Trump's Venezuela claims raise questions about planning, former diplomats say

President Donald Trump has made broad but vague assertions that the United States will “run” Venezuela following the ouster of Nicolás Maduro, while providing almost no details about how that governance would work, raising concerns among former diplomats and some lawmakers about the administration’s level of planning.

Seemingly contradictory public statements from Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio have left unclear whether the U.S. now controls Venezuela’s levers of power or intends to allow Maduro’s subordinates to remain in leadership positions. Current U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said they were not aware of any preparations for a military occupation or interim civilian governing authority.

The uncertainty draws pointed comparisons to U.S. military interventions in Iraq in 2003 and Panama in 1989, where months or years of interagency planning preceded the removal of autocratic leaders — yet still fell short of their hoped-for outcomes.

Mixed signals from Trump and Rubio

Dan Fried, a retired career diplomat who served as assistant secretary of state and sanctions coordinator under both Democratic and Republican administrations, said the administration’s public statements offered little clarity. Fried is now a fellow at the Atlantic Council.

“It strikes me that we have no idea whatsoever as to what’s next,” Fried said.

He said the discrepancy between Trump’s and Rubio’s public remarks pointed to internal disagreement. “For good operational reasons, there were very few people who knew about the raid, but Trump’s remarks about running the country and Rubio’s uncomfortable walk back suggests that even within that small group of people, there is disagreement about how to proceed,” Fried said.

Rubio said the U.S. would rely on existing sanctions on Venezuela’s oil sector and criminal gangs to wield leverage with Maduro’s successors.

Supporters argue U.S. leverage is sufficient

Supporters of the operation pushed back on the notion of confusion. Rich Goldberg, who worked at the National Energy Dominance Council at the White House until last year and is now a senior adviser to the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, said Trump’s public statements should not be read as policy ambiguity.

“The president speaks in big headlines and euphemisms,” Goldberg said. “Effectively, the U.S. will be calling the shots.”

“There are people at the top who can make what we want happen or not, and we right now control their purse strings and their lives,” Goldberg said. “The president thinks it’s enough and the secretary thinks it’s enough, and if it’s not enough, we’ll know very soon and we’ll deal with it.”

Historical comparisons raise caution flags

Previous military actions that removed autocratic leaders in Panama in 1989 and Iraq in 2003 were preceded by months, if not years, of interagency planning involving the State Department, the White House National Security Council, the Pentagon, and the intelligence community. Even that preparation did not guarantee the outcomes those administrations sought.

Venezuela presents a larger challenge than Panama. Venezuela is vastly larger in population and territory and has a decades-long history of animosity toward the United States. Panama had longstanding ties to the U.S. and a relatively compact political transition.

Fried said Panama’s operation succeeded not because of international support — which it lacked — but because it led to a swift democratic transfer of power. He expressed concern about Trump’s apparent dismissal of opposition leader María Corina Machado, whose party is widely believed to have won Venezuela’s 2024 elections, results that Maduro refused to accept.

“Panama was not successful because it was supported internationally because it wasn’t,” Fried said. “It was a success because it led to a quick, smooth transfer to a democratic government. That would be a success here, but on the first day out, we trashed someone who had those credentials, and that strikes me as daft.”

Trump said that Machado “doesn’t have the support within or the respect within the country” to be a credible leader and suggested he would be comfortable with Maduro’s No. 2, Delcy Rodríguez, remaining in power as long as she cooperates with the United States.

Rubio sought to distinguish the Venezuela situation from past Middle East interventions. “Venezuela looks nothing like Libya, it looks nothing like Iraq, it looks nothing like Afghanistan. It looks nothing like the Middle East,” Rubio said. “These are Western countries with long traditions at a people-to-people and cultural level, and ties to the United States, so it’s nothing like that.”

Republican skeptics raise costs and rationale

Trump campaigned on extricating the United States from foreign wars and entanglements, a position backed by many of his supporters, and some within his party expressed unease about the Venezuela operation’s scope and stated purpose.

Rep. Thomas Massie, Republican of Kentucky, posted on X: “Wake up MAGA. VENEZUELA is not about drugs; it’s about OIL and REGIME CHANGE. This is not what we voted for.”

Sen. Rand Paul, also of Kentucky, wrote on social media: “Time will tell if regime change in Venezuela is successful without significant monetary or human cost.” He added: “Easy enough to argue such policy when the action is short, swift and effective but glaringly less so when that unitary power drains of us trillions of dollars and thousands of lives, such as occurred in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Vietnam.”

Trump is also preparing to chair an as-yet unformed Board of Peace to govern postwar Gaza, extending U.S. involvement into a second long-term foreign governance commitment alongside Venezuela.