TrueValueMetrics ... Impact Accounting for the 21st Century

Date: 2026-03-03 Page is: DBtxt003.php txt00029474

VENEZUELA FALL OF MADURO ... Times Radio with Malcolm Nance How Trump got Maduro and why it doesn’t add up PLAY YOUTUBE VIDEO Original article: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PRtkjIGZ4UQ
How Trump got Maduro and why it doesn’t add up \| Malcolm Nance Times Radio Jan 5, 2026 1.63M subscribers ... 666,165 views ... 20K likes The Trump Report 'You can have all the rhetoric you want, airplanes can come in and bomb stuff, but you can't kill 25 million people. The fight will have to take place on the ground if Trump thinks he's now going to invade Venezuela' As the dust settles on Trump's raid on Caracas Maduro's supporters appear to have held on to power, and might have had a hand in his downfall, Malcolm Nance, US navy intelligence veteran and analyst, tells The Trump Report on #timesradio Join this channel to get access to perks - / @listentotimesradio 📻 Listen to Times Radio - https://www.thetimes.co.uk/radio 🗞 Subscribe to The Times https://www.thetimes.co.uk/subscribe/... 📲 Get the free Times Radio app https://www.thetimes.co.uk/radio/how-... Peter Burgess COMMENTARY Peter Burgess Transcript 0:00 The mission itself has a lot of facets that I have enormous amount of questions in. Why was it so easy? Because it was very easy. And how do you get Maduro in bed when the country is being hit by over 100 2,000 pound bombs? We use that bomb, the graphite bomb, which goes into the electrical substations, blows up over them, and shorts out the entire substation. What's missing from this is where was the armed forces of Venezuela's military forces? If there was the art of the deal being carried out here, it was carried out over the last four months with the assistance of the CIA and other governments uh where the government of Venezuela had him already controlled and packaged and turned over and all they had to do was go in and neutralize the final group for show and and walk him out because 28 minutes in and out from Trinidad is a 1:00 little fast. Hello and welcome to the Trump Report. I'm Luis Sykes. Today we are joined by Malcolm Nance, intelligence and foreign policy analyst and a former cryptologist in the US Navy. Malcolm, welcome back. Good to see you. It's great to have you back on with us, Malcolm. You've really been keeping us a breast of uh what's going on in Venezuela at the moment and and we at Times Radio and our audience are of course very grateful for that. Well, Nicholas Majur is currently on his way to a New York courtroom, it seems. uh we'll discuss where that leaves Venezuela and who is actually pulling the strings there now. But first of all, I wanted to look back at that raid on Caracus as as more details have emerged today. Uh which our audience can also read about in the Times. Let's break this down. We know this started with a stealth reconnaissance drone guiding in this massive fleet of aircraft. Um what was that made up of and what do they seem to have actually done? because we've seen a lot of uh bangs and crashes 2:01 over the weekend. Well, let's step back because it probably wasn't just that stealth drone, right? That's just one. The you know, the RQ170 drone is a high altitude surveillance drone, but it's still an aerial platform, right? Aerial platforms can get bounced around by turbulence and crash, right? So, we would never rely just on that. But going all the way back, this started in August when the uh war on drugs was forming. But it really was part of an intelligence uh finding presidential memorandum which was signed in July which sent CIA and other you know military assets into the region. So this is a very very long lead. The only question was what were all those forces going to do when they arrived? And as we saw, they started sinking drug boats, which technically were extra legal uh you know, murders because there was no there's no justification to sink someone in a in a small craft without any legal 3:02 finding or even knowing what they have in there. So that created a lot of consternation. But Trump is executing, let's go to the 100,000 meter look, right? Trump is executing a policy that he has very clearly discussed with Vladimir Putin and is part of a Putinist doctrine that was developed by a man named Alexander Duggin. Uh the the neo-urasianist theory in which Europe would fall under the influence and control of Russia. the United States would take control of the western hemisphere. allah the Monroe doctrine of the 1840s uh which led up to the Mexican-American war and China would be given you know full run of the house of Africa uh parts of the Indian subcontinent and Asia and that would that has actually now happened okay everyone thought that's fanciful you know the Atlantic alliance set in 1941 which has been going right up until the day we invaded we attacked Venezuela 4:05 has been about the maintenance of those ties between Europe and the United States and a rules-based world order. Before I can talk about bombs, helicopters and gun, you know, you know, helicopter