At exactly 11:46 p.m. local time on January 2, 2026, the United States launched Operation Absolute Resolve, which resulted in the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores.
Maduro and Flores rushed toward a steel‑coated safe room but failed to get inside. They were captured from within the “heavily guarded” and highly fortified presidential palace in a ground attack that lasted less than 30 minutes.
Before anyone could realize what was happening, they were flown by helicopter to a U.S. warship and later taken to a federal detention center in Brooklyn, New York, where they would face trial.
The midnight strike
The well‑planned operation began with more than 150 U.S. aircraft — including F‑22 Raptors, B‑1B Lancer bombers, and EA‑18G Growler electronic attack planes — launched from twenty bases across the globe. Their mission was to neutralize Venezuela’s air defense network and radar sites, turning Caracas into a dark, blind, and isolated city.
“We turned off almost all of the lights in Caracas,” President Trump boasted.
The first tactical victory
The U.S. Cyber Command gained control over the Generalísimo Francisco de Miranda Air Base (La Carlota), named after the military leader and first commander‑in‑chief of the Venezuelan armies, as well as the Fuerte Tiuna barracks — Venezuela’s largest military complex and headquarters of its armed forces. At least seven explosions were heard in Caracas during the attack, which lasted less than 30 minutes.
As soon as this was over, the entire city of Caracas was plunged into darkness. This blackout served two purposes: it neutralized the communications of colectivos, the local militias, and provided cover for the raiding U.S. forces. Cuban advisors and militias scrambled blindly without coordination, leaving defenders unable to communicate and effectively collapsing resistance.
The five‑minute war
At 2:01 a.m. Caracas time on January 3, MH‑47 Chinook and MH‑60 Black Hawk helicopters belonging to the elite 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (SOAR) hovered just 100 feet above the Miraflores Palace compound to evade Venezuelan radars.
Without wasting time, U.S. Army Delta Force troops fast‑roped into the compound.
A well‑rehearsed operation
From the very beginning, everything went smoothly. There was no chance of error: operators had practiced every likely development for months on a full‑scale replica of Maduro’s palace built in Kentucky. The mock‑up included steel doors, corridors, and safe rooms. Operators repeatedly practiced entry routes. This preparation meant the assault force was not improvising in Caracas; it was executing a memorized plan. They knew every hallway, every reinforced door, and the exact placement of the steel‑encased safe room Maduro had installed for such an eventuality.
The go‑ahead order and the role of weather
President Trump reportedly approved the operation earlier, but planners urged him to wait for clear skies.
“We waited four days,” Trump later said. “We were going to do this four days ago… then all of a sudden it opened up and we said, go.”
According to Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Dan Caine, the final go‑ahead came at 10:46 p.m. EST on January 2. Trump watched a live stream of the event surrounded by advisers at Mar‑a‑Lago — his high‑security 20‑acre residence in Palm Beach, Florida, where the U.S. Secret Service implements multilayered protections including robotic patrols and airspace restrictions. It has recently been used as a de‑facto war room for national security operations.
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Maduro’s failed countermeasures
Maduro had recently begun rotating bedrooms, discarding cell phones, and relying on Cuban advisors stripped of electronics. His residence was fortified with steel safe rooms, blast barriers, and anti‑drone measures. But these defenses collapsed in the face of U.S. tempo and insider leaks.
Break‑in
The breach into Maduro’s 32,500‑square‑meter Miraflores Palace complex, equipped with multiple security layers including anti‑aircraft defenses, was violent and instantaneous. The operation took place in total darkness, with machine guns facing the commandos from all directions. One wrong move could have been fatal, but heavily armed Delta Force operators — equipped with suppressed rifles, night‑vision goggles, and blowtorches to cut through steel doors — moved swiftly. Explosives were used to breach reinforced walls and doors of the room Maduro had attempted to lock himself in, while his guards fired blindly in the pitch‑dark environment.
“It had what they call a safety space, where it’s solid steel all around. He didn’t get that space closed. He was trying to get into it, but he got bum‑rushed so fast that he didn’t get into that. We were prepared,” Trump said.
The capture
Maduro and Flores were caught in their private quarters as they attempted to scramble toward a safe room. This was possible because of flawless intelligence provided by a CIA asset within Maduro’s inner circle. The asset helped pinpoint his location and turn the tide against him.
The ground battle lasted barely five minutes and ended with the targets identified via biometric scans and restrained.
Cost Involved
It was a well‑planned operation from the start but not without cost: two U.S. soldiers were injured, and one helicopter sustained damage during the skirmish. On the other hand, over 80 Venezuelan and Cuban defenders, including 32 members of the Cuban security detail, were killed.
Extraction: USS Iwo Jima
By 2:06 a.m. — within just five minutes after the first boot hit the ground — the helicopters were back in the air. They were shielded by a “corridor of fire” maintained by F‑18 Super Hornets and drones. By 3:20 a.m. EST, Gen. Dan Caine confirmed the extraction team was “over water” with Maduro and Flores onboard.
Minutes later, at 3:29 a.m., the helicopters touched down on the deck of the USS Iwo Jima, an amphibious assault ship positioned in international waters. A White House photo released shortly thereafter depicted a stunned, disoriented, and handcuffed Nicolás Maduro, 63, wearing a grey Nike fleece sweat suit.
Transit to U.S. soil
By the morning of January 4, Nicolás Maduro and Cilia Flores were airlifted from the USS Iwo Jima and locked up in the Metropolitan Detention Center, a federal administrative detention facility in the Sunset Park neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York City.
Why Washington targeted Maduro
On January 5, 2026, Maduro appeared in a Manhattan federal court and was charged with narcoterrorism conspiracy, cocaine importation, and possession of destructive devices. The U.S. had been pursuing him for five years. In 2020, American prosecutors charged him in a drug‑trafficking case, alleging that he had converted the Venezuelan state into a “narco‑cartel” that flooded the U.S. with cocaine in partnership with the Sinaloa Cartel and the Zetas. Maduro was accused of being the linchpin of a narco‑terror network, with ties to cartels and armed groups like Tren de Aragua.
In August 2025, Attorney General Pam Bondi and the Justice Department doubled the reward for information leading to his arrest to $50 million. This proved to be the final straw.
The build‑up and aftermath:
By late 2025, U.S. forces executed 35 strikes on suspected drug‑laden vessels in the Caribbean and Pacific, killing over 115 traffickers linked to Maduro’s regime. On December 29, a CIA drone strike hit a Venezuelan docking facility believed to be used by cartels — the first known U.S. operation on Venezuelan soil in this campaign.
These actions created the operational runway for what came next: a short, violent, high‑tempo raid enabled by a large U.S. military concentration in and around the Caribbean.
Maduro, however, pleaded not guilty and maintains that he has been “kidnapped” and remains the legitimate president of Venezuela.
