US imperialism seeks to escalate conflicts in the Caribbean

The United States has stolen a Venezuelan plane again; this time, their target was a Presidential plane of Head of State Nicolás Maduro Moros. The empire stole the Dassault Falcon 900EX aircraft with the T7-ESPRT plate, this time in the Dominican Republic.

The operation, led by the imperial Department of Justice, in its statement on the event, informs that the aircraft was transferred to the Southern District of the state of Florida, to the city of Fort Lauderdale. The Department of Commerce and the Department of Homeland Security were also involved in the investigation and the illegal seizure actions of the vehicle.

The US judicial entity alleges that, at the request of the United States to the Dominican Republic, the seizure was based on "violations of US export controls and sanctions laws."

This is the second case of illegal confiscation of Venezuelan aircraft this year, after the theft of the Boeing 747-300M, owned by the Venezuelan company Emtrasur, with the support of the Argentine Nazi puppet regime of Javier Milei on February 12, which concluded a two-year-long confiscation process of the Venezuelan asset. It was first seized by the failed weak and traitorous social-democrat government of Alberto Fernández.

Regarding the Dassault Falcon 900EX, the United States argues that the action is covered by Executive Order 13,884, issued by then-President Donald Trump in 2019, which "prohibits U.S. persons from conducting transactions with persons who have acted or intend to act directly or indirectly for or on behalf of the government of Venezuela, including as members of the so-called “Maduro regime."

The plane, according to the imperial Department of Justice, was purchased by the Venezuelan state through a company in a third country, being that of American origin. According to the AP report, the "third country" would be Saint Vincent and the Grenadines — whose government is an ally of Venezuela in the Caribbean.

In turn, the statement says, "the Department of Commerce has also imposed export controls for items destined, in whole or in part, to a Venezuelan military or military intelligence end user." According to the judicial entity, the aircraft "has flown almost exclusively to and from a military base in Venezuela and has been used for the benefit of Maduro and his representatives, including to transport Maduro on visits to other countries."

In addition, and it is not a minor fact, the Department of in-Justice charged the Venezuelan President with alleged and false charges in March 2020, the origin of a sinister arrest warrant against him. This is another maneuver that directly targets President Nicolás Maduro, in a context of ignorance of Venezuelan Institutions after his Electoral Triumph on July 28.

Although the theft of the plane is a material fact, it operates on the perceptive side at a time when the process of counterrevolutionary/reactionary “regime change” in the sector represented by petite-yankee María Violencia Machado Zuluaga is in a phase of little attention at the international level.

In this way, the United States seems to use the resort of illegal sanctions to carry out actions that refloat the agenda at once. But in addition, the fact presents extra nuances of criminality since the United States maintains the essential objective of the sanctions against Venezuela: the pressure for continuous deterioration around the persecution of State Assets abroad.

A process that had had an aggressive phase before 2024 and that Washington is resuming specifically with an asset that was located abroad, in territory politically co-opted by American influence, a unique opportunity to execute the illegal confiscation under the pretext of the sanctions program; after having spent most of its ammunition on the economic, financial, and commercial blockade for more than five years, an initiative led by the Treasury Department during the vicious Trump era.

However, the Bloomberg article published on Monday, September 2, reports that Joe Biden's government will announce the imposition of individual sanctions on 15 "Maduro-affiliated officials who, it claims, 'obstructed the holding of free and fair presidential elections,' according to documents seen by Bloomberg." The move is expected to happen this week. Double play: the theft of the plane and the imposition of individual sanctions as an effective measure in the post-J28 context.

On the other hand, such a criminal hijacking of the plane could be an immediate precedent of the kind of decisions that the desperate US Empire could make about Venezuela. In fact, this theft means the first major post-J28 step by the US authorities against the Venezuelan state in general, and President Nicolás Maduro in particular.

Another New Chapter in U.S.'s Criminal Policy

Last July, within the framework of the Presidential Elections, the Bolivarian Government of Venezuela suspended commercial flights to the Dominican Republic, as well as ordered the withdrawal of its Ambassador, along with those of six other countries, "in the face of interventionist actions and statements (...) trying to reissue the failed and defeated Lima Group."

A sovereignty resolution that had its reply in the acquiescence of the Dominican government to carry out the theft of the Dassault Falcon 900EX. Before the event, the Venezuelan Foreign Ministry issued a statement describing the operation of the United States as "piracy," noting that the U.S. government "has illegally confiscated an aircraft used by the President of the Republic, justifying itself in the coercive measures that it unilaterally and illegally imposes around the world."

The official text also characterizes the maneuver as "an example of the supposed 'rules-based order,' which, disregarding International Law, seeks to establish the law of the strongest, create norms that fit their interests, and execute them with total impunity."

Unilateral coercive measures such as "criminal policy" — words of the Foreign Ministry — continue to operate without restrictions despite the narrative that considers the regime of licenses issued by the Treasury Department as a relief or lifting of sanctions, when it is really a matter of a particular management of these given the energy and geopolitical needs of the United States' imperial death machine.

To this must be added the fact that, due to the pressure on the Dominican Republic, the United States gets in the way and undermines Venezuela's relations with other countries in the region, which it has tried with other governments such as those of Lula da Silva and Gustavo Petro.

The island nation was a signatory to the Petrocaribe agreement in 2005; however, according to Venezuela's tensions with the United States, the Dominican government of the day has leaned towards the resolutions of the North American nation: for example, in 2018, Santo Domingo ignored the results of the Presidential Elections that Nicolás Maduro won, followed by the suspension of diplomatic relations. So there is an immediate precedent for what happened after July 28.

Now, with the act of piracy of another Venezuelan State Owned Asset, a new chapter is being written in the saga of coercive measures against Venezuela, escalating tension and putting relations with the Dominican Republic—and, therefore, with the North American late empire—on the brink.

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