rides, bombs, guns, and helicopter rides as we call it, you need to understand what the politics of this is. So Trump has clearly adopted with Vladimir Putin's acquiescence or or agreement this philosophy. Um, by the way, it was developed by a game guy named Alexander Duggin. And Duggin's immediate ideological successor in the United States is Steve Bannon, who was Trump's closest adviser for 10 years, who thoroughly believes in this dividing the world up into three polls, a tripolar world. It is now in effect. So Trump has decided his first major act would be to come down to Venezuela, force the ending of the Maduro regime, reseize oil field assets that belong 5:05 that were developed in conjunction with the previous governments of Colombia which are not actually the property of the United States, right? They're done in joint partnerships and essentially gain control of the oil reserves of Venezuela, which is 25 billion barrels of oil. It's not this fancible 300 billion people are talking about. That's the real objective here. Nothing else. It is about oil and Trump announcing the launch of his new Don Row doctrine, right? which he tweeted out in and his secretary of defense tweeted out a picture of Donald Trump with a long tie with a big stick reminiscent of the old Monroe Doctrine cartoon with one foot on South America and one foot on Canada. So, interestingly, he intends, as he said in his press conference yesterday, to use American power to do 6:01 what he wants. And he by removing Maduro, right, is now saying he can dictate to the current government of Venezuela what they will do or he will kill or kidnap them. He had literally said that. So now that brings us to the bombs, guns, and helicopter rides, right? Um the mission itself has a lot of facets that I have enormous amount of questions in. And anyone who's been in an intelligence or government uh foreign policy would need to ask why was it so easy? Because it was very easy. Um and when I say easy, I mean in the sense there have been a lot of questions about was this done in coordination with elements within Venezuela? Was he kind of given up perhaps by by by his inner circle? Well, if you look at it, the entirety of the armed forces was not on alert, was not ready uh other than a few basic radar systems. Um, you know, I mean, they estimate that they killed about 80 7:03 people and out of them 30 were the Cuban bodyguards who protected Maduro himself, right? That's his immediate immediate close protection detail. Those are the guys who follow him in the armored vehicles, who secure his residencia, the interior of the residentia, and who guard the doors leading up to him or wherever safe room that he would have where he and his wife would be operating from. So, that's typical. What's missing from this is where was the armed forces of Venezuela's military forces that would be providing providing the perimeter security, the primary perimeter security, the intermediate perimeter security and then access to the building which would lead them to the 30man bodyguard. Where were they? Another group that we would want to know is why would the police who would be closing the roads leading up to a residencia, where are they? So, and how 8:04 do you get Maduro in bed as they allege that he jumped up and was running to a safe room when the country is being hit by over 100 2,000 lb bombs, right? No one's going to sleep through that. I've I mean I've been through some hairy stuff, but no one's going to sleep through when you can see out his window the city being bombarded. He would have already been by his personal security detail brought to a safe room, sequestered in there with a lot of security. He himself like Saddam, they would have had their own weapon with him. Right. Uh fascinating story leads a lot of questions to make the opposition claim that it was a negotiated withdraw, negotiated transfer, right? And that negotiated transfer could have been carried out by anyone in the government. One of two people actually uh uh what's his name? General Vladimir Pedrino Lopez, the minister of defense who had 9:01 the resources to fight the Americans and didn't. Minimal gunfire was happening. One surfaceto-air missile was launched at one military base. Minimal gunfire. and the minister of the interior, right? This cabello, this guy controls a half a million person paramilitary force. So if there was the art of the deal being carried out here, it was carried out over the last four months with the assistance of the CIA and other governments uh where the government of Venezuela had him already controlled and packaged and turned over. And when Delta Force landed, they landed on a compound that, you know, was already secure. And all they had to do was go in and neutralize the final group for show and and walk him out because 28 minutes in and out from Trinidad is a little fast. Yeah. Well, and and we talk about the the signs that Majura would have seen that this was about to happen. The Chinese told him. 10:04 Well, indeed. Uh, not just not just the the explosions themselves, but we we we're told the entire power supply