January 5, 2026 • 17 mins
- Announcement: Trump announced the success via a social media post and later held a press conference at Mar-a-Lago.
- Justification: The reasons include stopping drug trafficking, recovering stolen oil, and addressing fentanyl-related deaths in the U.S.
- Scale of Operation:
- Over 150 aircraft involved, including bombers, fighters, drones, and helicopters.
- Integration of multiple U.S. military branches and agencies (Space Command, Cyber Command, Marines, Navy, Air Force).
- Tactical surprise achieved through months of planning and intelligence gathering.
- Execution:
- The strike occurred during the night, with helicopters flying at low altitude over water.
- Venezuelan air defenses were dismantled before the extraction force landed.
- Maduro’s compound was heavily fortified with steel doors and a “safe space,” but he was captured before reaching it.
- Minimal U.S. casualties; one aircraft was hit but remained operational.
- Aftermath:
- Maduro and Flores were indicted in the Southern District of New York for narco-terrorism.
- Trump framed the operation as a warning to adversaries and a restoration of U.S. global respect.
- Statements from U.S. officials and lawmakers praised the complexity and success of the mission.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
And as to this commander in chief, he did something
people talked about doing. You just wait for Cuba. Cuba
is a communist dictatorship that's killed priests and nuns. They've
prayed on their own people. Their days are numbered. We're
gonna wake up one day, I hope in twenty six
(00:22):
in our backyard. We're gonna have allies in these countries
doing business with America, not narco terrorist dictators killing Americas.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
This is a.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Big frigging day.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
You're listening to the forty seven Morning Update with Ben ferguson.
Speaker 4 (00:37):
Good Monday morning. It's nice to have you with us
on the forty seven Morning Update, and we've got a
very big story. It's the President of the United States
of America, Donald Trump's foreign policy FAFO. Nicholas Maduro found
out exactly what happens when you don't listen to the
President of the United States of America and his warnings.
Now in a jail cell in New York City. So
(00:57):
how did we pull off this incredible mission and what
happens next? We have all the details for you. It's
the forty seven Morning Update and it starts right now.
Story number one, President Donald Trump announcing it in a simple,
true social post. The United States of America has successfully
carried out a large scale strike against Venezuela and its leader,
(01:19):
President Nicholas Maduro, who has been along with his wife,
captured and flown out of the country. This operation was
done in conjunction with US law enforcement. Details to follow.
He then said, there will be a news conference at
eleven am at mar Lago. Thank you for your attention
this matter, President J. Trump, and this is clearly the
(01:43):
Trump doctrine FAFO, making it clear that you better play
ball with us when we give you a warning.
Speaker 5 (01:51):
JD.
Speaker 4 (01:52):
Vance saying exactly that in his tweet, saying the President
offered multiple off ramps, but was very clear through out
the process the drug trafficking must stop and the stolen
oil must be returned to the United States. Maduro is
the newest person to find out that what President Trump says,
what he means, is what he says. Kudos to our
(02:14):
brave special operators who pulled off a truly impressive operation.
The President then called into Fox News Chump to talk
about it even before the press conference. Here's part of
what he said.
Speaker 5 (02:27):
You tell us.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
Where Maduro and his wife are right.
Speaker 6 (02:31):
The second, well, they'll be heading to New York. You
know they were indicted in New York and also so
were they take it to.
Speaker 3 (02:38):
A ship first?
Speaker 2 (02:39):
And then and then.
Speaker 6 (02:40):
Yes, the Ewojima they're own a ship. Okay, they'll be
heading into New York. The helicopters took come out and
they went by helicopter to a nice flight. I'm sure
they loved it. But they've they've killed a lot of people.
Remember that, they killed a lot of people, and even
people in their own country. They killed a lot of
(03:01):
people to maintain power. He's a very vicious person.
Speaker 4 (03:06):
A very vicious person. The President wasn't done there. He
also said this about Maduro as well, and why the
operation took place.
