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Multiple Explosions in Venezuelan Capital, Maduro Government Blames U.S. Aired 3-4a ET
Aired January 03, 2026 - 03:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): This is CNN breaking news
BEN HUNTE, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Hello, this is CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Ben Hunte. Breaking news from Caracas, where several explosions have rattled the Venezuelan capital. And the government has said in a statement that it is aggression by the United States.
The first blast was recorded at approximately 1:50 am local time early Saturday morning. Several areas of the city were without electricity and CNN journalists in Caracas could hear aircraft.
Venezuelan media reports explosions were also heard in two other states. The White House has not yet responded to CNN's request for comment but Colombia's president is calling for the U.N. to meet immediately over the explosions in Caracas.
U.S. president Donald Trump has repeatedly warned that the U.S. is preparing to take new action against alleged drug trafficking networks in Venezuela and that strikes on land will start soon.
Joining me live now is CNN contributor Stefano Pozzebon, who has reported extensively on Venezuela.
Stefano, thank you for being with me. We've spoken so often about Venezuela and we've now seen a statement from the Venezuelan government, blaming the U.S. for this incident.
What do you know so far?
STEFANO POZZEBON, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Ben. Well, remarkable statement coming out of Caracas just in the last few minutes or so, a little over an hour since the first explosion was recorded in the Venezuelan capital.
I mark out two aspects, two issues with that statement in particular. The first one is that they firmly put the blame squarely on Donald Trump's shoulders, saying that this is the result of this explosion that we're witnessing in the early hours of Saturday in Caracas.
Are the results of the military action from the current administration of the United States of America against the territory and population of Venezuela, in both civilian and military locations, in four different states.
We're talking about the state that comprises the capital and the three more states surrounding the Venezuelan capital herself, Miranda, Aragua and La Guaira.
So for the first few minutes, an hour after these attacks were taking place, we didn't know whether this was indeed the much taunted (ph) action from the White House that the U.S. was going to move directly against Nicolas Maduro himself. It looks like at least Maduro believes that this is indeed Donald Trump going after him.
And the second one is the declaration of a state of emergency now across the entire nation, across the entire nation of Venezuela. There is now a state of emergency as a result of this attack.
This is not exactly a martial law but it allows the government to take even more power than what it normally has and to limit the movement of the -- to limit the movement of civilian population.
I expect, for example, that the borders will be shuttered. The airspace will be closed to allow for people -- to allow for the military operation to take precedence in case attacks continue.
Right now, what we're hearing from Caracas is that the situation is calm. We've spoken with people in Caracas just a few minutes ago. One of our cameramen, for example, was able to drive from his home to the CNN office that we have in the east of the city to pick up cameras.
And we hope to bring you that, images live, in the coming hours. And the city is, of course, quiet. The explosion, just a wave of explosion around 1:50 to 2 am local time. And now we're talking about being 4 am in Caracas.
So well, over two hours after that, after those explosions. And we're still dealing with the aftermath.
The fact that Nicolas Maduro is now speaking on a live transmission on his Telegram channel shows us that the Venezuelan strongman is not intent on relinquishing power anytime soon and that he is indeed preparing to hunker down and call in -- on other countries.
For example, in these statements that they've released a few minutes ago -- excuse me -- they call another country, including the movement of nonaligned nations, but also their usual allies, Iran, Russia, China to raise the issue with the United Nations.
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Saying that this attack is a blatant violation of the U.N. charter. And calling again this just a grave aggression and most grave aggression from the government of the United States.
HUNTE: You have been reporting on the escalations in Venezuela for quite a while now. We've spoke several times about them.
Can you give us a sense of how shocking this breaking news is that's coming out of Caracas?
POZZEBON: I think it is very shocking because Venezuela has been a country that has been living on the edge for the last 15 years. The first time that we saw mass protests was in 2007 between violent (ph) in 2014.
The government of the United States, civil administration of the United States, from Obama to Trump 1 to Biden to Trump 2 has been at odds with Nicolas Maduro since at least he took power in 2013.
And, of course, it's a country that has been on shaky ground for quite some time. However, this shaky ground have never escalated, never boiled over into a military confrontation.
It's always been either a political protest that turned violent because of the government's repression or in many other cases, it been covert operations. And Nicolas Maduro, for example, blames the United States of attempting a coup d'etat against him pretty much once a year.
