Key Venezuelan capabilities complicate US and regional defence planning

Russian-made Venezuelan Air Force Sukhoi Su-30MKV multirole strike fighters overfly a military parade to celebrate Venezuela's 211th anniversary of its independence in Caracas on 5 July 2022. (Federico Parra/AFP via Getty Images)

Context

Since early September a US military build up in the Caribbean and strikes on alleged Venezuela-linked drug trafficker vessels have led to the prospect of a direct US-Venezuela conflict. The US administration has called for Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro to step down and linked him and the Venezuelan military to the international drug trade.

The US has threatened to strike government and military targets in Venezuela that it believes are linked to drug trafficking, and has deployed a US naval strike force centred around the USS Gerald R Ford (CVN-78), the lead ship of its class. The F/A-18E/F Super Hornets and EA-18G Growlers of Carrier Air Wing Eight (CVW-8) onboard the Gerald R Ford alone outnumber the entirety of the Venezuelan Air Force's operational combat jets and constitute a major US force deployment.

The US has a range of options to pressure Venezuela or remove Maduro, from psychological operations similar to those used in the 1954 Guatemalan coup to direct military confrontation. Military options could include limited strikes aimed at forcing concessions, comprehensive campaigns to weaken the regime, targeted raids on officials, or full-scale invasion. Janes assesses limited strikes on military targets linked to drug trafficking and regime figures as the most likely form of direct military confrontation. However, Janes maintains an unchanged assessment that direct US military action against the Venezuelan state remains unlikely in the short term (four weeks to six months), with a US military incursion into Venezuela very unlikely in the same timeframe.

Air force