Speaker 6 (03:15):
It just was the right time to do it. We
had to do it because it's a war. We're losing
three hundred thousand people a year. We don't lose that
much in a war. Okay, if you look, and we
had to do it. But he was in a house
that was more like a fortress than a house. It
had steel doors, it had what they call the safety space,
(03:38):
whereas you know, 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. We had, you know,
massive blow torches and everything else that you need to
get through that steel, but we didn't need it. He
didn't make it to that area.
Speaker 4 (03:59):
Of the President Trump giving an update to the world, obviously,
then having his press conference where he walked out and
he said, this is his opening statement.
Speaker 5 (04:10):
Late last night and early today, at my direction, the
United States Armed Forces conducted an extraordinary military operation in
the capital of Venezuela. Overwhelming American military power, AirLand and
(04:31):
sea was used to launch a spectacular assault, and it
was a assault like people have not seen since World
War Two. It was a force against a heavily fortified
military fortress in the heart of Bracus to bring outlaw
dictator Nicholas Maduro to justice. This was one of the
(04:54):
most stunning, effective and powerful displays of American military might
and confidence in American history.
Speaker 4 (05:04):
In American history. It was truly incredible what we'd accomplished.
The President then went on to talk about the Venezuelan
military capabilities and how we were able to take them
out so quickly. Much of their military powered come from
Russia as well as China, and some of their military
were even mercenaries that were borrowed from Cuba to protect him.
Speaker 5 (05:28):
No nation in the world could achieve what America achieved yesterday,
or frankly, in just a short period of time. All
Venezuelan military capacities were rendered perilous as the men and
women of our military, working with US law enforcement, successfully
captured Maduro in the dead of night. It was dark,
(05:53):
the lights of Caracas were largely turned off due to
a c expertise that we have. It was dark and
it was deadly, but captured along with his wife, Celia Flores,
both of whom now faced American justice.
Speaker 4 (06:16):
No nation you listen to the President of the United
States of America. They are saying, all Venezuelan military capabilities
and their capacities were rendered powerless as the men and
women of our military, working with US law enforcement, successfully
captured Maduro in the dead of night. The President then
explaining what happened to Maduro.
Speaker 5 (06:37):
Maduro and Floras have been indicted in the Southern District
of New York Jay Clayton for their campaign of deadly
narco terrorism against the United States and its citizens.
Speaker 4 (06:52):
Three hundred thousand Americans dying a year because of fetnol
and the drug overdoses that are coming into the country.
The President then, thinking, are men and women in uniform.
Speaker 5 (07:04):
I want to thank the men and women of our
military who achieved such an extraordinary success overnight with breathtaking speed, power, precision,
and competence. You rarely see anything like it. You've seen
some raids in this country that didn't go so well.
They were an embarrassment. If you look back to Afghanistan,
or if you look back to the Jimmy Carter days,
(07:29):
they were different. Days were a respected country again, like
maybe like never before. I want to thank the men in.
Speaker 4 (07:36):
You listen to the President of the United States of America,
it's very clear he was so thankful to those men
and women in uniform. The President United States of America
giving a very stark warning to the rest of the world,
saying the dictator in arras Mandua is finally gone, and
the Venezuelan and people are free. They're free again. It's
been a long time for them, but they're free. I
(07:58):
want you to hear one other thing real quick that
I just want to play, and that is in Congress,
there are some sane people among the insane. Tom Cotton
saying this about Maduro on Fox News Sunday. Listen carefully.
