Ryan Berg in Foreign Policy: Toppling Maduro Without Boots on the Ground

After the latest announcement of the USS Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier steaming toward the Caribbean theater, the U.S. Navy now counts around 10 percent of its total deployed assets in the Southern Command area of responsibility, which spans Central America, South America, and the Caribbean. In recent weeks, the deployment has been supported by flights of B-52s and B-1s departing from air bases in the continental United States. These aircraft have engaged in simulated bombing runs, flying within 20 miles of Venezuela. In late October, several major news outlets reported that U.S. President Donald Trump had reviewed a target list and that missile strikes could be "imminent " in Venezuela.

The impending arrival of the USS Gerald R. Ford carrier strike group, led by the most advanced aircraft carrier in the United States' arsenal, could represent a "crossing the Rubicon" moment. If the Ford were to participate in an air campaign against targets inside Venezuela, then it would not be able to loiter in the Caribbean forever. Competition for the Ford's presence from other regional combatant commands will be strong.

Following more than a dozen strikes against suspected drug-laden vessels, the United States has likely shut down known drug trafficking routes in the southern Caribbean-at least in the short term. Trump has vowed to take the campaign to the next phase, which could involve strikes against land-based targets in Venezuela.

"We are certainly looking at land now, because we've got the sea very well under control," Trump said in mid-October. What began as a counternarcotics mission, demonstrating a paradigm shift in dealing with cartels that have been newly designated as foreign terrorist organizations, may expand to encompass a campaign against the regime of Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro.

The possibility of strikes against targets in Venezuelan territory has initiated a flurry of commentary on the possibility of regime change in Venezuela. However, boots-on-the-ground regime change fits neither the current deployment's configuration nor aligns with Trump's foreign-policy principles. Since his 2016 presidential campaign, Trump has forsworn Iraq-style regime change operations.

Yet there are other theories of change in Venezuela that can avoid the famous "Pottery Barn rule"-if you break it, you own it. Rather than a ground invasion aimed at regime change, regime collapse seems to be a much more promising theory of change, and it is worth pursuing.

Distinct from aboots-on-the-ground invasion of Venezuela aimed at overthrowing Maduro, a regime collapse would entail a more limited campaign of U.S. strikes on targets at the heart of the Maduro regime's state-crime nexus, implicating the country's armed forces and its political elites. These strikes would leverage precision-guided munitions and U.S. standoff weapons fired from a safe distance, possibly catalyzing movement internally to force Maduro's exit-all without putting U.S. personnel at risk as with a "regime change" strategy.

Multiple permutations of the regime collapse theory exist and could be well worth pursuing despite long odds. That's especially so given the paucity of alternatives for democratic transition following Venezuela's brazenly stolen election in July 2024 and Maduro's subsequent clampdown.

Pursuing such a theory of change against the Maduro regime would also fit Trump's modus operandi, which has featured a pattern of quick-strike actions without the introduction of ground forces or extended engagements. And an air and naval campaign that does not put U.S. personnel at great risk is more likely to garner the support of war-weary U.S. voters, some of whom see the Maduro regime and its involvement in drug trafficking as a grave threat to homeland security. Lastly, recent polling suggests that Maduro's departure through a military operation would be welcomed by much of Latin America-a region where his regime has worn out its welcome.

For more than a decade in Venezuela, just about every nonkinetic theory of change has had a chance to succeed against Maduro's dictatorship. The United States and the international community have imposed diplomatic pressure and isolation; deployed increasingly powerful sanctions, starting in the first Trump administration, meant to strangle the regime's financing of repression; launched an investigation for crimes against humanity at the International Criminal Court; and even supported the constitutional arrangement of an interim government led by National Assembly leader Juan Guaidó, which was at one point recognized as the legitimate government of Venezuela by around 60 countries.

While each move achieved incremental success against the regime, none achieved the ultimate objective-to dislodge Maduro and catalyze a return to democracy. Unfortunately, no strategy has even managed to achieve less ambitious objectives-changing the regime's behavior or putting an end to rigged elections.

To parry these strategies, Chavismo-the left-wing movement started by Maduro's predecessor, Hugo Chávez-has enraptured Washington policymakers through dozens of rounds of negotiations. These meetings followed a well-worn pattern: The regime earned temporary reprieves and bought itself time, only to advance an excuse or manufacture an "offense" that led it to walk away from the negotiating table, typically leaving Washington empty-handed but the regime pocketing the concessions. Most dramatically, the Maduro regime played for time while the Biden administration negotiated with it for more than a year, culminating in last year's stolen election.

Through it all, the Venezuelan opposition has often played along, cajoled by Washington into accommodating the regime, participating in unfree and unfair elections, and even agreeing to concessions that made little strategic sense. Many of the opposition's most prominent members bear the scars of the country's fight for democracy-torture, clandestinity, and exile.

After the disappointment of yet another stolen election in 2024, one of dozens in the past decades, the democratic opposition has shown enthusiasm for the Trump administration's deployment and the possibility of regime collapse that it signifies.

As opposition leader and Nobel Peace Prize winner María Corina Machado put it in a recent interview< /a>: "We've had thousands of protests, peaceful rallies, demonstrations. We've gone through every single institutional means." Translation: We have tried everything short of kinetic solutions, and nothing has worked to force Maduro from power.

