January 5, 2026 • 12 mins
Military analyst Mike Lyons joins Armstrong & Getty to talk about the masterfully executed mission conducted by the U.S. military to extricate Venezuela's president, Nicolas Maduro, from the presidential palace in Caracas.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
As a helicopter force ingress 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
(00:23):
the area to ensure the safety and security of the
ground force while apprehending the indicted persons.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
So how old is Maduro? I gotta think he get
woken up from a sound sleep, and there's a bunch
of you know, us super secret special Forces special Forces
dudes with guns and flashlights and stuff in your face.
Takes a while to.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
Get your bearings. You got to have at least one
thought that, wow, this is a weird dream.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
He's sixty three. Yeah, it take me a little while
to yah sec I had some price of food last night.
What's going on here?
Speaker 3 (00:59):
Right right? Well? General Cain there describing the critical kind
of you know, the climactic moments of the raid and
coming across Maduro. We skipped past where he helps us
understand the incredible complexity and sophistication of the operation and
(01:19):
for that analysis. What a pleasure it is for the
first time the year to talk to military analyst Mike
Lyons about this awesome, awesome demonstration of American capability. Mike,
how are you, sir? Do you have a good holiday season? Good?
Speaker 4 (01:31):
What you guys? Happy New Year? Yes, had a great
holiday season and what a way to start the year
for sure.
Speaker 3 (01:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:36):
I was really digging your Twitter feed in the middle
of the night the other night following your analysis of
it is what's happened? So thanks?
Speaker 4 (01:43):
Yeah, you know, just watching this, you know, here's to
me is the biggest issue. For months, I've been talking
to former special operators and other people in the military
trying to figure out what are we doing in the
Caribbean right Obviously we're projecting power blown up drug boats
and the like there, and we all thought that this
mission was going to be impossible. I mean, for us
to go in kinetically take out Maduro, it would mean
(02:06):
an invasion for US. I kept saying, well, nothing's going
to happen because the Army's not in the game yet.
And the only I can think of it's like you're
sitting on a desert island. You got a can without
a can opener and you're not going to eat, and
then all of a sudden the next day the cans
open and now you're gonna be able to eat. I mean,
the level of from an operational perspective was so complex
and just just incredible, and from a competency perspective, And
(02:28):
I still have the scars from the nineteen eighties with
you know, Desert one and what happened there and the
ashes that that took place there. So I can't reiterate
just how incredibly amazing this mission was and the complexity
of it. One hundred and fifty aircraft, no casualties in
and out two and a half hours. It's you couldn't
write a script that said it would go as.
Speaker 3 (02:48):
Easy as a one hundred and fifty aircraft. Yeah, help
us understand what kind of aircraft and what were they
doing for we layman. Just give us the broad outlines
of the complexity of the operation.
Speaker 4 (03:00):
All the levers of forces that we have in power,
we're applied here. Aircraft that took out their air defense systems,
drones monitoring surveillance, helicopters shuttling in the seventy fifth rangers.
You know, this was if you had to give a visual.
It's kind of like Blackhawk down back from the nineties,
that failure of a mission, unfortunately. But you know the
(03:22):
fact that we had the Rangers in there protecting the
strike force, which is the Delta guys that go in
and extract people like this, this is their mission. And
we know that they ended up practicing this for months
before they had a set up and they had done this.
I'm still surprised that Maduro didn't have thirty thousand troops
surrounding him. I mean, given the fact that you know,
he knew the United States was going after him. So
(03:44):
it still is just incredible about those those soldiers getting in.
But every single one of those aircraft had a mission
either bringing troops in, gathering surveillance, taking out targets, just
a real high combination. And you noticed General King kept
talking about the joint force. The joint force. That is
the difference between US and every other military out there.
This is why the Russians are wallowing a novacane in Ukraine, right.
(04:06):
They can't jointly bring all their forces together to make
to attack something and move forward with They don't combine
air power with ground power and ISR. They just go
one at a time. But in this case, the United
States is able to take with interagency, take all of
these levers of power and bring them together and create
this incredible fist that can take anybody out that we choose.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
To give me an idea of how risky this would
have been, like if you do it ten times, are
you successful eight times? Or do you have any guests
on that?