Speaker 7 (08:10):
I've heard from too many Arkanson families who have been
devastated by illegal drugs flowing into this country, who's lost
a loved one, who've struggled with addiction. Those stories have
been repeated thousands of times across the country. President Trump
has been clear all along that he wants to the
flow of drugs from Venezuela to stop. Venezuela is really
unique in Latin America. They weren't just tolerating drug traffickers
(08:31):
on their territory or lack control of their territory where
drug traffickers had taken control. They were in league with
drug traffickers. Also, Venezuela is in league with America's adversaries
Cuba and Iran and Hezbala and other Islamic radicals. President
Trump made clear yesterday and his remarks that he gave
Nicholas Maduro multiple chances to change his ways and ultimately
(08:54):
to leave and go into exile elsewhere, and Maduro refused
to do that, and our military executed an amazing operation
that I highly command. President Trump for authorizing Secretary Hegseth
and General Kine and all of our frontline warriors for executing.
It's hard to overstate just how complex it was. The
United States military is the only one that could have
(09:14):
pulled off this operation.
Speaker 4 (09:16):
That's a former veteran now member of the United States
Congress and the Senate saying what we pulled off is unbelievable,
and saying Nicholas Muduro was indicted drug trafficker responsible for
thousands and thousands and thousands of American deaths, which bring
me to the rage in Cajun a man that I
(09:36):
just love. And this is a moment where you say,
how did we pull it off? I want you to
hear the timeline in the story. This will be a
movie one day, but this is the man in charge
explaining how we pulled this off, how we were able
(09:56):
to do it. Listen.
Speaker 3 (09:58):
This operation, known as Operation Absolute Resolve, was discreete precise,
and conducted during the darkest hours of January TEWOD and
was in the culmination of months of planning and rehearsal.
We watched, we waited, we prepared, We remained patient and professional.
(10:18):
This mission was meticulously planned, drawing lessons from decades of
missions over the last many years. Decades are many missions
over these last many years.
Speaker 5 (10:29):
This was an.
Speaker 3 (10:30):
Audacious operation that only the United States could do. It
required the utmost of precision and integration within our joint force,
and the word integration does not explain the sheer complexity
of such a mission, an extraction so precise. It involved
(10:51):
more than one hundred and fifty aircraft launching across the
Western Hemisphere in close coordination, all coming together in time
and place to layer effects for a single purpose to
get an interdiction force into downtown Caraccas while maintaining the
element of tactical surprise. Failure of one component of this
(11:16):
well oiled machine would have endangered the entire mission, and
failure is never an option for America's Joint Force. Those
in the air over Caraccas last night were willing to
give their lives for those on the ground and in
the helicopters. Let me talk a little bit about the preparation.
After months of work by our intelligence teammates to find
(11:39):
Maduro and understand how he moved, where he lived, where
he traveled, what he ate, what he wore, what were
his pets. In early December. Our force was set pending
a series of aligned events. Key was choosing the right
day to minimize the potential for civilian harm and maximize
(12:03):
the element of surprise, and minimize the harm to the
indicted personnel, so as the President said, they could be
brought to justice. And as the President said earlier today,
weather in Venezuela is always a factor this time of
the year, and over the weeks through Christmas and New
Year's the men and women of the United States Military
(12:25):
sat ready, patiently, waiting for the right triggers to be
met and the President to order us into action. Last night,
the weather broke just enough, clearing a path that only
the most skilled aviators in the world could maneuver through ocean,
mountain low cloud ceilings. But when tasked with a mission,
(12:48):
this organization does not quit. At ten forty six pm
Eastern time last night, the President ordered Cofford with this mission.
President good luck and godspeed, and those words were transmitted
to the entire joint force. Over the course of the night,
aircraft began launching from twenty different bases on land and
(13:10):
sea across the Western Hemisphere. In total, more than one
hundred and fifty aircraft, bombers, fighters, intelligence, reconnaissance, surveillance, rotary
wing were in the air last night. Thousands and thousands
of hours of experience were airborne. Our youngest crew member
was twenty and our oldest crew member was forty nine.