to Karakas was cut off. That's likely been done by something called a BLU14B graphite bomb. Right. Is that what was what was used, do we think? How does that work? And and would that fit the profile? That's possible. Uh the first time that this weapon uh came into use, some of you might remember back in the 1990s when we bombed Belgrade Serbia. Uh we were having the micro Serbia war. Uh we use that bomb, the graphite bomb, which goes into the electrical substations, blows up over them, and shorts out the entire substation. That of course cuts all electrical power to whatever sector of the city you want. The entire city wasn't done. And we could see from videos that parts of the city were in operation. But if it's going to be the pathway to where you're going to up in the residentia and all these things, 11:03 yeah, that would have happened. Another thing that makes you ask questions, did he nav no senior staff? You know, I mean, everyone has a chief of staff. Everyone has butlers, you know, in these compounds. You have an intelligence staff. you have an com liaison to the commander of the armed forces who would have his own secure communications to you. So the whole he was in his bed just doesn't work. He he maybe he has an operation center in there where he's watching for this. And of course everyone knows the Americans like to fly in, right? We like to fly in, do the bin Laden on you and get out. He should have been prepared for the idea that he was going to be killed. and 30 men is not enough to protect you, right? Uh when you're talking about a massive military force. Also, he had no idea. Did he even know that it was a raid versus an invasion? Because at my first blush, I thought based on some of 12:01 the reporting it was an invasion where we were landing Marines because there were some misidentifications of helicopters and things like that. But in fact, um it was all US special operations. and the thing we do the best, which is drop bombs on you before you even know you're what's going on. And and I'm interested as well in that in that uh special operations team that went in because they they were reportedly uh assisted by by US law enforcement. They even had an FBI hostage negotiator with them apparently if they thought that that Majiraa was going to lock himself in a in a safe room and they'd have to get him out. Um, is that a standard composition for this sort of snatch and grab or something they've done bespoke for Majura? What does that tell us about how this operation was put together? Well, every mission is bespoke, right? Uh, but this is 1989. This is Manuel Noriega being holed up in first his residencia and then going over to the Papa Nunio, right? Where they had to blast him out with music, white noise, and negotiations over two weeks, right? 13:06 Same scenario, drug lord, hold up, arrested, brought out the premise of this military operation, which let no one make a mistake when they say it was a law enforcement operation. That is just a lie. The Geneva Convention of 1949 states that a state of armed conflict exists when the first attacks are launched even if one of the parties does not recognize they are in a state of armed conflict. So all of the rules of the Geneva Convention had to kick in um that they brought with them one DEA agent uh or one FBI officer to affect an arrest. Um, I'm almost dead certain that person was not on the helicopters. You don't want to, you know, that's that guy would have been on the ship that they bought you back to. The snatch requires 14:04 you, you know, every gun, right? Even if he's a well-trained DEA has a lot of SWAT teams, FBI, same thing. Um, you could have had a a judge advocate general who was a member of the KAG of the of the Delta Force on board who could have, you know, made sure everything was being done in accordance. But, um, the whole promise was that from the attorney general that this was not a military operation. It was a law enforcement operation where they were capturing a fugitive. It just doesn't work like that in terms of all legalities. The president had an enormous amount of requirements that he was required to do. Notifications, he refused to do them. Um, didn't notify Congress, didn't notify House Senate intelligence committees, just did him on his own whim after setting this operation up. And but he did notify the oil companies, which is interesting that they would be getting their assets back. So, the mission going in battling, killing the 15:04 final bodyguards around him, which is relatively easy, right? Uh, and then him already to walk out to a helicopter. Any other circumstance, you would had to blast him out. You would have been on the ground for hours. So, interesting that that you say a hostage negotiator. Um, they're not negotiating. They would have blown the place to pieces. Well, and and as we mentioned before, along with that Sentinel uh drone which had been tracking Majurro for some time, there's also apparently been that CIA team tracking Majiro since roughly August it's being reported. Right. That's something you yourself pointed out in a previous episode