Speaker 4 (04:38):
Well, that's why we all sat around and said, this
just wasn't going to happen, wasn't even a kind of
a course of action. And I was talking to guys
that at the highest levels of Jaysak and you know
that that had been in that spot. They just thought
it was going to be just too difficult. The element
of surprise, just maintaining that that alone was a factor
(04:59):
that just was incredible. And then the weather played, I mean,
the D Day type invasion is what we all thought.
We thought that, yeah, if they thought they would move
twenty to twenty five thousand troops or so, and because
we thought they'd had to get an egress point in,
but they were able to take out any of the
air defense systems. So the other thing this does, too
is that it shows that once again the total crap
(05:19):
of Russian military equipment, because that's what's been surrounding Venezuela
when it comes to their air defense system. So the
essay three hundred, you might as well put it in
a museum right now, because anybody who has it is
never going to use it again, because the United States
just blew right by it. So we take out the
air defense platforms, we take out their systems, and then
we've shut the power off in the country. I mean again,
(05:39):
there's no other country in the world that can do this.
But to say that you wouldn't expect a casualty, or
you wouldn't expect something to go wrong, very unlikely. In
this case, eight out of ten times something else would
go wrong. You have the expectation, commanders expect losses, you'd
have an expectation you lose something.
Speaker 3 (05:53):
Right, Yeah, miraculous success. I was struck by General Kine
saying we rehearse this over and over and over again,
not so that we could get it right, but so
that it couldn't go wrong. Now, obviously fate and God intervened,
but that that's that's a philosophy that we civilians don't
I hadn't heard articulated in that way before.
Speaker 4 (06:14):
Yeah, that is that's a result of Desert one and
the fact that you have to plan. When when I
was on active duty, we said, with the planning gets slimed, right,
what's going to happen to us along the way, And
you have to plan for every one of those contingencies,
rehearse them so their second nature, so you know exactly
what to do. It's that your playbook, checklist mentality that
the military has military trains for that. That that within
(06:37):
our military because of this thing called commander's intents. Right,
I'm watching people try to say, oh, the soldiers are
the sailors, they don't know where are going. You know,
we're invading Venezuela. None of that. Everybody got the mission.
Everybody knew what the mission was. Get in, get out,
extra extra, extra, strate the guy, get him in and out.
Everybody knows commanders intent. And that's what's another thing that
makes our military work better than everybody else's.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
Well, as you're talking to some of your friends who've
been there, done that with regime change and nation building
and everything, is there some concern that we're going to
have boots on the ground trying to keep Venezuela a
stable place for a certain amount of time.
Speaker 4 (07:14):
I don't think so. This is not a rock. We
don't have one hundred thousand troops there. This was not
an invasion and it's also not regime change. Their constitution
has put their vice president, Kelsea Rodriguez now in charge,
and we've given her the message you're either going to
play ball or not. And if you're not going to
play ball, you might find yourself in a pair of
white tennis shoes and a Nike jumpsuits sitting in the
back of a Special Forces helicopter here if you don't
(07:36):
play ball. And the thing about it is, this is
what we want to do. We're taking control, taking control
of three hundred billion barrels of reserve crude oil in
our hemisphere, not allowing the Chinese, by the way, the
Ranians that had already built a drone facility manufacturing drones
in Venezuela. The Chinese are taking their oil. The Russians
(07:58):
and the military this is long overdue to take care
of this situation right now. I mean, this is this
has been so, this will be so pivotabal for our
country and from from a generational perspective and how we've
reset the world and reset the economy and any energy
market in particular. It's fantastic.
Speaker 3 (08:14):
I'm we're talking to military analyst Mike Leons. Mike I
mentioned earlier in the show that you almost have to
compartmentalize each part of this because you always want to
leap to the next part, and you kind of did,
which is a great discussion, and I'm a little mystified
by this. The operation was amazing, and as a demonstration
of American power, I think it will echo around the
(08:34):
globe and it should. Uh, But going forward, can we
exercise Lever's power effectively enough to get what we need
out of the Venezuelan regime given the fact that they
are still what they were and this this Gallow's in
charge now is a hardcore Maduroite socialist.