(13:32):
And there's simply no match for American military might. As
the night began, the helicopters took off with the Extraction Force,
which included law enforcement officers, and began their flight into
Venezuela at one hundred feet above the water. As they
approached Venezuelan shores, the United States began layering different effects
provided by Spacecom, Cybercom and other members of the Inner
(13:55):
Agency to create a pathway overhead. Those forces were per
detected from aircraft were protected by aircraft from the United
States Marines, the United States Navy, the United States Air Force,
and the Air National Guard. The force included F twenty
two's F thirty fives, F eighteen's, EA eighteens, E twos,
(14:17):
B one bombers, and other support aircraft, as well as
numerous remotely piloted drones. As the force began to approach Caracas,
the Joint Air Component began dismantling and disabling the air
defense systems in Venezuela, employing weapons to ensure the safe
passage of the helicopters into the target area. The goal
(14:41):
of our air component is was and always will be
to protect the helicopters and the ground force and get
them to the target and get them home. As the
force crossed the last point of high terrain where they'd
been hiding in the clutter, we assessed that we had
made maintained totally the element of surprise. As the helicopter
(15:05):
force ingressed towards the objective at low level. We arrived
at Maduro's compound at one one am Eastern Standard time
or two to one am Caracas local time, and the
apprehension force descended into Maduro's compound and moved with speed, precision,
and discipline towards their objective and isolated the area to
(15:28):
ensure the safety and security of the ground force while
apprehending the indicted persons. On arrival into the target area,
the helicopters came under fire and they replied with that
fire with overwhelming force and self defense. One of our
aircraft was hit but remained fliable, and as the President
said earlier today, all of our aircraft came home, and
(15:50):
that aircraft remained fliable during the rest of the mission.
As the operation unfolded at the compound, our air and
ground intelligence teams provided real time updates to the ground force,
ensuring those forces could safely navigate the complex environment without
unnecessary risk. The force remained protected by overhead tactical aviation.
(16:13):
Maduro and his wife, both indicted, gave up and were
taken into custody by the Department of Justice, assisted by
our incredible US military with professionalism and precision, which with
no loss of US life.
Speaker 4 (16:29):
Truly incredible. That is the story of American resilience, of leadership,
of President trumping the right people to be in the
right positions of power, and also I think in God
protecting them. God bless America. God bless our President, God
bless his cabinet, and God bless our men and women
(16:51):
in uniform.
Speaker 2 (16:52):
Thank you for listening to the forty seven Morning Update
with Ben Ferguson. Please make sure you hit subscribe wherever
you're listening to this right now and for more in
depth news. Also subscribe to the Ben Ferguson podcast and
we will see you back here tomorrow.
And as to this commander in chief, he did something
people talked about doing. You just wait for Cuba. Cuba
is a communist dictatorship that's killed priests and nuns. They've
prayed on their own people. Their days are numbered. We're
gonna wake up one day, I hope in twenty six
(00:22):
in our backyard. We're gonna have allies in these countries
doing business with America, not narco terrorist dictators killing Americas.
Speaker 2 (00:31):
This is a.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Big frigging day.
Speaker 2 (00:33):
You're listening to the forty seven Morning Update with Ben ferguson.
Speaker 4 (00:37):
Good Monday morning. It's nice to have you with us
on the forty seven Morning Update, and we've got a
very big story. It's the President of the United States
of America, Donald Trump's foreign policy FAFO. Nicholas Maduro found
out exactly what happens when you don't listen to the
President of the United States of America and his warnings.
Now in a jail cell in New York City. So
(00:57):
how did we pull off this incredible mission and what
happens next? We have all the details for you. It's
the forty seven Morning Update and it starts right now.
Story number one, President Donald Trump announcing it in a simple,
true social post. The United States of America has successfully
carried out a large scale strike against Venezuela and its leader,
(01:19):
President Nicholas Maduro, who has been along with his wife,
captured and flown out of the country. This operation was
done in conjunction with US law enforcement. Details to follow.
