Creating a new justification for a regime change war, Secretary of State Marco Rubio put out a statement saying, “The Department of State intends to designate Cartel de los Soles as a Foreign Terrorist Organization (FTO), effective November 24, 2025. Based in Venezuela, the Cartel de los Soles is headed by Nicolás Maduro and other high-ranking individuals of the illegitimate Maduro regime who have corrupted Venezuela’s military, intelligence, legislature, and judiciary.”
The major issue with this is not only is there no evidence that Maudro heads “Cartel de los Soles”, but there is no evidence that the drug cartel even exists, and in reality the name “Cartel de los Soles” was a term created by journalists in the 1990s to refer to drug smuggling in the Venezuelan National Guard backed by the CIA.
As France24 noted, “ in March, the latest US State Department report on global anti-drug operations made no mention of the ‘Cartel de los Soles’ or any connection between Maduro and narco trafficking.”
The outlet wrote, “‘There is no such thing, so Maduro can hardly be its boss,’ Phil Gunson, an analyst at the International Crisis Group think tank, told AFP of the so-called ‘Cartel de los Soles’” adding, “‘direct, incontrovertible evidence has never been presented’ for the existence of an organized cartel by that name in Venezuela.”
The outlet noted, “According to the InSight Crime think tank, the name was ironically coined by Venezuelan media in 1993 after two generals were nabbed for drug trafficking. The sun is a symbol on the military uniform epaulettes of generals in the South American country.”
As InSight Crime noted, “The phrase ‘Cartel of the Suns’ reportedly emerged in 1993, when two GNB generals – anti-narcotics unit chief Ramón Guillén Dávila and his successor, Orlando Hernández Villegas – were investigated for drug trafficking and related crimes. As brigade commanders, each wore a single sun insignia on their epaulettes, giving rise to the phrase ‘Cartel of the Sun.’ When division commanders – who bore double suns – were later accused of trafficking, the name evolved into the ‘Cartel of the Suns.’”
An extra layer of irony is added to this deception, given that when Ramón Guillén Dávila was caught for drug smuggling, he was backed by the CIA.
Investigative journalist Seth Hettena reported:
The name Cartel de los Soles originated in 1993 when Brigadier General Ramon Guillen Davila and his successor were first accused of trafficking, according to InSight Crime, a think tank that studies organized crime. The ‘sun’ referred to the insignia the Venezuelan generals wore on their epaulettes.
Guillen, the anti-drug chief of the Guardia Nacional (National Guard), was once one of the CIA’s most trusted partners in the region. The agency built and financed a special intelligence unit within the National Guard, headed by Guillen. But Venezuela’s top drug warrior was also an alleged cocaine smuggler
He went on to write:
The CIA operation, approved under President Ronald Reagan, was designed to gather intelligence on Colombian cartels by inserting agents into the smuggling pipeline. In 1986, Reagan had declared global drug trafficking a threat to U.S. national security and directed the CIA to target international traffickers with suspected links to terrorist or insurgent groups.
A civilian informant working with Guillen, Adolfo Romero Gomez, served as a key middleman between Colombian suppliers and traffickers in South Florida. Through Guillen, Romero kept both the CIA and the DEA informed about so-called ‘controlled deliveries’ of cocaine into Miami—shipments allowed to move under surveillance in hopes of snaring major players and seizing the drugs.
As he noted, “A DEA investigation found that a ton of nearly pure cocaine that had been shipped under the auspices of the CIA anti-drug program wound up on the streets of the United States,” adding, “In 1992, Guillen was arrested in Venezuela on local drug trafficking charges, but the charges were later dropped by a judge. Four years later, a Miami grand jury indicted Guillen for conspiring to smuggle 22 tons of cocaine into the United States between 1987 and 1991.”
He also noted, “Romero was less fortunate. Arrested in Colombia, he was extradited to Miami, convicted of cocaine-conspiracy charges, and sentenced to nearly 20 years in prison.”
