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More War in Latin America Feared as Farmers Describe Torture From US-Ecuadorian ‘Operation Total Extermination’
An Ecuadorian human rights group has called for a probe after “bombings, burning of homes, arbitrary detentions, torture, and threats against the civilian population” by the joint US-Ecuadorian military operation.
Mar 24, 2026
Just a day after President Donald Trump suggested that he'd use his crushing economic blockade in a bid to "take" Cuba, an administration official said much more American warfare is on the horizon across Latin America.
It's called "Operation Total Extermination," according to Joseph M. Humire, the acting assistant secretary of war for homeland defense and Americas security affairs, who testified last week before the House Armed Services Committee.
Humire explained in written testimony that beginning on March 3, the US Department of Defense (which the Trump administration refers to as the Department of War) "supported, at the request of Ecuador, bilateral kinetic actions against cartel targets along the Colombia-Ecuador border."
"The joint effort," Humire said, "is the start of a military offensive by Ecuador against transnational criminal organizations with the support of the US, setting the pace for regional, deterrence-focused operations against cartel infrastructure throughout Latin America and the Caribbean."
The operation with Ecuador, led by the right-wing president Daniel Noboa, is part of "Operation Southern Spear," the Trump administration's illegal bombing campaign in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific Ocean, targeted at boats accused, with little evidence, of ferrying drugs to the US.
The latest of these bombings, which killed at least two more people, occurred on Friday and brought the total death toll since September of last year up to at least 160.
No casualty counts have yet been released by the US or Ecuadorian government for its operations to target what they said were "domestic terrorist organizations." But reports from those on the ground suggest they may have been similarly bloody.
Víctor Gómez, a journalist for the Ecuadorian outlet Radio Sucumbíos, conducted interviews with the residents of the rural town of San Martín in northeastern Ecuador near the Colombian border, who said their community was attacked twice by Ecuadorian and American forces on March 3 and 6.
Noboa celebrated the attacks on the area, which he said housed "a training ground for drug traffickers," and reportedly the home of "Mono Tole," who is the leader of the Colombian drug trafficking group known as the Border Commandos.
But Gómez described the town as having "no trenches, no firing ranges, no traces of a clandestine military infrastructure," adding that "the only things there are horses, cows, and donkeys, at least that's what can be seen on the Radio Sucumbíos cameras."
Locals, many of whom did not have their names published to avoid retaliation, describe military patrols landing on the riverbank on March 3 and launching an "ambush" against four farmers.
“They tied my hands and feet and then hung me up. They put me in a bucket of water, as long as I could stand it… they kicked me, they hit me with the butt of a gun," one of the workers described.
Another said that the soldiers "were looking for someone we didn't know... they told us to hand things over, but we had nothing to hand over."
The soldiers then reportedly "doused the main house and the wooden kitchen with gasoline" and set it ablaze, leaving the flames to consume large amounts of farm equipment.
As residents attempted to advocate for their loved ones, the farm owner said, "The commander in charge wouldn't let us near; they greeted us with gunfire until they took them away."
The four captured farmers were reportedly transported by helicopter to the capital of Sucumbíos, Lago Agrio, where one of the young men described being taken to a tiny room and tortured.
“They shocked us with that thing they called a taser," he said. "They poured water on me and placed it on my ribs and asked us questions."
After finding no evidence of guilt, authorities released the four men near a hospital in the capital.
Three days later, planes and helicopters flew over San Martín, dropping bombs on the ruins of the same house that had already been burnt to the ground three days earlier and on another abandoned house.
Video of that bombing was shared on social media by the Ecuadorian Armed Forces.
“First they burned it on the 3rd, and then on the 6th they came to bomb it. That’s what they did," said the farm's owner.
“How can it be a training camp if this is a livestock area?" he asked. "There is nothing to justify it, there are no training grounds, there is nothing."
The Alliance for Human Rights Ecuador has called for an investigation into the military's alleged "bombings, burning of homes, arbitrary detentions, torture, and threats against the civilian population," which it said were "serious violations of international humanitarian law."
The fallout from the attack has spilled over to create an international incident with neighboring Colombia. Two weeks after the bombing of San Martín, an unexploded 500 lb. bomb was discovered on a farm on the other side of the San Miguel River in Colombia's Putumayo region.
The bomb was identified as a US-made Mark-82. According to the New York Times, "had the bomb exploded, it would have done so with the force of 192 pounds of TNT" and could have harmed people as far as over 1,900 feet away.
"We're being bombed by Ecuador," said Colombian President Gustavo Petro in response to the explosive's discovery. Noboa denied the accusation, saying that "we are acting in our territory, not yours."
Following the US military's January abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, whom the US Department of Justice accused of drug trafficking, leaks have suggested that the US may soon attempt to bring similar charges against Petro, another left-wing leader who has resisted cooperation with Trump. Petro has denied accusations of drug trafficking.
One unnamed official told Nick Turse of The Intercept that attacks along the Ecuador-Colombia border "increasingly look like a coordinated campaign to foment 'discord' if not conflict" in the country.
In his hearing before Congress, Humire said that the US military was providing Ecuador with “capabilities that they otherwise would not have."