He then said, there will be a news conference at
eleven am at mar Lago. Thank you for your attention
this matter, President J. Trump, and this is clearly the
(01:43):
Trump doctrine FAFO, making it clear that you better play
ball with us when we give you a warning.
Speaker 5 (01:51):
JD.
Speaker 4 (01:52):
Vance saying exactly that in his tweet, saying the President
offered multiple off ramps, but was very clear through out
the process the drug trafficking must stop and the stolen
oil must be returned to the United States. Maduro is
the newest person to find out that what President Trump says,
what he means, is what he says. Kudos to our
(02:14):
brave special operators who pulled off a truly impressive operation.
The President then called into Fox News Chump to talk
about it even before the press conference. Here's part of
what he said.
Speaker 5 (02:27):
You tell us.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
Where Maduro and his wife are right.
Speaker 6 (02:31):
The second, well, they'll be heading to New York. You
know they were indicted in New York and also so
were they take it to.
Speaker 3 (02:38):
A ship first?
Speaker 2 (02:39):
And then and then.
Speaker 6 (02:40):
Yes, the Ewojima they're own a ship. Okay, they'll be
heading into New York. The helicopters took come out and
they went by helicopter to a nice flight. I'm sure
they loved it. But they've they've killed a lot of people.
Remember that, they killed a lot of people, and even
people in their own country. They killed a lot of
(03:01):
people to maintain power. He's a very vicious person.
Speaker 4 (03:06):
A very vicious person. The President wasn't done there. He
also said this about Maduro as well, and why the
operation took place.
Speaker 6 (03:15):
It just was the right time to do it. We
had to do it because it's a war. We're losing
three hundred thousand people a year. We don't lose that
much in a war. Okay, if you look, and we
had to do it. But he was in a house
that was more like a fortress than a house. It
had steel doors, it had what they call the safety space,
(03:38):
whereas you know, 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. We had, you know,
massive blow torches and everything else that you need to
get through that steel, but we didn't need it. He
didn't make it to that area.
Speaker 4 (03:59):
Of the President Trump giving an update to the world, obviously,
then having his press conference where he walked out and
he said, this is his opening statement.
Speaker 5 (04:10):
Late last night and early today, at my direction, the
United States Armed Forces conducted an extraordinary military operation in
the capital of Venezuela. Overwhelming American military power, AirLand and
(04:31):
sea was used to launch a spectacular assault, and it
was a assault like people have not seen since World
War Two. It was a force against a heavily fortified
military fortress in the heart of Bracus to bring outlaw
dictator Nicholas Maduro to justice. This was one of the
(04:54):
most stunning, effective and powerful displays of American military might
and confidence in American history.
Speaker 4 (05:04):
In American history. It was truly incredible what we'd accomplished.
The President then went on to talk about the Venezuelan
military capabilities and how we were able to take them
out so quickly. Much of their military powered come from
Russia as well as China, and some of their military
were even mercenaries that were borrowed from Cuba to protect him.
Speaker 5 (05:28):
No nation in the world could achieve what America achieved yesterday,
or frankly, in just a short period of time. All
Venezuelan military capacities were rendered perilous as the men and
women of our military, working with US law enforcement, successfully
captured Maduro in the dead of night. It was dark,
(05:53):
the lights of Caracas were largely turned off due to
a c expertise that we have. It was dark and
it was deadly, but captured along with his wife, Celia Flores,
both of whom now faced American justice.
Speaker 4 (06:16):
No nation you listen to the President of the United
States of America. They are saying, all Venezuelan military capabilities
and their capacities were rendered powerless as the men and
women of our military, working with US law enforcement, successfully
captured Maduro in the dead of night. The President then
explaining what happened to Maduro.
Speaker 5 (06:37):
Maduro and Floras have been indicted in the Southern District
of New York Jay Clayton for their campaign of deadly
narco terrorism against the United States and its citizens.
Speaker 4 (06:52):
Three hundred thousand Americans dying a year because of fetnol
and the drug overdoses that are coming into the country.