It's almost a yearly tradition for him to call for some covert operation against him that his government has somehow dismantled.
The fact that we're now seeing bombs, explosions in Caracas, the fact that we're now seeing these in the halls of power, we're talking about the most strategic and the most central locations of military might that the Venezuelan has.
Two in particular, two military installations within the center of Caracas, in the middle of the city, there are two military bases that were targeted this morning.
That is, of course, something that nobody -- everybody has always imagined or somehow postured about because, the possibility of a military action has always been there but has never happened.
So finally seeing it in front of their eyes, especially, with what we're seeing now, with hundreds of videos that are, of course, already going viral on social media, being shared across Instagram or WhatsApp and across the entire Venezuelan diaspora community of Venezuelan migrants living abroad, is of course completely unprecedented.
And adds a new element of shock to everyone who has been following this story very, very closely.
HUNTE: We have been seeing constant threats escalate since September last year from the U.S.
How have Venezuelan authorities been managing public fears so far, though?
What have they been saying to people?
And just as importantly, what have they not been saying?
POZZEBON: Yes, and this is a question actually, because so far, the Venezuelan government has almost tried to pretend that this escalation was not taking place. You probably remember that Maduro declared the Christmas holiday to start early on October 1st.
That was a move to like take the attention away from the escalation around the issue of kinetic strikes against drug boats, alleged drug trafficking speedboats that the United States had been taking out in the midst of the Caribbean Sea.
And for the last few weeks, Maduro has always gone on his weekly TV show or his (INAUDIBLE) broadcast on his social media to portray an image of stillness, to portray an image of the man in control, of the -- of the man in power and of a nation that would just be able to shake off this tension.
And walk ahead toward 2026 with a prosperous Christmas pretty much, that was the line from the government.
Seeing today this acknowledgment that the United States was able to target and to hit military installations inside the Venezuelan capital, of course, is unprecedented and might have caused Maduro a big bit of pride to have the knowledge that that attack from the U.S.
We need to see now how that will move in the next few hours and the next few days. The next hour of the days (ph), there is now a state of emergency in place in Venezuela. That was automatically declared as soon as the attack took place.
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But the -- when the attack took place. But the statement also reiterates that Nicolas Maduro is in charge. He signed this state of emergency and then after that he is -- he went straight to live on his Telegram signal channel to show that he's in charge and he's not afraid.
He's not afraid of being in -- of being -- of being out, to ensure that he's in charge, at least, at least for now, of course.
HUNTE: Which is interesting because there were concerns on social media that he may have been affected by this. We know that the Venezuelan government has declared a state of emergency.
What are you hearing from your sources inside the country about any other immediate threats to residents?
POZZEBON: We haven't heard that, the situation is calm in the city. There are some reports of movements from military units but those are unconfirmed.
What we can say, especially from people that are there, that there has been a nonstop of aircraft flying over the Venezuelan capital. That is, of course, understandable, especially if you consider police units or security officers being on the move to assess the damage of these attacks.
These explosions that Venezuela blames on the United States. But it's worth remembering and pointing out that we don't have a direct confirmation from the White House that, indeed, the United States are behind this action. So we don't know that.
But so far, it's quiet. What has been affected, is that many areas of the city have been without power as a result of these explosions, of course.
And then one other aspect that is worth pointing out is, of course, the economic damage. Whenever there is an act of frenzy in a country, whenever a government is shown in a position of weakness, well, of course, the local currency tends to collapse or at least to lose value, especially against hard currency.
There is normally a run on shop. We will need to see if this happens in Venezuela as well, because, of course, there is not many -- government cannot be seen in a much weaker position than after sustaining an attack like the one that we've seen in the early hours of this Saturday against the Venezuelan government.
HUNTE: I know this might be a bit of a difficult question to answer but I'm going to ask it anyway.
If there is U.S. involvement in this, as the Venezuelan government has said and claimed, what would the immediate future look like?
POZZEBON: I think the immediate future will need to be assessed. The fact that we have seen that statement from the Venezuelan foreign ministry.
And, more importantly, the fact that Nicolas Maduro, speaking on his Telegram channel right now, shows that the attack, if indeed was against him personally, which we all know was not able to dislodge him or take him out personally. So we need to see how Maduro reacts.
