Maduro was delivered up by insiders.

 MILITARY STOOD DOWN

WHAT IS GOING TO HAPPEN NOW?

It is becoming clear that the former Vice President, now President of Venezuela, Delcy Rodriguez collaborated with the Trump administration to arrange for the abduction of Maduro and his wife. Rodriguez and her brother, Jorge, president of the National assembly, are politically powerful. As this becomes common knowledge, there is a high chance that opposition to them may become very strong, In fact there are reports of gunfire and explosions near the president palace in the last day.

Yesterdays outrage was voiced by much of the world and an interesting speech by Jeffrey Sacks at the U.N. security council made a clear portrait of the U.S. relations in central America and around the world since 1947. He stated that the U.S. has engaged in 70 documented regime change operations between 1947 and 1989 and all of them left the countries in question and their citizens in a far worse place, often for decades.

It seems the debate in the U.S., expressed by John Bolton, is that the Trump administration did not go far enough and needed to depose all of the government in Venezuela. This would have required extensive military action and occupation, possibly for years. Is this outrageous action by Trump now considered too moderate by neocon insiders?

It seems this country often talks about democracy, but when another country chooses leaders or political systems not approved it is then necessary to overturn those results. While the last election in Venezuela has had questionable results, as had many elections in the U.S., Romania, Moldova and a long list of countries, earlier elections were the will the people. 

As for the dire state of the Venezuelan economy, it has been under sanctions and economic warfare for years, With a normal economy, they may have been able to pay the awards for money owed to former owners of assets. No one defends the political system that they chose, but it is their right to make those choices and when the external and internal subversion increase then it seems they always end up in becoming more authoritarian and seek outside allies. Then they are also labeled a national security threat, because they sell their sanctioned resources to someone else. 

In this case they have even been accused of being a base for Iran's supposed terrorist activities in the western hemisphere, an absurd accusation. What terrorist activities in the western hemisphere?

Maduro is also indicted for having a machine gun in his possession, a absurd charge for a President of any country, not subject to any U.S. law. I guess they assume everyone in the world is subject to U.S. law. 

It can be assumed that this endeavor is just in its beginning, not a done deal, and can the U.S. really impose its will without many thousands of troops to enforce that will?,  or will Venezuela now fade into the background as other bigger fish, like Iran, come onto the menu for regime change operations?