The President then, thinking, are men and women in uniform.
Speaker 5 (07:04):
I want to thank the men and women of our
military who achieved such an extraordinary success overnight with breathtaking speed, power, precision,
and competence. You rarely see anything like it. You've seen
some raids in this country that didn't go so well.
They were an embarrassment. If you look back to Afghanistan,
or if you look back to the Jimmy Carter days,
(07:29):
they were different. Days were a respected country again, like
maybe like never before. I want to thank the men in.
Speaker 4 (07:36):
You listen to the President of the United States of America,
it's very clear he was so thankful to those men
and women in uniform. The President United States of America
giving a very stark warning to the rest of the world,
saying the dictator in arras Mandua is finally gone, and
the Venezuelan and people are free. They're free again. It's
been a long time for them, but they're free. I
(07:58):
want you to hear one other thing real quick that
I just want to play, and that is in Congress,
there are some sane people among the insane. Tom Cotton
saying this about Maduro on Fox News Sunday. Listen carefully.
Speaker 7 (08:10):
I've heard from too many Arkanson families who have been
devastated by illegal drugs flowing into this country, who's lost
a loved one, who've struggled with addiction. Those stories have
been repeated thousands of times across the country. President Trump
has been clear all along that he wants to the
flow of drugs from Venezuela to stop. Venezuela is really
unique in Latin America. They weren't just tolerating drug traffickers
(08:31):
on their territory or lack control of their territory where
drug traffickers had taken control. They were in league with
drug traffickers. Also, Venezuela is in league with America's adversaries
Cuba and Iran and Hezbala and other Islamic radicals. President
Trump made clear yesterday and his remarks that he gave
Nicholas Maduro multiple chances to change his ways and ultimately
(08:54):
to leave and go into exile elsewhere, and Maduro refused
to do that, and our military executed an amazing operation
that I highly command. President Trump for authorizing Secretary Hegseth
and General Kine and all of our frontline warriors for executing.
It's hard to overstate just how complex it was. The
United States military is the only one that could have
(09:14):
pulled off this operation.
Speaker 4 (09:16):
That's a former veteran now member of the United States
Congress and the Senate saying what we pulled off is unbelievable,
and saying Nicholas Muduro was indicted drug trafficker responsible for
thousands and thousands and thousands of American deaths, which bring
me to the rage in Cajun a man that I
(09:36):
just love. And this is a moment where you say,
how did we pull it off? I want you to
hear the timeline in the story. This will be a
movie one day, but this is the man in charge
explaining how we pulled this off, how we were able
(09:56):
to do it. Listen.
Speaker 3 (09:58):
This operation, known as Operation Absolute Resolve, was discreete precise,
and conducted during the darkest hours of January TEWOD and
was in the culmination of months of planning and rehearsal.
We watched, we waited, we prepared, We remained patient and professional.
(10:18):
This mission was meticulously planned, drawing lessons from decades of
missions over the last many years. Decades are many missions
over these last many years.
Speaker 5 (10:29):
This was an.
Speaker 3 (10:30):
Audacious operation that only the United States could do. It
required the utmost of precision and integration within our joint force,
and the word integration does not explain the sheer complexity
of such a mission, an extraction so precise. It involved
(10:51):
more than one hundred and fifty aircraft launching across the
Western Hemisphere in close coordination, all coming together in time
and place to layer effects for a single purpose to
get an interdiction force into downtown Caraccas while maintaining the
element of tactical surprise. Failure of one component of this
(11:16):
well oiled machine would have endangered the entire mission, and
failure is never an option for America's Joint Force. Those
in the air over Caraccas last night were willing to
give their lives for those on the ground and in
the helicopters. Let me talk a little bit about the preparation.
