Anticipating Escalation: Neutralizing Swarming’s Armed Front

By Misión Verdad  –  Oct 15, 2024

In her effort to readjust the agenda of regime change and in the face of a clear mood of demobilization within her ranks, María Corina Machado has decided to publicly incorporate the concept of “swarming“ into her narrative.

This decision reflects the consolidation of a path that goes beyond what is attempted to be presented as “peaceful protest” by proposing a more aggressive form of confrontation, embedded in the scope of military operations, while using the discourse on human rights to counteract the possible limitations suffered by the violent actions that the far right hopes to set in motion.

In a widely viewed  investigation piece, Misión Verdad mentioned that the introduction of swarming in Venezuela represents an evolution of the so-called guarimbas, with which a more focused and less widespread virulence technique is adopted.

Its asymmetric nature allows operators and critical mass to carry out coordinated actions from multiple directions, which tends to maximize target saturation and makes it difficult to defend in situations of sabotage or street violence.

During the events of July 29 and 30, after the results of the presidential elections were not recognized, criminal gangs openly participated in the operation of political and criminal turbulence led by the “comanditos,” a structure created by Maria Corina Machado’s Vente Venezuela.

This connection between organized crime and María Corina Machado’s movement, along with her revelation about the intention to escalate the offensive through asymmetric warfare tactics such as swarming, may explain the rapid-action approach of Venezuelan state security agencies in dismantling the criminal gangs, previously linked to post-electoral violence.

Statistics: all-out combat against criminal gangs
In the posdcast Tubazos con Eligio Rojas, the Venezuelan journalist Eligio Rojas presented detailed information on the results of the police and military operations, implemented between August 7 and October 7, to confront the “sleeper cells” of the criminal organizations Tren de Aragua and Tren del Llano.

His work is focused on these two criminal organization due to their intrinsic relationship with the coup agenda. According to Rojas, the term “sleeper cells” refers to groups, made up of between 10 and 20 people, which have been setup at the behest of these two criminal gangs.

“The Tren de Aragua was dismantled on September 20, 2023, but its dormant cells persist … as for the Tren del Llano, its structure is still alive and operates on the outskirts of Altagracia de Orituco, José Tadeo Monagas municipality, Guárico state,” wrote Rojas.

Rojas’ work, based on reports from various security agencies to which the Venezuelan journalist had access, reveals an intensified government effort in the last two months against criminal gangs.

Firstly, 60 procedures were carried out in 11 entities of the country, with Guárico being the most active region, with 28 operations, because it is the territory where the Tren del Llano is actively deployed.

The interventions included:

• Central region (Miranda, Guárico, and Carabobo).
• Western region (Zulia and Trujillo).
• Southern and eastern regions (Bolívar, Sucre, and Anzoátegui).

During these operations by law enforcing agencies, 25 confrontations against the criminal cells were carried out and culminated in the elimination of 37 individuals and the capture of 81 more, all linked to the two criminal gangs mentioned.

A significant arsenal was also seized, including 1,729 cartridges, 60 firearms—including eight rifles and 24 pistols—as well as grenades, telescopic sights, and other tactical equipment, data that demonstrate the capacity of these groups.

The weak point in the destabilizing plan
In his report, Rojas explores the expansion of these cells and raises questions about their emergence and management.

“At what point did these structures begin to establish cells in the regions where they operated and, furthermore, why did they do so?” The journalist  highlights that, according to intelligence reports to which he had access, this strategy began in 2020 with the intervention of the DEA and Colombian drug trafficking groups to control territories on Venezuelan territory.

Over time, these gangs migrated to the political arena, a phenomenon that became more noticeable in the July 28 post-election scenario, when the actions of the Tren de Aragua and the Tren del Llano played a prominent role by engaging in confrontations whose results include murders of civilians and material damage to sensitive public infrastructure.   

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Likewise, it was revealed that the recently dismantled terrorist operation aimed at assassinating President Maduro and other political leaders of the government was significantly supported by the participation of criminal gangs, as indicated by the investigations carried out by Venezuelan authorities.

This new destabilization tactic, aligned with the swarming approach proposed by María Corina Machado, would seek to be channeled through the previously mentioned examples or through dark initiatives such as “Ya casi Venezuela.” The latter involves an eventual military incursion outsourced through private security companies [mercenaries], in a kind of remake of the 2020 Operation Gideon.

Any of these scenarios depends, to a large extent, on the ability of its operators to coordinate with the cells that may be readjusting their calculations at strategic areas in the country, while the Venezuelan state advances in the objective of neutralizing them.

Breaking the convergence between the swarming proposed by Machado and greater activity by criminal gangs seems to be at the heart of the equation for political and social stability at the beginning of next year for the Venezuelan government.

 

 

(Misión Verdad)

Translation: Orinoco Tribune

OT/JRE/SL