Whereas past theories of change relied on outmaneuvering Chavismo, forcing it to make mistakes, slowly reinstitutionalizing the country, and eventually negotiating the authoritarian movement out of power, the regime collapse theory implies a more decisive moment in which the opposition could have a chance to assume control of the state apparatus. From that point, the theory goes, the perilous task-by no means guaranteed to succeed-of rebuilding the country's institutions could begin.

Indeed, Maduro allegedly offered Trump two deals, one involving his own departure in 2028 and the other giving U.S. companies priority access to the country's natural resources. Trump has confirmed both these offers and his denial of them, auguring toward a scenario where de-escalation via diplomatic off-ramp appears less likely.

Another variation of regime collapse could see Chavismo mortally wounded as a result of U.S. strikes, impacting the Maduro regime's long-term viability by imperiling key sources of licit and illicit financing. The Trump administration may target sites connected to drug trafficking and illegal mining, among other activities, combined with oil infrastructure. While a slow bleed may not be satisfying to anyone, least of all Trump himself, Maduro's eventual departure and a democratic transition in Venezuela would be a strategic boon to the United States and redound more broadly on Latin America's security and prosperity.

Yet another regime collapse scenario would place disgruntled figures in the Venezuelan armed forces at the center of a transition movement. The Venezuelan armed forces have proved to be a hard nut to crack for the United States. While on the one hand, it is one of the few semi-functioning institutions remaining in the country, on the other hand, it has been thoroughly penetrated by the ideology of Chavismo and corrupted by its involvement in drug trafficking, illegal gold mining, human trafficking, and sundry other crimes. The United States would be fighting an uphill battle against years of Maduro's coup-proofing as well as a Cuban-facilitated counterintelligence superstructure, which imposes brutal penalties on those accused of treason. Hundreds of Maduro's political prisoners come from the armed forces.

While the military has remained united thus far, if the United States launched missile strikes on Venezuela, the strategic milieu would change overnight. Modern Venezuela has never been at war, and any strikes on the country would have to contend with its air defense, meaning that the first targets would likely be military sites where radars, Buks, and the Russian S-300 systems are located. This is especially the case if Trump wants to target sites at the nexus of Venezuela's state-criminal enterprise, which are occasionally the same sites in question.

The Venezuelan military, so accustomed to forming callouses and convincing itself that it can survive anything, could be forced to realize the unprecedented nature of missile strikes by the United States. Furthermore, there is significant discontent within the institution, given a severe erosion of the chain of command and lack of upward mobility. It is quite possible that the Venezuelan armed forces could act in the interest of self-preservation in a post-Chavismo reality once the effect of strikes sets in. It is certainly not lost on the Venezuelan military that the most recent U.S. interventions in Latin America, such as Operation Just Cause in Panama and Operation Uphold Democracy in Haiti, resulted in the dissolution of the armed forces of those countries. Getting in front of a regime collapse would permit the Venezuelan armed forces to shape any post-Maduro transition and potentially obviate significant purges.

In this final scenario, the military could force Maduro into exile, capture him, and hand him over to the United States, possibly in return for the $50 million bounty. Without protection, Maduro may seek to flee or make himself vulnerable to capture by moving around the country. The military could also move to install President-elect Edmundo González Urrutia in honor of the mandate given to him by voters in last year's presidential election. Machado and the democratic opposition also maintain contacts within the armed forces, which is reflected in the 70 percent of the vote they garnered in elections last year according to the vote tallies.

By cutting off diplomacy with Venezuela, Trump has the ability to speak clearly and directly to Venezuela's military: Strikes on their facilities connected to drug trafficking will continue until the armed forces move on Maduro.

There is anunconsidered X factor: Trump's recent presidential finding -a document directing covert operations abroad-greenlighting more robust CIA activities. To be sure, the CIA was active in Venezuela during the first Trump administration, but it was notably unenthusiastic about doing so. Under Director Gina Haspel, the agency slow-walked many of the most creative ideas for covert action.

In contrast, John Ratcliffe, Trump's current director of the CIA, has enthusiastically supported the administration's pivot to the Americas. For instance, the CIA is well-positioned to employ cyber tools and options including blocking monthly payments to the military until such time as it guaranteed a democratic transition. Additionally, CIA efforts in information warfare could help to precipitate regime collapse by convincing the armed forces that a transition is inevitable, turning regime heavyweights against one another, or announcing the reactivation of the Naval Station at Guantanamo Bay, which could eventually hold high-level prisoners of the Maduro regime.

Maduro is a wily dictator who has survived serious challenges to his rule before, and more than a quarter-century of Chavismo should lead the Trump administration to calibrate its expectations accordingly. However, no U.S. administration has ever brought this level of pressure against Maduro and his coterie, and certainly none have opened the toolbox to kinetic options.

Trump is right to understand that something different, novel, and unprecedented must be tried against Maduro, even if that something is not a full-blown ground invasion and its attendant risks that most Americans would rightly oppose. Now that the southern Caribbean deployment has reached record numbers, aiming for regime collapse appears to be a middle ground strategy with some chance of success and acceptable risks to the United States.