Maduro Captured: What Comes Next for Venezuela

Commentary by Ryan C. Berg

Published January 3, 2026

Overnight and into the morning of January 3, an extraordinary military operation captured Venezuela's dictator Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores and flew them to the USS Iwa Jima. This action had been presaged for months, as the Trump administration sought to negotiate Maduro's exit from power. At present, strikes have been reported in at least four Venezuelan states-Caracas (federal district), La Guaira, Miranda, and Aragua. Both Maduro and his wife have been indicted in the Southern District of New York on drug trafficking charges. While many of the operational details remain vague-and likely classified-the U.S. military appeared to overrun Venezuela's air defenses, while special operations forces and law enforcement agencies participated in the raid on Maduro's house. The operation appears to have been an overwhelming success on the tactical level, as the U.S. Air Force controlled the skies, Venezuela's radars and electrical grid were jammed, and many of its air defenses were destroyed. Only time will tell if the operation was successful at the strategic level.

President Trump's late morning press conference left many questions and provided few answers about the exact shape of what comes next and whether the Chavista regime can survive a capture operation against Maduro that has decapitated his regime. In the press conference, Trump asserted that the United States would take a leadership role in rebuilding Venezuela, with a particular emphasis on the oil sector. In recent weeks, analysts have debated the famous "Pottery Barn" principle for Venezuela-you break it, you own it. At several points during his remarks, Trump appeared to take ownership of the challenge, declaring that the United States would be "running" the country until such time as a just and orderly transition can take place. Later in the press conference, he hinted at an arrangement akin to a provision government, involving designees, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and others in the U.S. government. Just as noteworthy was the dearth of mentions of Venezuelan opposition.

Left entirely unclear is the fate of regime insiders still in Venezuela, such as Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello and Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez. Vice President Delcy Rodriguez appears to have flown to Russia (as of writing, only Russia has condemned the attack, giving political support and "solidarity" to Maduro). Trump's promise of another operation, if necessary, combined with the tactical success of the first, appears to be an invitation for others in the regime to negotiate an exit on more favorable terms than Maduro and his wife. Given the precision of the "snatch and grab" operation, it is highly likely that the United States had the assistance of several regime insiders either looking to cash in the $50 million reward for Maduro's capture or negotiate a cushier exile for themselves.

This is, to paraphrase Winston Churchill, not the beginning of the end, but the end of the beginning. Venezuela will enter a long transition with even greater U.S. involvement in shaping the government to come, as well as the bilateral relationship with Washington.

The operation also dovetails with the changing geopolitics of Latin America. First, it signals that the "Trump Corollary" outlined in the 2025 National Security Strategy (NSS) is not mere bluster. The NSS declared the United States' intent to "restore American preeminence" in the Western Hemisphere, and the Trump Corollary states that the administration "will deny non-Hemispheric competitors the ability to position forces or other threatening capabilities, or to own or control strategically vital assets, in our Hemisphere." To underscore the connection to great power competition, Maduro met with a Chinese special envoy mere hours before U.S. forces snatched him from his home. It is likely Chinese diplomats did not make it out of the country before the U.S. operation began, sending a clear message to China about Beijing's role in Venezuela-to which it has lent more than $60 billion in recent decades-and in the hemisphere at large.

Also at the press conference, Trump affirmed that "America First" foreign policy means building a safer, more prosperous, more secure hemisphere. The operation this morning is in line with a more active role for the United States in the Western Hemisphere presaged by the NSS. The president explicitly endorsed the idea of cleaning up the Western Hemisphere neighborhood and making it a zone of greater strategic benefit for the United States. He also drew a direct comparison to the strength and operational skill displayed his first-term decapitation strike on Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Commander Qasem Soleimani, as well as Operation Midnight Hammer against Iran's nuclear infrastructure during the summer of 2025. In doing so, Trump has once again proven the staleness of the debates over isolationism and retrenchment that have dominated many analyses; at least in the Western Hemisphere, he has proven capable of a muscular foreign policy that will utilize U.S. power and even military force to reshape many geographies of the world-and now the Western Hemisphere-in the U.S. interest.

Ryan C. Berg is director of the Americas Program and head of the Future of Venezuela Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in Washington, D.C.

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