of the Trump report. I I should add I think probably in September or maybe August. Um ju just give us an idea then as you were earlier what that team might have been getting up to. How do you track Nicholas Majiro for such a long amount of time? Well, first off, he's a he's the principal of the country, so it's not hard to track him. He's got a schedule, 16:02 right? He's got he's got a you know, he's got a social secretary and uh a chief of staff and a uh you know, a uh a person who has a resource listing for all the vehicles that have to go out, the fuel allocations. There's an enormous amount of intelligence that goes into moving a VVIP from point A to point V B. So the Central Intelligence Agency, not just them, plus the Joint Special Operations Command have numerous resources that they can use. The first is using case officers to go down there and buy the loyalty or work the loyalties of people who know the most about this. We could have used other resources and assets. Other countries have agents and assets that can report to us through our third parties. Like, you know, you never know, an Ecuadorian intelligence officer could be running a guy who's inside the residencia and he for the low amount of $50 million will give you that little bit of information and then you pick it up. CIA officers on 17:04 the ground there or more importantly paramilitary officers who would be the the spearheads and the pathfinders for the US military and they work together quite quite easily. So that you would put into place and what you would do is you just watch the building. You pay the little lady who's selling uh you know you know empanadas out front you know to let you know when Maduro does Maduro come by here every day and then you start you infusing this with space-based resources right satellites dronebased resources like the RQ170 uh you know which is a very high altitude high-flying drone um and other drones that you know are generally not talked about. So these are relatively relatively easy things when you're talking about a VVIP. Also, he had just met the Chinese delegation 3 or 4 hours before which gave you a fixed final location. Uh that fixed final location, 18:04 you can vector off of that. Did he relieve the residencia? Did he leave his wife there and then go off in a jeep to go see his mistress? All of these things, right? these, you know, his movement, his his his pattern of life is what we would call that. And and as a VVIP, he's got people he invites over for dinner, right? So, if his favorite doctor, his favorite uh, you know, politician comes over, the vice president comes over, they also have a network of communications around them, right? and that will be in Spanish language in which you know security vehicles will talk the uh telephone calls from the vice president whatever this this is just not outside of our realm of of of copying as we say in my world right uh and that will tell you the truth uh same thing with his own phone we don't know if we had access to his phone I have this saying right the president you know a VVIP always lies to 19:05 his wife never lies to his mistress so if he knew something was really coming. He'd be telling his boo boo to go get the kids or get get your, you know, your your stripper clothes and take a suitcase and go over to the holiday, you know, the the Intercontinental, you know, or go to Colombia. That's real. That is not a joke. Uh, you know, and then of course he leaves the, you know, the fat wife behind. So the this is multiple layers. When you're talking about an operation that is focused on a single individual or a terminus at one single place, we could input an enormous amount of national and international resources into it. Now that was done. The key question is you know I there's this poem by by Ruard Kipling about you know he I have six uh faithful serving men which is who what when where right uh that's those are the keys to intelligence but the key word is always 20:05 why did we do it this way the terminal effect of removing Nicolam Maduro and his wife only right killing his Cuban bodyguards Why? What was the effect that you expected? Did Maduro negotiate his own self out? Did Naguro, you know, why then did the opposition, as the opposition says, it was a negotiated exit. Was the minister of defense the opposition, right? Because this looks closer to a soft who where there usually when there's turmoil, where there's a change of regime, there's gunfire, bank robberies, crime goes out the window, law goes rule, you know, world without rule of law uh goes into effect. The criminal gangs, the trenda, they could be running cities right now and living in the central bank with tons of gold. They could be running the country. Why did 21:01 none of this happen? So, and and and yeah, I mean, Nicholas Majura himself seems pretty upbeat about the whole situation. He's come off double thumbs up on the way. Exactly. He's come off the boat, flown into New York. He's he's probably in a a New York courtroom as we're speaking. And yet, every time he's caught on a camera, he's smiling, thumbs up, waving, saying