traveled with the president aboard Air Force One on Sunday, said he would be comfortable with Trump taking over other countries without congressional approval, including Greenland.

“The commander in chief is the commander in chief. They can use military force,” Graham said.

Greenland may further test the limits

Graham’s comments come as the administration weighs not only its next steps in Venezuela, but also Greenland. The White House has said the “military is always an option” when it comes to a potential American takeover of the world’s largest island.

While Republicans have cited Greenland’s strategic value, most have balked at the idea of using the military to take the country, instead favoring a potential deal to purchase the country.

Democrats want to get out in front of any military action and are already preparing to respond. Arizona Sen. Ruben Gallego said he is working on a resolution “to block Trump from invading Greenland.”

“We must stop him before he invades another country on a whim,” Gallego wrote on X. “No more forever wars.”

Kaine also said Wednesday that a resolution on Greenland would soon be filed, in addition to Cuba, Mexico, Colombia and Nigeria.

Greenland belongs to a NATO ally, Denmark, which has prompted a much different response from Republican senators than the situation in Venezuela. Paul said Republicans discussed Trump’s plans for Greenland at their Wednesday luncheon and he heard “zero support” for taking military action to seize it.

Sen. Thom Tillis, a co-chair of the Senate NATO Observer Group, used a Senate floor speech to criticize White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller for comments this week that the U.S. should take control of Greenland. Tillis said such remarks were “amateurish” and “absurd.”

“This nonsense on what’s going on with Greenland is a distraction from the good work he’s doing,” Tillis said of the president.

“And the amateurs who said it was a good idea should lose their jobs,” he said.

Men carried wooden caskets cloaked in the Venezuelan flag past rows of uniformed officers. Singing echoed out from a nearby church in Caracas and music from a military orchestra ceremony echoed over the cemetery, while throngs of family members and soldiers marched behind a row of caskets.

As the caskets were lowered into the ground, gunfire from a military ceremony echoed out over the state-owned graveyard in a low-income neighborhood in the city’s south side. Earlier in the day, families cried and embraced next to the caskets during a wake.

“Thank you for letting them embrace a military career,” Rafael Murillo, a commander in the military, said to families surrounding him.

Before the ceremony, armed National Guard members patrolled some areas while families of the killed soldiers finished paperwork required for the burials.

At least 24 Venezuelan security officers were killed in the dead-of-night U.S. military operation over the weekend to capture Maduro and spirit him to the United States to face drug charges, according to Venezuela’s military.

Venezuela’s Attorney General Tarek William Saab said “dozens” of officers and civilians were killed and that prosecutors would investigate the deaths in what he described as a “war crime.” He didn’t specify if the estimate was specifically referring to Venezuelans.

Cuba’s government on Sunday announced that 32 Cuban military and police officers working in Venezuela had died in the operation, prompting two days of mourning on the Caribbean island.

“Their spilled blood does not cry out for vengeance, but for justice and strength,” the Venezuelan military wrote in an Instagram post on Monday. “It reaffirms our unwavering oath not to rest until we rescue our legitimate President, completely dismantle the terrorist groups operating from abroad, and ensure that events such as these never again sully our sovereign soil.”

Associated Press reporter Megan Janetsky contributed to this report from Mexico City.

When that window opened, the U.S. military moved fast, launching more than 150 aircraft from 20 bases in a high-risk operation to capture Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro from the country’s populated capital over the weekend.

After a tightly synchronized mission that lasted less than five hours from authorization to exfiltration, Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, were taken Saturday by U.S. forces from their Caracas compound, according to President Donald Trump and Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

One defense expert, who was not involved in the operation, said that unlike past regime-change operations that involved the deployment of troops en masse, this operation appeared to have been designed to be precise.

“This was surgical,” Carlton Haelig, a fellow with the defense program at the Center for a New American Security, told Military Times. “But in terms of the tactical and support elements surrounding it, it was still relatively large scale.”

Though many details remain opaque, the mission, dubbed Operation Absolute Resolve, offered a rare public look at how today’s military plans and executes complicated, high-stakes interagency operations.

Months of planning, days of waiting

According to Caine, intelligence planning for the mission began months earlier and relied heavily on intelligence work to track Maduro’s whereabouts — “where he lived, where he traveled, what he ate, what he wore,” — and even information about his pets.

In a press conference Saturday, Caine said the apprehension would not have been possible without the Central Intelligence Agency, National Security Agency and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, though he did not elaborate on each branch’s exact contributions.

Adam Taichi Kraft, a former intelligence collection strategist with the Defense Intelligence Agency who now consults on national security issues, speaking generally, said that for missions like this, information gathering never stops.

“Intelligence collection is going on 24/7, all around the world,” he said in an interview with Military Times. “You cannot hide; we are in a zero-privacy world.”

He emphasized that watching people’s behavior — whether in person or online — cannot be understated.

“If you are breathing oxygen, if you leave a fingerprint on a cab door, if you go to the doctor, if you order Starbucks, you are opening yourself up to surveillance,” he said.

Haelig said mapping the patterns of Maduro’s life was essential, but equally important would also be the military intelligence that enables U.S. forces to safely enter and exit a targeted area.

