U.S. forces stop second tanker off the coast of Venezuela after Trump vows oil ‘blockade’
On Saturday, US forces stopped an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela for the second time in less than two weeks, while President Donald Trump continues to intensify pressure on Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.
The pre-dawn operation comes days after Trump announced a “blockade” on all sanctioned oil tankers coming in and out of the South American country, and following the December 10 seizure of an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela by US forces.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem confirmed that the US Coast Guard, with the assistance of the Department of Defense, stopped the oil tanker that had last docked in Venezuela. It also posted on social media an unclassified video of an American helicopter landing on a ship called Century.
A Panama-flagged crude oil tanker is operating under that name and was recently spotted near the Venezuelan coast, according to MarineTraffic, a project that tracks ship movements around the world using publicly available data. It was not immediately clear whether the ship was subject to US sanctions.
“The United States will continue to pursue the illicit movement of sanctioned oil used to fund drug terrorism in the region. We will find you and we will stop you,” Noem wrote on X.
The action was an “approved boarding,” in which the tanker voluntarily stopped and allowed U.S. forces to board, according to a U.S. official who was not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.
Pentagon and White House officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
In a statement on Saturday, the Venezuelan government described the actions of US forces as “criminal” and pledged not to allow them “to escape punishment” by pursuing various legal avenues, including filing complaints with the UN Security Council.
“The Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela categorically condemns and rejects the theft and hijacking of another private ship transporting Venezuelan oil, as well as the forced disappearance of its crew, committed by US military personnel in international waters,” the statement read.
After seizing the first tanker, a ship called Skipper, Trump pledged this month that the United States would implement a blockade of Venezuela. It all comes as Trump has escalated his rhetoric toward Maduro and warned that the longtime Venezuelan leader’s days in power are numbered.
This week, the president called on Venezuela to return the assets it seized from American oil companies years ago, once again justifying his announcement of a “blockade” on oil tankers traveling to and from the South American country that faces US sanctions.
Trump cited lost US investments in Venezuela when asked about his latest tactics in the pressure campaign against Maduro, suggesting that the Republican administration’s moves are at least somewhat motivated by disputes over oil investments, along with accusations of drug trafficking. Some sanctioned tankers have already begun diverting away from Venezuela.
“We’re not going to let anyone get through,” Trump told reporters earlier this week. “You remember they took all our energy rights. They took all our oil not long ago. And we want it back. They took it, they took it illegally.”
American oil companies dominated Venezuela’s oil industry until the country’s leaders moved to nationalize the sector, first in the 1970s and again in the 21st century under Maduro and his predecessor Hugo Chavez. The compensation provided by Venezuela was deemed insufficient, and in 2014, an international arbitration panel ordered the country’s socialist government to pay $1.6 billion to ExxonMobil.
The targeting of tankers comes as Trump ordered the Department of Defense to carry out a series of attacks on ships in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific that his administration claims are smuggling fentanyl and other illicit drugs into the United States and beyond.
At least 104 people have been killed in 28 known raids since early September.
The strikes have faced scrutiny from US lawmakers and human rights activists, who say the administration has provided little evidence that its targets are actually drug traffickers, and that the deadly strikes amount to extrajudicial killing.
The Coast Guard, with occasional assistance from the Navy, typically intercepted suspected drug-smuggling boats in the Caribbean Sea, searched for illicit goods, and arrested the people on board for prosecution.
The administration justified the strikes as necessary, stressing that it was in an “armed conflict” with drug gangs with the aim of stopping the flow of drugs into the United States. Maduro faces federal charges of drug-related terrorism in the United States
The United States in recent months has sent a fleet of warships to the region, the largest troop buildup in generations, and Trump has repeatedly said ground attacks are coming soon.
Maduro insists that the real goal of US military operations is to force him from power.
White House chief of staff Susie Wiles said in an interview with Vanity Fair magazine published this week that Trump “wants to keep blowing up boats until Maduro cries.”
This story originally appeared on Fortune.com
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2025-12-21 01:19:00