happy new year to the the the DEA agents. Um I I I've seen that before. Where does this leave Venezuela itself though? I mean, let's let's kind of lay out the pieces if we can here. Um, in the aftermath, we, as you've noted, there's there's possibly even Cuban troops in Venezuela, maybe as many as 20,000. The rest of the Venezuelan military seems to be intact there. There's governmentbacked militias. There's even Colombian guerrilla groups around the western border. And of course, the US Navy and that that naval group is still off off Venez Venezuela's northern shores. Who's in charge as of today, Monday, and what is the risk of 22:04 this actually destabilizing? You know, they call the people who follow Madura um who were the the political heirs of the Hugo Chavez um era of of radical socialist capitalist warlording, right? Uh that hybrid, you know, get rid of the socialist capitalist, the radical warlord, right? And Hugo Chavez, his followers are known as chavistas. And everyone who follows Maduro are chavistas. The government has now been left in place with the vice president. It was a lead chavista. The minister of defense, Chavista. The minister of the interior, Chavista. So here's what's happened. Nicholas Maduro left Venezuela. That's it. Nothing else has changed. the relationships. I mean, they are all taking this defiant tone. Maduro's our president. Please return him. That's what you would do when you've turned your buddy in and you now have the reigns of power. So, nothing has 23:06 changed. Trump has somehow got it into his head that he has been assured that they will do whatever he wants or he could just drop more bombs and that would change the dynamic. That's not true. They could resist at the wat's edge. They could, you know, rig the oil fields to blow up even though it's in their interest. Just in the last 24 hours or 48 hours, every one of the sanctioned breaking tankers that were in that country, 14 right now are moving and they are heading out to the high seas uh turning off their locator beacons and they are duping the US Navy and they're probably the bulk of them will get away with their oil loads. And there are 88 other sanctioned vessels around the world uh that were associated with Russia and 24:00 Iran and and and Venezuelan oil that will do that. Another that will get away. Another component of this is a lot of that oil went to Cuba and this is where Cuba gained resources. Right now that oil will have to come from Russia to Cuba if if they want to sustain themselves. And this may have been block number one to get to block number two, which is the overthrow of the government in Cuba. And Marco Rubio and Donald Trump yesterday said Cuba's next. If that's the case, now I think we've been here before. It was called the SpanishAmerican War, right? It was started on a false flag operation, an accident that occurred in the USS Maine's boiler system, and we took over Cuba and the Philippines uh fighting Spain in that way. And it lasted right up until the communists kicked us out in the 1950s. Please go refer to the Godfather 2 if you'd like the details of that. Right. Uh you know, which was the Bastista government, a corrupt corrupt 25:04 capitalist uh government run on drugs, gambling, and and rum. That's what Donald Trump is saying they want to reinstall back into Cuba. The Cuban people have something to say about this, too. many will go along with it. But, you know, the the the political aspect of this shows a president who who said Panama could be next, right? He has a fantasy that Venezuela was full of Chinese troops and Chinese ships. He says the same thing about Panama. he threatened Greenland uh where I'm going back to because that is most likely the lowest hanging fruit uh you know for him to try to seize Greenland from Denmark which would start in NATO versus United States war or as I told the one of the senior principles in Denmark the first DanishAmerican war uh and Denmark has put troops and weapons there since I was 26:00 there. Uh but now they are full of themselves if you listen to them in the news that they can do any damn thing they want in the Western Hemisphere. This is madness. And right now because there is no Congress to control them, there's a Duma, right? A Russian state-like government that just rubber stamps everything, a pallet bureau that rubber stamps anything Trump does. But people will start dying soon if we execute any of these ridiculous fantasies. Actually, when you and I spoke about Greenland, there's 50,000 people there. There are 30,000 high caliber silenced caribou hunting rifles there of, you know, 300 Win Mag or higher. I mean, these guys, you think these people won't defend their sovereignity, then somebody will pull the full avatar on you, right? will stand up against you. And you know, you think that they're a bunch of peaceloving hippies or they're Cubanos 27:02 who are just going to roll over and say, 'Yay, we can all go to Miami.' Uh-uh. This could get very, very nasty. And and it's not even clear if this is quite yet mission successful in Venezuela, is it? I mean, over the