“Most of that comes from knowing the enemy’s order of battle — where their defensive assets are positioned. What are their response capabilities? What needs to occur in order to take those capabilities offline — whether that’s kinetically — through missile and air strikes — or by other means like electronic jamming,” he said.

Outlets including Reuters and The New York Times reported that the U.S. Army’s elite Delta Force practiced the extraction using a mockup of Maduro’s compound, but officials have not publicly confirmed which units were involved in the mission.

Even with extensive preparation, operations of this scale carry inherent uncertainty, including the possibility of shifting air defense and unseen threats along a route, Haelig said.

Those risks, he said, “were almost certainly something that was in the back of the minds of all of the planners and the operators themselves.”

And yet, the final go-ahead hinged on weather. In a Saturday morning phone interview on “Fox and Friends Weekend,” Trump said military forces had been waiting for “days” until the weather was right.

Into Caracas

Trump gave the green light at 10:46 p.m. Eastern Standard Time on Jan. 2, according to Caine, and over 150 aircraft began to launch across the Western Hemisphere.

“As the night began, the helicopters took off with the extraction force, which included law enforcement officers, and began their flight into Venezuela at 100 feet above the water,” Caine said in a statement.

The helicopters, skimming the water at such a low altitude to avoid detection, were protected by a fleet that included fighter jets, bombers and surveillance aircrafts.

After clearing the last stretch of high terrain, leaders determined that the force had maintained the element of surprise, Caine said.

The force descended.

Shortly after one in the morning Saturday, helicopters arrived at Maduro’s compound. A firefight ensued, and according to Caine, one aircraft was hit but did not sustain catastrophic damage and was able to remain flyable.

Trump said in his “Fox and Friends Weekend” interview that Maduro “got bum-rushed so fast” in “a house that was more like a fortress than a house.”

By 3:29 a.m., the force had left the compound with Maduro and his wife and were “over the water,” Caine said, after multiple engagements.

Trump on Saturday posted a photo of a blindfolded man who he said was Maduro post-capture aboard the USS Iwo Jima. Maduro is now facing federal criminal charges in New York.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Monday in a speech that nearly 200 Americans were on the ground in Caracas during the operation; he did not specify if that number represented soldiers or others supporting the operation.

When asked to clarify if special operations forces were involved in the mission, the Pentagon declined to comment citing operational security.

Col. Allie Weiskopf, the U.S. Special Operations Command director of public affairs, said in an email Tuesday that the operation belonged to the U.S. Southern Command.

Haelig said that many have speculated — based on the rotary wing aircraft seen in videos posted on social media by people on the ground in Venezuela — that the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment was involved in the mission. That unit, known as the Night Stalkers, is trained for risky aviation missions at low altitudes.

“They work equally with Delta Force and SEAL Team 6 on missions like this,” he said, adding that “both are absolutely capable and trained for high value target missions.” Delta Force and SEAL Team 6 are elite units trained to conduct the military’s most sensitive operations — often at night and in close coordination with intelligence agencies.

The people selected for these missions, Kraft said, are extremely high caliber and often handpicked.

“These guys are so well-rehearsed and so mature,” he said, adding “there are contingencies and branch plans as part of training. They’re always practicing. So if something goes wrong, they’re able to accomplish the mission regardless.”

Following the weekend military operation capturing Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, a number of Canadian officials were spooked by the U.S. administration’s talk of reordering the Western Hemisphere to Trump’s liking.

“It confirms the new U.S. National Security Strategy, particularly towards the Americas and, therefore, Canada — Canadians should be concerned that for Trump, force is now a sufficient reason to impose his will on other countries,” Jean Charest, former deputy prime minister of Canada, wrote on his X social media platform on Jan 5.

The leader of the Bloc Québécois, Yve-François Blanchet, said his party was especially troubled that Washington “is positioning itself as the enforcer of principles at the risk of disregarding international law, particularly by resorting to military force at the peril of civilian lives.”

The American president has previously expressed his ambition to make Canada the 51st U.S. state.

Mike Morrice, the deputy leader of the Green Party of Canada, said Canada “cannot stand by while one man’s insatiable and violent thirst for oil makes an already perilous time in the world even less safe and unstable.”

Absent from the list of commentators was Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, whose muted response was criticized by some policymakers for failing to condemn the neighbor’s actions.

“The Liberals [Party] have been weak and afraid to call out illegal U.S. actions — they are putting economic interests ahead of truth, values and law, and it’s time for us to take principled positions,” Don Davies, the interim leader of the New Democratic Party said in a post on X.

Charest urged Ottawa to lessen its economic and military reliance on the United States.

A large portion of the Canadian defense procurement budget is spent on American equipment, with approximately 75 cents of every dollar allocated to U.S. technology, according to Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney.

Some Canadian politicians expressed support for the U.S. Venezuela takeover. Pierre Poilievre, the leader of the Conservative Party, congratulated Trump on “successfully arresting socialist dictator Nicolas Maduro,” adding: “Long live freedom.”

Canada is currently at a crucial stage in deciding whether to proceed with the order pledged in 2023 for 88 F-35 fighter jets from Lockheed Martin. So far, it has only committed to buying 16 and is assessing other foreign aircraft models, such as the Swedish Gripen, which has an American engine.

Minister for Economic Development Mélanie Joly stated this week that the final decision will be made this year.