So far this whole story has been an escalation of moves, like a siege mounting from the from the United States, first with strikes against alleged drug trafficking boats, then against the tankers, then covert operations by the CIA, like a circle closing on Nicolas Maduro.
And Nicolas Maduro reaction has always been to shrug it off and to stay put, to buy time, to call for dialogue and call for the international community but also for not giving an inch of a disposition, of walking away.
So we need to know whether these reaction changes. I think, once again, the ball is now in Maduro's corner. Maduro doesn't have, of course, the military capacity after 15 years of continuous economic crisis to retaliate against this traffic.
We're not going to see Venezuelans so-called is going after the warships that the United States has deployed in the Caribbean Sea.
So what can Nicolas Maduro do, other than stay put, stay in charge and see if he can win this off once again?
HUNTE: OK, we'll leave it there for now. Stefano Pozzebon, I appreciate your reporting. We'll speak again very, very soon.
And for our audiences, we'll be right back with CNN's breaking news coverage.
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HUNTE: Welcome back. Let's return to the breaking news.
The Venezuelan government is accusing the U.S. of military aggression after multiple explosions were reported in the capital, Caracas, and other parts of the country early on Saturday morning.
Several explosions rattled windows and sent plumes of smoke into the air. The first blast was recorded at approximately 1:50 am local time early on Saturday morning and CNN journalists in Caracas could hear aircraft in the skies above them.
Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro has declared a state of emergency and ordered all national defense plans to be activated. The White House has not yet responded to CNN's request for comment.
Colombia's president is calling for the U.N. to meet immediately over the explosions in Caracas. Obviously, we're going to continue speaking about this. I'm joined now by CNN military analyst and retired Air Force Colonel Cedric Leighton.
Thank you so much for being with me, sir. We've talked about Venezuela so much over the past few months.
What's your initial response to the Venezuelan government saying that the U.S. is now responsible for what we've seen this morning?
COL. CEDRIC LEIGHTON (RET.), CNN MILITARY ANALYST: Well, good morning, Ben. It's definitely one of those moments where the Venezuelans may actually be right about this.
But we haven't got any confirmation, of course, as you mentioned, from the White House or from the Pentagon, saying that this is exactly what has happened, that there's some kind of military operation.
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But then logic dictates that the only military force that is capable of conducting these kinds of actions would be the military force, the armada, basically, that's arrayed just off the coast of Venezuela in the Caribbean Sea. So that would be, you know, a clear possibility that the U.S. was doing something like this.
There are several things to watch out for. One of the things I thought was interesting was with Stefano Pozzebon's report that the president of Venezuela, Nicolas Maduro, is on Telegram.
And it may be that the broadcast capabilities that he normally uses through Venezuelan television maybe knocked out at this particular point in time. If that's the case, that would be a very logical progression in terms of the targeting methods that are used by the U.S. military when they go after targets like this.
You normally go ahead and knock out communications links; you knock out as much of the military force that you can and then you also knock out the television and radio broadcasting capabilities.
So that might be what we're seeing here at this particular point in time. It's certainly something to look for. And as we can -- when we can assess exactly what's happening here, that might be something to, you know, that would be a clear indicator of this kind of an attack.
HUNTE: From a military standpoint, what evidence would you need to see before fully supporting the Venezuelan government's claim of U.S. involvement in this though?
LEIGHTON: Well, it would depend on what kind of weapons were used., you know, we'd look at flight tracks and see what kind of aircraft were in the air.
If that's, you know, if we can get things from, you know, systems like the air traffic control system or FlightAware, any of those types of sources, I would also look and see what kind of bomb fragments are left over.
Are these remnants from a Tomahawk missile?
Are these bomb remnants from the types of bombs that would be dropped by U.S. aircraft?
And, you know, would they, you know, for example, Hellfire missiles or something like that, that could be dropped either from manned aircraft or from unmanned aircraft.
So those are the kinds of things that would provide that forensic evidence that you would need in order to, you know, fully ascertain that this has, in fact, taken place and that the U.S. is the one that is actually conducting these operations.
HUNTE: There is still no acknowledgment from the U.S. government, though.
How realistic is it that the U.S. would conduct a strike of this nature inside Caracas without publicly acknowledging it, especially with the U.S. president, as we know, who openly communicates so often?