Speaker 4 (08:54):
Well, we're going to find out. And she controls the
military right now, and he's basically said we'd back in
if we had to. So we're gonna let this thing
ste for a little bit. Again, It's not been regime
changed right now, it's just different person running the country
right now. I've got confidence that we'll put enough pressure
on them we will then start to take over the
(09:15):
petroleum assets and where they actually pump oil from. And
we'll do all we'll do all those kinds of things,
which is what we're trying to do here, which we're
trying to get to. I think. So for example, this
this administration that Trump's was not keen about restoring Machado.
That was the individual won the Nobel Peace Prize from
UH this last year and was.
Speaker 3 (09:34):
And we already won the left election right.
Speaker 4 (09:37):
Right, But this but real politic on the ground. She
doesn't control anything, you know, it's right now, this is
hardcore human nature. Who controls the military. This is for
you know, grown ups. This is not for you know,
theoretical people that are running the government. She's got no legitimacy. Unfortunately,
I hate to say it like that, but she doesn't
(09:57):
to run the government. So we're gonna give this person, Rodrigae,
the chance because she does control the military and the oil.
We're gonna cut a deal with her. I'm sure, and
we'll move this. We'll move this down the road. And
if we do it, this is again trumped with leverage.
He is the leverage meister, getting leverage of oil. Right now.
The fact that we have this control now over there
oil puts Canada on notice, China onnoticed. China might not
(10:20):
be able to invent inde Taiwan now they only have
twenty five billion barrels in reserve. They might not have
the energy to do it now. So there's so much
leverage that was gained by this operation that without even
a casualty being gone, I just can't talk about it
so much.
Speaker 3 (10:35):
So if this gal doesn't come around, we snatch her up,
and then the person after her, and before long it's
like being the head of isis you know the first
thing you do when you get the job is you're
write your will.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
Yeah right.
Speaker 4 (10:45):
You know what's funny was they got asked the question
like Marco Ruby got asked question over the weekend about
why did you just take him? Why didn't you take
all his other henchmen. It's like, do you not get
do you not hear yourself? I mean that was the
mission of getting that one person, which is the person.
So again it's all done legally too, which is really
why we go in there in the first place, under
this guise of you know, getting him from legally from
(11:08):
a drug perspective. No, you can't argue against it. Again,
you know the Democrats wanted him out five years ago.
They just didn't have the nerve to do what.
Speaker 3 (11:16):
We did military analysts. Mike Lines, Yeah, Marco gave a
fine spank into Margaret Brendon. We enjoyed that.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
I wanted to ask you this before we let you go.
I purposely went to New Orleans over vacation just to
go to the World War II Museum. I assume you've
been there before.
Speaker 4 (11:33):
I have amazing just you know, the stories you know,
starts in the that real car and you walk through.
Speaker 2 (11:40):
That's the most amazing museum I've ever been to anywhere
in the world. Absolutely incredible.
Speaker 4 (11:45):
A lot of presents there and just the sacrifices made
and we just should never forget. And we're getting further
from that generation, but it's just incredible. I advise everybody
to go there. My classmate actually is one of the
directors there, works down there and they held nice events there,
but just the his historical what they've captured there is
just amazing.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
We'll tell them I'm impressed.
Speaker 3 (12:04):
Yeah, yeah, I want to hear more about that from you,
Jack as well. Mike Lines, Mike, thanks so much for
the time. Great to talk to you.
Speaker 4 (12:10):
Great guys. Thanks for having me all right
Speaker 1 (12:12):
Our pleasure, Armstrong and Getty
As a helicopter force ingress 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
(00:23):
the area to ensure the safety and security of the
ground force while apprehending the indicted persons.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
So how old is Maduro? I gotta think he get
woken up from a sound sleep, and there's a bunch
of you know, us super secret special Forces special Forces
dudes with guns and flashlights and stuff in your face.