After months of work by our intelligence teammates to find
(11:39):
Maduro and understand how he moved, where he lived, where
he traveled, what he ate, what he wore, what were
his pets. In early December. Our force was set pending
a series of aligned events. Key was choosing the right
day to minimize the potential for civilian harm and maximize
(12:03):
the element of surprise, and minimize the harm to the
indicted personnel, so as the President said, they could be
brought to justice. And as the President said earlier today,
weather in Venezuela is always a factor this time of
the year, and over the weeks through Christmas and New
Year's the men and women of the United States Military
(12:25):
sat ready, patiently, waiting for the right triggers to be
met and the President to order us into action. Last night,
the weather broke just enough, clearing a path that only
the most skilled aviators in the world could maneuver through ocean,
mountain low cloud ceilings. But when tasked with a mission,
(12:48):
this organization does not quit. At ten forty six pm
Eastern time last night, the President ordered Cofford with this mission.
President good luck and godspeed, and those words were transmitted
to the entire joint force. Over the course of the night,
aircraft began launching from twenty different bases on land and
(13:10):
sea across the Western Hemisphere. In total, more than one
hundred and fifty aircraft, bombers, fighters, intelligence, reconnaissance, surveillance, rotary
wing were in the air last night. Thousands and thousands
of hours of experience were airborne. Our youngest crew member
was twenty and our oldest crew member was forty nine.
(13:32):
And there's simply no match for American military might. As
the night began, the helicopters took off with the Extraction Force,
which included law enforcement officers, and began their flight into
Venezuela at one hundred feet above the water. As they
approached Venezuelan shores, the United States began layering different effects
provided by Spacecom, Cybercom and other members of the Inner
(13:55):
Agency to create a pathway overhead. Those forces were per
detected from aircraft were protected by aircraft from the United
States Marines, the United States Navy, the United States Air Force,
and the Air National Guard. The force included F twenty
two's F thirty fives, F eighteen's, EA eighteens, E twos,
(14:17):
B one bombers, and other support aircraft, as well as
numerous remotely piloted drones. As the force began to approach Caracas,
the Joint Air Component began dismantling and disabling the air
defense systems in Venezuela, employing weapons to ensure the safe
passage of the helicopters into the target area. The goal
(14:41):
of our air component is was and always will be
to protect the helicopters and the ground force and get
them to the target and get them home. As the
force crossed the last point of high terrain where they'd
been hiding in the clutter, we assessed that we had
made maintained totally the element of surprise. As the helicopter
(15:05):
force ingressed towards the objective at low level. We arrived
at Maduro's compound at one one am Eastern Standard time
or two to one am Caracas local time, and the
apprehension force descended into Maduro's compound and moved with speed, precision,
and discipline towards their objective and isolated the area to
(15:28):
ensure the safety and security of the ground force while
apprehending the indicted persons. On arrival into the target area,
the helicopters came under fire and they replied with that
fire with overwhelming force and self defense. One of our
aircraft was hit but remained fliable, and as the President
said earlier today, all of our aircraft came home, and
(15:50):
that aircraft remained fliable during the rest of the mission.
As the operation unfolded at the compound, our air and
ground intelligence teams provided real time updates to the ground force,
ensuring those forces could safely navigate the complex environment without
unnecessary risk. The force remained protected by overhead tactical aviation.
(16:13):
Maduro and his wife, both indicted, gave up and were
taken into custody by the Department of Justice, assisted by
our incredible US military with professionalism and precision, which with
no loss of US life.
Speaker 4 (16:29):
Truly incredible. That is the story of American resilience, of leadership,
of President trumping the right people to be in the
right positions of power, and also I think in God
protecting them. God bless America. God bless our President, God
bless his cabinet, and God bless our men and women
(16:51):
in uniform.
Speaker 2 (16:52):
Thank you for listening to the forty seven Morning Update
with Ben Ferguson. Please make sure you hit subscribe wherever
you're listening to this right now and for more in
depth news. Also subscribe to the Ben Ferguson podcast and
we will see you back here tomorrow.
Host
Ben Ferguson
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