A US warship has docked in the capital of Trinidad and Tobago, as US President Donald Trump increases military pressure on Venezuela.
The guided missile destroyer, USS Gravely, is in addition to the aircraft carrier USS Gerald R Ford, which is moving closer to Venezuela.
President Trump has accused the country’s president, Nicolas Maduro, of being the leader of an organised crime gang but has not offered any evidence.
President Maduro has called the deployment of warships an attempt by the US government to “invent a new eternal war” against his country.
Government officials in Trinidad and Tobago and from the US said the warship will remain in Trinidad until Thursday for training exercises.
Venezuela’s government has since issued a statement condemning what it called a military provocation by Trinidad and Tobago and the US.
The country claimed it captured a group of mercenaries “with direct information of the American intelligence agency” who intended to carry out a false flag attack in the region.
The statement from vice president Delcy Rodriguez did not give any details or evidence of the alleged false flag attack.
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Jenifer Neidhart de Ortiz, the US Embassy’s charge d’affaires, said the exercises sought to “address shared threats like transnational crime and build resilience through training, humanitarian missions, and security efforts”.
A senior military official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the move was only recently scheduled.
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The presence of the ship is controversial for some.
“This is a warship in Trinidad, which will be anchored here for several days just miles off Venezuela when there’s a threat of war,” said David Abdulah, leader of the Movement for Social Justice political party.
“That’s an abomination.”
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Trinidad and Tobago’s Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar is a supporter of the deadly US strikes on suspected drug boats in waters off Venezuela.
On Friday, the US secretary of war claimed six “narco-terrorists” had been killed in a strike on an alleged drug smuggling boat in the Caribbean Sea.
Chief correspondent
The question is simple – is this really all about President Trump’s war on drugs in South America?
I doubt it. A sledgehammer to crack a nut that isn’t even there.
There are a few reasons to doubt the American government’s stated aim of wiping out these so-called “narco terrorist” gangs threatening the US from Venezuela, even after one takes out of the equation the sort of equipment the military is deploying – which isn’t what they would need for effective drug smuggling interdiction.
While the president acknowledges that the synthetic opioid fentanyl is a huge killer in the US (which it is) and is supplied by drug gangs (which it is), to blame Venezuela for fentanyl production is simply incorrect.
Mexican cartels produce fentanyl with precursors largely supplied from China, and it is from Mexico – America’s neighbour – that the fentanyl is smuggled directly into the US across its southern border.
Venezuela isn’t involved in this fentanyl business in any meaningful way, and I know this because I have reported from the Sinaloa cartel’s fentanyl production labs in Mexico.
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Pete Hegseth said his military had bombed a vessel, which he claimed was operated by Tren de Aragua – a Venezuelan gang that was designated a terror group by Washington in February.
Speaking during a White House news conference last week, Donald Trump argued the campaign against suspected smugglers from Venezuela would help tackle the opioid crisis in the US.
“Every boat that we knock out, we save 25,000 American lives. So every time you see a boat, and you feel badly you say, ‘Wow, that’s rough’. It is rough, but if you lose three people and save 25,000 people,” he said.
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Some Democratic politicians have expressed concerns that the strikes risk dragging the US into a war with Venezuela because of their proximity to the South American country’s coast.
Others have condemned the attacks as extrajudicial killings that would not stand up in a court of law.