Takes a while to.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
Get your bearings. You got to have at least one
thought that, wow, this is a weird dream.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
He's sixty three. Yeah, it take me a little while
to yah sec I had some price of food last night.
What's going on here?
Speaker 3 (00:59):
Right right? Well? General Cain there describing the critical kind
of you know, the climactic moments of the raid and
coming across Maduro. We skipped past where he helps us
understand the incredible complexity and sophistication of the operation and
(01:19):
for that analysis. What a pleasure it is for the
first time the year to talk to military analyst Mike
Lyons about this awesome, awesome demonstration of American capability. Mike,
how are you, sir? Do you have a good holiday season? Good?
Speaker 4 (01:31):
What you guys? Happy New Year? Yes, had a great
holiday season and what a way to start the year
for sure.
Speaker 3 (01:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (01:36):
I was really digging your Twitter feed in the middle
of the night the other night following your analysis of
it is what's happened? So thanks?
Speaker 4 (01:43):
Yeah, you know, just watching this, you know, here's to
me is the biggest issue. For months, I've been talking
to former special operators and other people in the military
trying to figure out what are we doing in the
Caribbean right Obviously we're projecting power blown up drug boats
and the like there, and we all thought that this
mission was going to be impossible. I mean, for us
to go in kinetically take out Maduro, it would mean
(02:06):
an invasion for US. I kept saying, well, nothing's going
to happen because the Army's not in the game yet.
And the only I can think of it's like you're
sitting on a desert island. You got a can without
a can opener and you're not going to eat, and
then all of a sudden the next day the cans
open and now you're gonna be able to eat. I mean,
the level of from an operational perspective was so complex
and just just incredible, and from a competency perspective, And
(02:28):
I still have the scars from the nineteen eighties with
you know, Desert one and what happened there and the
ashes that that took place there. So I can't reiterate
just how incredibly amazing this mission was and the complexity
of it. One hundred and fifty aircraft, no casualties in
and out two and a half hours. It's you couldn't
write a script that said it would go as.
Speaker 3 (02:48):
Easy as a one hundred and fifty aircraft. Yeah, help
us understand what kind of aircraft and what were they
doing for we layman. Just give us the broad outlines
of the complexity of the operation.
Speaker 4 (03:00):
All the levers of forces that we have in power,
we're applied here. Aircraft that took out their air defense systems,
drones monitoring surveillance, helicopters shuttling in the seventy fifth rangers.
You know, this was if you had to give a visual.
It's kind of like Blackhawk down back from the nineties,
that failure of a mission, unfortunately. But you know the
(03:22):
fact that we had the Rangers in there protecting the
strike force, which is the Delta guys that go in
and extract people like this, this is their mission. And
we know that they ended up practicing this for months
before they had a set up and they had done this.
I'm still surprised that Maduro didn't have thirty thousand troops
surrounding him. I mean, given the fact that you know,
he knew the United States was going after him. So
(03:44):
it still is just incredible about those those soldiers getting in.
But every single one of those aircraft had a mission
either bringing troops in, gathering surveillance, taking out targets, just
a real high combination. And you noticed General King kept
talking about the joint force. The joint force. That is
the difference between US and every other military out there.
This is why the Russians are wallowing a novacane in Ukraine, right.
(04:06):
They can't jointly bring all their forces together to make
to attack something and move forward with They don't combine
air power with ground power and ISR. They just go
one at a time. But in this case, the United
States is able to take with interagency, take all of
these levers of power and bring them together and create
this incredible fist that can take anybody out that we choose.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
To give me an idea of how risky this would
have been, like if you do it ten times, are
you successful eight times? Or do you have any guests
on that?
Speaker 4 (04:38):
Well, that's why we all sat around and said, this
just wasn't going to happen, wasn't even a kind of
a course of action. And I was talking to guys
that at the highest levels of Jaysak and you know
that that had been in that spot. They just thought
it was going to be just too difficult. The element
of surprise, just maintaining that that alone was a factor
(04:59):
that just was incredible. And then the weather played, I mean,
the D Day type invasion is what we all thought.