LEIGHTON: Yes, so that's a very interesting, actually, that this is under wraps., you know, if it is indeed a U.S. operation, when one of the key indicators there, Ben, would be the volume of attacks.
You know, Stefano, I believe, mentioned three different areas, that, you know, would be, you know, that are being attacked right now. So this would or have been attacked in the last few hour hours or so.
So what we're looking at is the military installations in the center of Caracas. You're looking at military installations on either side of Caracas, basically the northern side and the southern side.
Plus another thing to look for is, was there any damage to any of the major air bases that are in the region or near the Caracas area?
So that would, you know, be one of the main indicators there that something like this is going on. The fact that the U.S. has not acknowledged that may be a function of the early morning hour that we're dealing with, on the East Coast of the United States.
Or it could be part of the element of surprise that the U.S. wants to basically take advantage of, in a situation like that.
So this, you know, I think we'll hear more in the next few hours, you know, an operation that seems to be of great, you know, deal of -- using a great deal of force and probably a large number of aircraft is something that the Pentagon would at some point have to acknowledge and they would want to acknowledge it.
But they would do so, you know, at a time when they can, you know, in essence, control the narrative. So that's kind of what they're looking for right now, I think. And they're waiting to make that announcement probably in the early hours of, you know, like around 6 or so in the morning, I would guess.
But that is Eastern time U.S.. So that -- and we'll see exactly what they have to say. But at this particular point in time, the one thing that you can see is that there is no other military force that would be capable of mounting this kind of an operation using multiple targets, going after multiple targets.
And it seems like they're sequencing the attack as well. So given that it's a very sophisticated operation and that would indicate that, you know, there's a major power behind this effort.
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HUNTE: If the U.S. isn't responsible, what reasons might Venezuela have for immediately pointing the finger at Washington?
Are there any risks for what this accusation could actually create?
LEIGHTON: Well, of course, if the accusation is a false accusation, then there are considerable risks in terms of credibility. And, you know, basically, the ability to, you know, conduct, business on a normal diplomatic basis.
But I think the, you know, if Venezuela were say, mounting this operation against themselves for, you know, in some bizarre false flag operation, that would be very strange indeed. And I don't think they would want to waste the resources on something like that.
So, you know, it would be, you know, certainly unique if something like that were to happen and the risks would be considerable, especially given the fact that there is an embargo against Venezuela that's been in effect for basically decades. And that impacts their capability from a military standpoint.
Their military readiness is not what it -- what it once was. And it's, you know, impacted by lack of weapons, lack of maintenance for aircraft. They have a mixed fleet of both U.S.-made F-16s as well as Su-30 from Russia. That -- so that's the kind of thing that they want to be -- would be very careful, I think, in using that for these kinds of operations.
So, you know, if it is a false flag operation, it would be, you know, a tremendous interest and would be a very unique thing to do. But it would also kind of paint them in a kind of a bizarre light. And it would be illogical, even for the Venezuelan government, to do something like that.
HUNTE: Can you just give me a sense of how you're assessing the scale of what we've seen so far?
And does this look more like a final signal to you or the opening move of something far bigger?
LEIGHTON: Well, I think it depends on the reaction of Nicolas Maduro to this. So what we're seeing so far is that he's gone on Telegram and basically announced the fact that he is still around. So that could indicate that he may have been a target of a, you know, what we would call a so-called decapitation strike.
Now if that's the case, that's a real serious type of thing if the U.S. were doing that immediately, to go after the head of a government like this.
So with that in mind, the, you know, the other part of this is, you know, in terms of the actual assessment, looking at exactly how they're sequencing these targets and the fact that they seem to be going after military installations.
I mean, if that's the case, you've got two military installations in Caracas, basically near the center of Caracas. Those would be very important for the regime to maintain their power.
If there's any difficulty that they have in terms of command and control, in terms of activating any response to the attacks, that would indicate that the attacks were designed to not only cut off that command and control but also to damage those forces and prevent them from responding to any U.S. efforts.
So in terms of the sequence of events, I don't think this is a one- and-done type operation. In other words, I believe this might be the precursor to something more extensive, more intense. That at least -- that's the potential right now.