Seth Hettena wrote, “Mark McFarlin, the former officer who had worked closely with Guillen, told the court the agency had trained and equipped the National Guard’s intelligence center in Caracas, teaching officers spy tradecraft and agent handling” adding, “In Venezuela, the CIA struck an anti-drug partnership with the National Guard that operated separately from the DEA and Venezuela’s own police and intelligence services. The Caracas CIA station deliberately kept the DEA in the dark about key operations.”
A 1993 investigation by 60 Minutes uncovered that the CIA knew of and supported the drug smuggling done by Ramón Guillén Dávila.
Former DEA head, Robert Bonner, said to Mike Wallace, after conducting an investigation, “There was some knowledge on the part of CIA, at least some participation in approving or condoning this to be done”, adding, “the only rationale that’s ever been offered is that this would lead to some valuable drug intelligence about the Colombian Cartels”.
Annabelle Grimm, the former lead DEA agent in Venezuela, said, “The CIA and the Guardia Nacional wanted to let cocaine go into the traffic without doing anything; they wanted to let it come up to the United States, no surveillance.”
She added, “This would enable them to gain the traffickers’ confidence, keep their information cool, and it would lead to larger seizures of drugs … I guess they thought they were going to get Pablo Escobar at the scene of the crime or something, which I found personally ludicrous”.
Robert Bonner said, “They (the CIA) made this proposal, and we said ‘no, no way we will not permit this, it should not go forward’ and then apparently it went forward anyway”.
To add an extra layer of irony, Ramón Guillén Dávila was only actually arrested by Nicolas Maduro’s predecessor, Hugo Chavez, for plotting along with his son to kill Chavez, possibly with the support of the CIA.
Venezuela analysis reported at the time, “‘I want to kill that son of a bitch,’ said the Capitan of the Venezuelan National Guard, Thomas Guillen in a recorded telephone call with his wife. In the call, played on Venezuela’s state TV channel last month, the Capitan reveals his and his father’s plans to kill President Hugo Chávez. The next day, the Capitan and his father, retired General Ramon Guillén Dávila, were arrested and taken into custody for conspiring to kill the President of Venezuela”.
As the outlet noted, “In recent weeks, Hugo Chávez has increasingly warned that the United States has plans to kill him and is stepping up its activity against him and his government” adding, “It seems feasible that former CIA ‘asset’ General Ramon Guillén Dávila was conspiring with the CIA to get rid of the most consolidated leftist movement in Latin America today”.
The outlet noted that, “According to the web page School of the Americas Watch, General Guillén graduated from the infamous U.S. combat training school in 1967” adding, “The School of the Americas, renamed the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation in 2001, is a US military facility that is used to train Latin American soldiers in counterinsurgency techniques and interrogation tactics” and “ Located in Fort Benning, Georgia, the school sends its graduates throughout the region to repress left-wing and communist movements and to influence the political situations in Latin American countries.”
Marco Rubio’s deception about Nicolas Maduro leading the “Cartel de los Soles” and the designation of it and de facto Maduro as a “terrorist organization”, means a U.S. regime change war in Venezuela could be about to happen.
Maria Corina Machado, the United States’ puppet in Venezuela, admitted that she has been “in touch with him, of course, and with his team,” referring to Marco Rubio.
Days before Rubio’s designation of Maduro and Cartel de los Soles, Machado put out a cryptic video where she called on the Venezuelan military to “lay down your arms,” adding, “What is going to happen is already happening. That decisive hour is imminent. The position that each one of you takes will mark your life forever. You will know very well how and when to take that step because everything around you will be unequivocal. This coming day, join us.”
This, coupled with Rubio’s new designation, signals heavily that a U.S. invasion may be coming soon.
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Here you can see the confesions of Goudreau, the US military leader of a failed coup to Venezuela, supported by Trump during his last presidency.
He talks about the Cartel de los Soles history that you refered and the involment of the CIA in the 1990, with the so called cartel, Which was dismantle during Chavez government when he expulsed for good the CIA, the South Command and the DEA from Venezuela.
I myself witnessed the whole story.
https://youtu.be/_ZkpOZXeJGQ?si=4RfHMXjmPi9tj_lX
The NeoCon Regime Change has been a disaster for America and the world: Iraq, Libya, etc.