We thought that, yeah, if they thought they would move
twenty to twenty five thousand troops or so, and because
we thought they'd had to get an egress point in,
but they were able to take out any of the
air defense systems. So the other thing this does, too
is that it shows that once again the total crap
(05:19):
of Russian military equipment, because that's what's been surrounding Venezuela
when it comes to their air defense system. So the
essay three hundred, you might as well put it in
a museum right now, because anybody who has it is
never going to use it again, because the United States
just blew right by it. So we take out the
air defense platforms, we take out their systems, and then
we've shut the power off in the country. I mean again,
(05:39):
there's no other country in the world that can do this.
But to say that you wouldn't expect a casualty, or
you wouldn't expect something to go wrong, very unlikely. In
this case, eight out of ten times something else would
go wrong. You have the expectation, commanders expect losses, you'd
have an expectation you lose something.
Speaker 3 (05:53):
Right, Yeah, miraculous success. I was struck by General Kine
saying we rehearse this over and over and over again,
not so that we could get it right, but so
that it couldn't go wrong. Now, obviously fate and God intervened,
but that that's that's a philosophy that we civilians don't
I hadn't heard articulated in that way before.
Speaker 4 (06:14):
Yeah, that is that's a result of Desert one and
the fact that you have to plan. When when I
was on active duty, we said, with the planning gets slimed, right,
what's going to happen to us along the way, And
you have to plan for every one of those contingencies,
rehearse them so their second nature, so you know exactly
what to do. It's that your playbook, checklist mentality that
the military has military trains for that. That that within
(06:37):
our military because of this thing called commander's intents. Right,
I'm watching people try to say, oh, the soldiers are
the sailors, they don't know where are going. You know,
we're invading Venezuela. None of that. Everybody got the mission.
Everybody knew what the mission was. Get in, get out,
extra extra, extra, strate the guy, get him in and out.
Everybody knows commanders intent. And that's what's another thing that
makes our military work better than everybody else's.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
Well, as you're talking to some of your friends who've
been there, done that with regime change and nation building
and everything, is there some concern that we're going to
have boots on the ground trying to keep Venezuela a
stable place for a certain amount of time.
Speaker 4 (07:14):
I don't think so. This is not a rock. We
don't have one hundred thousand troops there. This was not
an invasion and it's also not regime change. Their constitution
has put their vice president, Kelsea Rodriguez now in charge,
and we've given her the message you're either going to
play ball or not. And if you're not going to
play ball, you might find yourself in a pair of
white tennis shoes and a Nike jumpsuits sitting in the
back of a Special Forces helicopter here if you don't
(07:36):
play ball. And the thing about it is, this is
what we want to do. We're taking control, taking control
of three hundred billion barrels of reserve crude oil in
our hemisphere, not allowing the Chinese, by the way, the
Ranians that had already built a drone facility manufacturing drones
in Venezuela. The Chinese are taking their oil. The Russians
(07:58):
and the military this is long overdue to take care
of this situation right now. I mean, this is this
has been so, this will be so pivotabal for our
country and from from a generational perspective and how we've
reset the world and reset the economy and any energy
market in particular. It's fantastic.
Speaker 3 (08:14):
I'm we're talking to military analyst Mike Leons. Mike I
mentioned earlier in the show that you almost have to
compartmentalize each part of this because you always want to
leap to the next part, and you kind of did,
which is a great discussion, and I'm a little mystified
by this. The operation was amazing, and as a demonstration
of American power, I think it will echo around the
(08:34):
globe and it should. Uh, But going forward, can we
exercise Lever's power effectively enough to get what we need
out of the Venezuelan regime given the fact that they
are still what they were and this this Gallow's in
charge now is a hardcore Maduroite socialist.