But if the Venezuelan government were to respond to this and say this is something that we, you know, we, in essence, don't want this to continue, we're willing to, you know, start talks with the U.S. or, you know, make some accommodation with the U.S.
That could involve Maduro leaving the country or something like that. Then the operation would basically cease, at least from this level of intensity. And that's really the kind of thing that, you know, that we're looking at here, is they can they could potentially turn this off if they wanted to.
But if they feel that they haven't hit all the targets, if they feel they haven't achieved what they wanted to achieve, it could ramp up in intensity and it could hit other targets in the Venezuelan inventory or it could hit the same targets.
They could hit the same targets again, for greater effect, greater impact, depending on what the battle damage assessments are from these first strikes.
HUNTE: OK, well, as always, I appreciate your expertise. CNN military analyst and retired Air Force Colonel Cedric Leighton, thank you. I'm sure we'll be speaking to you again very, very shortly.
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And to our audiences, we will be right back with more breaking news.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): This is CNN breaking news.
HUNTE: Welcome back. Let's return now to the breaking news in Venezuela, where multiple explosions have been witnessed in Caracas and other states, too. Venezuela's government is accusing the United States of carrying out that attack, calling it a grave military aggression.
President Nicolas Maduro has signed a state of emergency ordering all national defense plans to be ready to be implemented. CNN has reached out to the White House and the military for comment but, at this time, we haven't received a response.
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Meanwhile, several areas of the city of Caracas were without power and CNN journalists on the ground in the Venezuelan capital could hear the sound of aircraft after the explosions.
Colombia's president is calling on the United Nations to meet immediately to discuss these attacks. And, of course, this all comes as president Donald Trump has repeatedly warned that land strikes in Venezuela could happen at any time.
Well, let's keep talking about it. Joining me live now is CNN contributor Stefano Pozzebon, who has reported extensively on Venezuela.
Stefano, thank you so much for being with me again. I just want to understand what the latest that you're hearing is, especially after the Venezuelan government has effectively blamed the U.S. for these attacks.
POZZEBON: Yes. The latest is that we heard, the strong, the strong voice from the Venezuelan government, the strong condemnation, calling this a military aggression from the United States. So firmly laying the blame on Donald Trump.
We are yet to hear from Donald Trump himself. We understand from sources that are coming in from -- to CNN that the Senate committee was not briefed on potential military strikes in the last few days or hours.
So this could be something that, if it's confirmed that it was indeed from the United States, it could be something that the White House decided to do unilaterally and decide to brief Congress only after these -- on the -- after these attacks took place.
But it's important to wait to hear from the White House themselves to understand, one, whether they did it and, two, what was the goal of these strikes?
Because we know that Nicolas Maduro is safe. He was -- he signed a decree, calling for a state of emergency. And then he went on his Telegram channel to share a video, a Telegram live, to show that he was still in charge and that he took to essentially portray an image of power and stillness that he was not personally affected by these explosions.
Which have been several, at least more than five explosions in the early hours of -- from at least the 1:50 am in the capital of Caracas.
Especially around military installations like the base of where both the Venezuelan military academy has its headquarters but also where several members of the Maduro's government are rumored to held their private residences.
So the latest is that we know where Maduro is. He's in Caracas. He's probably now in a situation room, we imagine, trying to make assessment of the damage. We know that the situation in Caracas is calm. There are no reports of troops in the streets or chaos in the streets of Caracas.
However, there is, of course, reports of blackouts and power outages across the city. We don't know whether this was indeed the White House moving after Maduro himself. We don't know if they were actually trying to take out Maduro himself and failed to do so or whether this was just a warning shot.
Perhaps a shot to show, an attack to show that they are willing to take military action but are not willing, perhaps, to go after Maduro himself directly, perhaps. And we don't know how this will move forward, whether this is just a one-off or will -- this will be a just a -- just a new -- a new normality of U.S. strikes on the Venezuelan capital.
I remember when we first reported on a U.S. strike against an alleged drug trafficking speedboat moving out of Venezuela, of course, that was unprecedented. It seemed like a dramatic escalation. We had more than 20 other strikes before moving to the following step, which was seizing oil tankers.
Then we had several tankers being seized and now we had an attack on Venezuelan soil.
We will need to know now what happens if indeed there will be further strikes in the coming hours or in the coming days and if, indeed, this is the end of the U.S. forces?
