US President Donald Trump has ordered an amphibious armada, including three missile destroyers and an equal number of helicopter landing craft with 2,200-4,000 Marines, to be deployed off Venezuela, as part of the fight against “drug trafficking”, Reuters and AFP news agency sources told his government yesterday (Wednesday), against the backdrop of a further escalation of already high tensions between Washington and Caracas.

The two countries have been at loggerheads for years and a build-up of forces is being recorded as US President Trump steps up pressure on his Venezuelan counterpart Nicolas Maduro: in early August, the reward for information that would allow his arrest for “drug trafficking” was doubled to $50 million.

According to Reuters sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, the USS San Antonio, USS Iwo Jima and USS Fort Lauderdale, with 4,500 US military personnel, including 2,200 Marines, are expected to have arrived in the area possibly as early as Sunday.

In addition to them, at least three other warships, the USS Gravely, USS Jason Dunham and USS Sampson, have been ordered to sail to the area. These are destroyers equipped with guided missiles and the Arleigh Burke class Aegis system. At least one submarine is also expected in the area.

According to US media, some 4,000 Marines are expected to be sent to the area near the Venezuelan coast.

Donald Trump is drawing on the fight against drug trafficking to justify several spectacular decisions he has made since his return to the White House in January, from customs tariffs in Mexico and Canada to a wave of arrests of migrants from Latin America.

The US government, which does not recognise the victory – disputed by the opposition – of Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela’s July 2024 presidential election, accuses him of being the “head” of an international “drug trafficking network”.

White House spokeswoman Caroline Levitt called the Venezuelan government a “drug cartel” and President Maduro the “fugitive leader of that cartel” the other Tuesday.

Asked about the possibility of US armed forces taking action in Venezuela, she said Donald Trump would use “all means” to “prevent drugs from flooding our country.”

After calling the increase in the US reward for his arrest “pathetic” and a “crude political propaganda operation”, President Maduro announced on Monday that 4.5 million militiamen would be deployed to “guarantee coverage of all of Venezuela’s territory”.

The Latin American country’s national guard was established by the late former president Hugo Chavez, whose political heir Maduro is seen as. According to official sources, it has some 5 million members, civilian or reserve, and reports to the general staff.