Speaker 4 (08:54):
Well, we're going to find out. And she controls the
military right now, and he's basically said we'd back in
if we had to. So we're gonna let this thing
ste for a little bit. Again, It's not been regime
changed right now, it's just different person running the country
right now. I've got confidence that we'll put enough pressure
on them we will then start to take over the
(09:15):
petroleum assets and where they actually pump oil from. And
we'll do all we'll do all those kinds of things,
which is what we're trying to do here, which we're
trying to get to. I think. So for example, this
this administration that Trump's was not keen about restoring Machado.
That was the individual won the Nobel Peace Prize from
UH this last year and was.
Speaker 3 (09:34):
And we already won the left election right.
Speaker 4 (09:37):
Right, But this but real politic on the ground. She
doesn't control anything, you know, it's right now, this is
hardcore human nature. Who controls the military. This is for
you know, grown ups. This is not for you know,
theoretical people that are running the government. She's got no legitimacy. Unfortunately,
I hate to say it like that, but she doesn't
(09:57):
to run the government. So we're gonna give this person, Rodrigae,
the chance because she does control the military and the oil.
We're gonna cut a deal with her. I'm sure, and
we'll move this. We'll move this down the road. And
if we do it, this is again trumped with leverage.
He is the leverage meister, getting leverage of oil. Right now.
The fact that we have this control now over there
oil puts Canada on notice, China onnoticed. China might not
(10:20):
be able to invent inde Taiwan now they only have
twenty five billion barrels in reserve. They might not have
the energy to do it now. So there's so much
leverage that was gained by this operation that without even
a casualty being gone, I just can't talk about it
so much.
Speaker 3 (10:35):
So if this gal doesn't come around, we snatch her up,
and then the person after her, and before long it's
like being the head of isis you know the first
thing you do when you get the job is you're
write your will.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
Yeah right.
Speaker 4 (10:45):
You know what's funny was they got asked the question
like Marco Ruby got asked question over the weekend about
why did you just take him? Why didn't you take
all his other henchmen. It's like, do you not get
do you not hear yourself? I mean that was the
mission of getting that one person, which is the person.
So again it's all done legally too, which is really
why we go in there in the first place, under
this guise of you know, getting him from legally from
(11:08):
a drug perspective. No, you can't argue against it. Again,
you know the Democrats wanted him out five years ago.
They just didn't have the nerve to do what.
Speaker 3 (11:16):
We did military analysts. Mike Lines, Yeah, Marco gave a
fine spank into Margaret Brendon. We enjoyed that.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
I wanted to ask you this before we let you go.
I purposely went to New Orleans over vacation just to
go to the World War II Museum. I assume you've
been there before.
Speaker 4 (11:33):
I have amazing just you know, the stories you know,
starts in the that real car and you walk through.
Speaker 2 (11:40):
That's the most amazing museum I've ever been to anywhere
in the world. Absolutely incredible.
Speaker 4 (11:45):
A lot of presents there and just the sacrifices made
and we just should never forget. And we're getting further
from that generation, but it's just incredible. I advise everybody
to go there. My classmate actually is one of the
directors there, works down there and they held nice events there,
but just the his historical what they've captured there is
just amazing.
Speaker 2 (12:02):
We'll tell them I'm impressed.
Speaker 3 (12:04):
Yeah, yeah, I want to hear more about that from you,
Jack as well. Mike Lines, Mike, thanks so much for
the time. Great to talk to you.
Speaker 4 (12:10):
Great guys. Thanks for having me all right
Speaker 1 (12:12):
Our pleasure, Armstrong and Getty
Hosts And Creators
Joe Getty
Jack Armstrong
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.
Two Guys, Five Rings: Matt, Bowen & The Olympics
Two Guys (Bowen Yang and Matt Rogers). Five Rings (you know, from the Olympics logo). One essential podcast for the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics. Bowen Yang (SNL, Wicked) and Matt Rogers (Palm Royale, No Good Deed) of Las Culturistas are back for a second season of Two Guys, Five Rings, a collaboration with NBC Sports and iHeartRadio. In this 15-episode event, Bowen and Matt discuss the top storylines, obsess over Italian culture, and find out what really goes on in the Olympic Village.