HUNTE: Can you just give us a sense of how massive this breaking news coming out of Caracas actually is?
Because even with the threats, was there a real expectation that this would happen?
POZZEBON: Well, it's a tricky one because Venezuela is a country that has been living on the edge for pretty much the last 15 years.
And if you hear to Nicolas Maduro's propaganda, they have been fighting a shadow war against Washington and the allies of the empire for pretty much the last decade, Maduro is known for blaming Washington for every shortcoming of his administration.
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And especially he says that he dismantles a coup or a plot to take him out of power pretty much every single year.
What is unprecedented is actually seen, in front of our eyes, military actions, targeted strikes in the midst of the Caracas, in the midst of the Venezuelan capital, which, by the way, is a city of 8 million people if you consider also the surrounding urban area.
Often when we heard the possibility of air strikes, so we understand we understood from military analysts but also from sources that the U.S. would move against the drug trafficking facilities.
Or perhaps drug producing operations in the outskirts of Venezuela, like in the provinces, in far-off remote areas in the midst of the mountainous or jungle regions to the west or to the south of Venezuela.
The fact that they moved so strongly against the -- against the military installation in the capital, if indeed this is confirmed to be at the hands of the United States, is definitely unprecedented as a dramatic escalation in a story that has been a siege mounting around Nicolas Maduro for the last 10 years or so.
First, with economic isolation, then with a full embargo and the sanctions, then the indictment from the United States Department of Justice. Then, as I was saying, the strikes on speedboats, then the oil and now this.
So it's truly something that we have never seen before and we've never seen in the Americas before. We normally see -- I was speaking with a friend who is in Caracas and she was commenting on the images and said, I thought that this was Iran.
Making a reference to the fact that we know that Donald Trump has threatened to take military action against Iranian officials if indeed they do repress protest in Iran. That is something that we are more accustomed to seeing in other regions of the world.
Latin America is not -- is not used to seeing military strikes on its major urban areas. And Caracas is definitely one of them. So it is, of course, something unprecedented and remarkable.
HUNTE: OK, Stefano Pozzebon. I think we're going to go to a quick break but thank you for your reporting. We'll be speaking to you again very soon.
Thanks for watching. We'll be right back.
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HUNTE: Welcome back.
We're following breaking news out of Venezuela, where explosions were reported in the capital, Caracas, and other locations just a short time ago.
Venezuela's government is now accusing the U.S. of carrying out a very serious, grave military aggression. President Nicolas Maduro has declared a state of emergency and activated all national defense plans.
Several areas of the capital are without power and CNN journalists reported hearing aircraft after the explosions. We are waiting to hear from the White House still.
But president Donald Trump has repeatedly warned that the U.S. is preparing to take new action against alleged drug trafficking networks in Venezuela.
Let's keep talking about it. We're going to go live to journalist Mary Mena, who is standing by for us in Venezuela's capital.
Mary, from what I understand, you actually saw and heard these blasts, right?
Where were you?
What did you see and hear when it happened
MARY MENA, JOURNALIST: Yes, well, I was at home. Mainly Venezuelans, we woke up with several big sounds. We didn't know what happened exactly. But then we heard detonations and then planes passing by in the skies of Caracas.
As you said, Venezuela has confirmed -- this is the official version coming from the Maduro government -- that it happened in Miranda state. That is, which concentrates the city of Caracas; La Guaira, which is a very important port. And it's a place, a strategic place in Venezuela because it concentrates the Venezuelan air force and Aragua state.
That is a state that concentrates most of the military forces, especially the aviation. And right now, well, we woke up early in the morning with these sounds. They were several of them. They were not permanent.
And then when we heard from planes and helicopters passing by across the city, reports coming from people that woke up at that hour told us that they lost power in certain areas.
The place where I'm living right now in the center of Caracas, it has power. It hasn't lost the power in all the day. And by now, this is what we can see, that it's quiet. There is -- the city remains in silent after a very turbulent night that we have, waking up with these sounds.
The city of Caracas is surrounded by mountains. And that is why when you hear something like that, you can hear it clearly. There were some reports of people on social media, saying there was a blast on the La Carlota Airport that is located in the center of the main metropolitan area of Caracas.