weekend, Trump Trump announced that there was going to be a US occupation of Venezuela. Marco Rubio since walked that back, but there does, as you say, still seem to be this plan to somehow take control of the oil industry. Can the US military snatch and grab an entire oil industry? I mean, where does this come? Let's let's give Trump credit for for one time being accurate with his words, okay? And and this is just mark it down on a calendar because this is rare. He said we will run Venezuela. He did not say we will occupy Venezuela. Now, full disclosure, been there on the occupied and run a country thing when I was at the, you know, Republican palace in 28:04 Baghdad on, you know, with El Paul Bremer trying to run Iraq. And as an Arabic speaking intelligence professional, my opinions were not welcome. All right. They wanted to live their fantasy that the Iraqis loved us and they didn't know the difference between Sunna and Shia. All right. So, same thing with this. Trump said they will run Venezuela. Marco Rubio and others have clarified they are going to run it through coercion. They will run it by threatening the lives of the vice president. Then Trump came out yesterday afternoon and said she will do what we say or I will do things to her that are worse than Maduro, which is threatening that person's life. Now, if Malcolm Nance were running Venezuela, I'd be mobilizing a million people with rifles and surfaceto-air missiles and say, 'Okay, we're hearing that we're hearing that more weapons are being handed out to militia groups and civilians as we speak 29:02 as well.' Because you can have all the rhetoric you want. Airplanes can come in and bomb stuff, but you can't kill 25 million people. The fight will have to take place on the ground if Trump thinks he's now going to invade Venezuela. But that's not how he works. You know, I I do a podcast with his his lawyer, Michael Cohen, every week and a former lawyer worked with him every day and he goes, 'No, it's all mafia don stuff. He only wants as much threat as he can give for you to comply. Then once you've complied, he will put you through a ritualistic humiliation and then he will demand things of you that you will do for him publicly and then he has you. The problem is, you know, uh Deli Rodriguez, the vice president, immediately came out and was like, 'No, we're not doing any of the stuff that you said. Trump seems to 30:00 think that this that he that he has somebody there a lot of people there are saying you now have a big stick you can kill anyone you can snatch anyone uh it was only by the grace of God that that a helicopter wasn't shot down although a helicop one of the helicopters that was a troop car was badly damaged and several US personnel were shot and wounded that already plays lie to the to the rumor or to the statement they made that there were zero casualties and you don't know if someone's going to die from their injuries. Uh, you know, but that being said, you can threaten all you want. As I said in one of my tweets, if you don't take that place and and and change it fundamentally, your bite at the apple is over. It's the next bite where they have they could say, 'Hey, we're mobilizing the country. We're nationalizing the oil. You're never getting this back. come and take it. Now you're in a street fight. You're in a jungle fight with people with flipflops. And we have never 31:04 won a war against people in flipflops. So we can say for certain as of right now, the Venezuelan military and government, they're still in control of Venezuela. 100%. Mhm. Oh, let me rephrase. Let me rephrase that. That's not true. 99.8% the 2% is Maduro, right? He's gone. Nothing has changed. And this whoever is saying that it's regime change and there were not public outcries of of of of um excitement and cheers in the streets. Every video we have seen was either AI generated by Elon Musk or was in Miami. Okay. And here's the kicker. Trump has already removed the protective status against the 600,000 Venezuelans in the United States. Mark my words, in the next 48 to 96 hours, Trump will come out 32:00 and say, 'I am sending all the Venezuelans back because the country has gone with Maduro and you're safe.' No, the entire regime that forced those people out is still intact and they have long memories and he would be sending many people back to their deaths. Uh, but this is also immigration warfare is also a component of his, right? Cleansing America of Latinos, that crazy thing that comes from Steven Miller, uh, you know, who the guy who I famously called on Real Time with Bill Maher, Baby Gerbles, right? Uh, this guy, these people are hellbent on this, forcing people out at the same time saying, 'Oh, I cleaned up your country. You have to leave now.' Indeed. Well, there's a lot more to happen with this, I suspect. Now, Malcolm, so I I'm I'm sure we will be talking again about it soon, but Malcolm Nance, intelligence and foreign policy analyst and former cryptologologist in the US Navy, thank you very much for joining me today on the Trump Report. Truly my pleasure. We'll see you soon.

SITE COUNT