[03:50:10]
And we waited for the information coming from the government that came about two hours later of (INAUDIBLE) those sounds in the city. Right now, as I said, it is quiet, it's in silence. The government is calling his supporters to -- and all the citizens to serve the sovereignty of the country.
I cannot see right now or what cars driving around the city. It's pretty much the empty in Caracas. We have lights, electricity in many buildings in the city and that is why people are concerned but watching television, staying, trying to follow the information, the information that is coming from the government.
We haven't heard from -- directly from president Nicolas Maduro, just the ministry of foreign affairs, referring to the -- this situation. They say that it was perpetrated by the United States. It happens (INAUDIBLE) Venezuela.
And they are calling for an emergency. But we don't know the implication of this. We know that the Venezuelan constitution allowed the president of Venezuela to take some extreme security measures when things like this happen.
And they call it a commotion, a state of emergency. And probably we will learn in the coming hours what this will imply.
For example, limitations in people driving around the city or the government taking control of strategic locations such as airports or oil infrastructure in Venezuela.
We need to remember that the Venezuelan government said they were bracing for. And they said that several times, several situations like this one, they said they conducted military drills over the past few months.
And also they called civilians to enroll in the militia. They said they had a plan. They didn't reveal the expansion or the reach of that plan. But right now we are waiting to learn more about the aftermath of these events that happened in Venezuela. So far, we have no report of civilians or people damaged by this incident.
We haven't heard of that. And that is important because --
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HUNTE: OK, Mary.
MEAN: We haven't heard of, I don't know, a community or something like that.
HUNTE: Thank you so much for your reporting on the ground there. And please do stay on the line for us. We're going to speak to you again in just a moment.
I'm just now going to go to Christopher Sabatini. He's a senior fellow for Latin America at Chatham House.
Thank you so much for being with me, sir. I just want to get your initial response to the Venezuelan government saying that the U.S. is responsible for what we have seen this morning.
CHRISTOPHER SABATINI, SENIOR FELLOW, LATIN AMERICA, CHATHAM HOUSE: Hello. Yes, yes, fully, the United States is fully responsible. We can see this right now in the flights that are taking place, there are even rumors of Chinook helicopters that would be ferrying, if true, Special Ops Forces.
Look, the array of the armada that's been arrayed against Venezuela was there to do this, eventually threaten it. And at least now we're entering the next phase of this conflict, where Donald Trump is making good on something he's threatened for a long time.
What we don't know if this is a one-and-done operation, one strike and trying to frighten the government into negotiating or even collapsing, or whether this will be a prolonged operation. That will be the question as the smoke clears over the next couple of hours.
HUNTE: So you almost seem quite certain that the U.S. is responsible for this.
Can you just tell me a bit more about your confidence within that?
What's making you think that this is pointing to it?
SABATINI: Well, first of all, of course, they've amassed well over 15,000 military personnel off the coast of Venezuela; more than 15 boats, different boats, including a nuclear submarine, the largest aircraft carrier in the world, as well as F-35s in Puerto Rico.
Many of the boats that I mentioned before are carrying guided missiles and Reaper drones. They have the firepower to do it.
But also, quite frankly, Donald Trump has been saying for a long time that -- basically that land strikes were imminent. We saw a series of strikes against more than 30 boats in the Caribbean, the Pacific, alleged to be carrying drugs that were conducted by the U.S. Navy.
[03:55:00]
We also saw the U.S. Navy and Coast Guard board two ships that were carrying illegal Venezuelan oil.
But all along, the threat was always that there would be some sort of land strike in Venezuela. That because, quite frankly, what this has always been about is regime change. And the hope before was simply to scare the military or those around Nicolas Maduro into defecting and leaving him.
That did not occur. So ultimately, this was what Donald Trump had to do. And he's been warning about this for a while, both in terms of saying there were covert operations in Venezuela and saying that Nicolas Maduro had to go one way or the other. Now he's taking the next step. How far it will go, we simply don't know.
HUNTE: OK, it was brief but we appreciate your expertise for now. Christopher Sabatini, thank you so much.
(CROSSTALK)
HUNTE: (INAUDIBLE) though.
Thanks for joining us. I'm Ben Hunte in Atlanta. Fred Pleitgen picks up our breaking news coverage after a very quick break. Stay with us for more. Thank you.