Humire said he was not sure how many strikes have been conducted on land so far as part of Operation Total Extermination, but responded "yes" when asked by the committee's ranking member, Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.), if the Department of Defense would “be moving to a lot more terrestrial strikes."
He said that these attacks were "just the beginning" of a much broader campaign, adding that the US has entered into agreements with 17 partner nations in the Western Hemisphere as part of the so-called Americas Counter Cartel Coalition.
While Humire said the nations that have reached these agreements "want this support and most of them all are looking for this,” the same cannot necessarily be said for the people living in the crossfire of the operation.
Gomez said that the people of San Martín are still living with “psychological trauma” following the attack. According to the town's vice president, Vicente Garrid, families are living in constant fear that their homes could be targeted next.
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To Lead on Climate, Colombia's Petro Must Oppose Trade Framework That Impedes Action
Investor-state dispute settlement has become a powerful weapon for multinational firms to challenge policies aimed at phasing out fossil fuels, often resulting in massive financial penalties for states that attempt to regulate or transition their economies.
Mar 24, 2026
As Colombia prepares to host the world’s first Global Conference on Transitioning Away from Fossil Fuels this April, a powerful coalition of more than 220 leading economists, legal scholars, and policymakers is calling on President Gustavo Petro to take bold action.
In a public letter presented on Monday in Bogota, promoted by the Center for Economic and Policy Research, Boston University Global Development Policy Center, and the NGO Public Citizen, signatories including Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz, economist Thomas Piketty, and Paris Agreement architect Laurence Tubiana urge Colombia to lead an international effort to dismantle investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS), a system embedded in thousands of trade and investment agreements worldwide, including in Colombia.
As of 2025, Colombia had over $13 billion in pending ISDS charges, about one-seventh of its annual budget. To compare, it would cost $42 billion to fully implement the 2017 peace agreement, while it would cost about $25 billion for the country to have universal healthcare. Without confronting ISDS, meaningful state action may be impossible.
ISDS, sometimes referred to by economists as “litigation terrorism,” allows foreign corporations to sue governments in private arbitration tribunals over public-interest regulations, including environmental protections. It has become a powerful weapon for multinational firms to challenge policies aimed at phasing out fossil fuels, often resulting in massive financial penalties for states that attempt to regulate or transition their economies.
If the world is serious about confronting the climate crisis, it must also confront the legal and economic structures that entrench fossil fuel dependence. Dismantling ISDS is a precondition for meaningful change.
“Investor-State Dispute Settlement has a track record of being very favorable to foreign corporations at the expense of local communities, the environment, and economic development,” Stiglitz noted. For countries seeking to move away from fossil fuels, ISDS creates a chilling effect; governments hesitate to enact ambitious climate policies for fear of triggering billion-dollar lawsuits.
Stiglitz added that "investor-state dispute settlements don’t just mean growing debt burdens for countries: they are also a barrier to action on the climate crisis.”
Colombia is especially exposed. The country has 129 oil and gas projects covered by ISDS provisions, leaving it vulnerable to a wave of potential claims as it pursues its energy transition.
Petro has signaled his intent to reduce reliance on these mechanisms, but has yet to follow the path of countries such as South Africa, India, and Indonesia, which have terminated ISDS-linked agreements outright after concluding they undermined national sovereignty.
Across Latin America, ISDS has quietly transferred enormous public wealth to foreign corporations. Governments have been forced to pay out tens of billions of dollars in arbitration awards, particularly in countries like Argentina, Peru, and Venezuela, which, not coincidentally, have also faced severe economic and energy crises.
This system vastly privileges foreign investors over domestic firms, bypasses national courts, and effectively grants corporations veto power over public policy. As development economist Jayati Ghosh argues, bilateral investment treaties have “weaponized” corporate influence, restricting the ability of governments to act in the public interest without delivering clear benefits in terms of increased investment.
Colombia’s upcoming conference offers a rare opportunity to challenge this global regime. The letter’s authors propose the creation of an international alliance committed to unwinding ISDS and restoring democratic control over economic policy. The European Union’s recent withdrawal from the Energy Charter Treaty, due to its protections for fossil fuel investments, signals that even advanced economies are beginning to recognize the incompatibility of ISDS with climate goals.
Yet, even as Petro pushes for a fossil fuel phaseout and questions the legitimacy of ISDS, other governments in the hemisphere are moving in the opposite direction. Ecuador’s conservative President, Daniel Noboa, a billionaire businessman dogged by allegations of corruption, authoritarianism, and links to drug traffickers, has aggressively pursued new trade and investment agreements with the United Arab Emirates, Canada, and the United States. These deals include ISDS provisions, despite both the Ecuadorian Constitution and the Ecuadorian people outright banning ISDS.
Other right-wing politicians in the region, including anarcho-capitalist Argentine President Javier Milei, have also expressed support for expanding ISDS, to further the entrenchment of corporate power in the region.
As Andrés Arauz of the Center for Economic and Policy Research puts it, ISDS creates a “fast-track legal system” that grants corporations a “license to kill” public-interest regulation through the threat of massive financial penalties.
The coalition’s message to Colombia is salient; if the world is serious about confronting the climate crisis, it must also confront the legal and economic structures that entrench fossil fuel dependence. Dismantling ISDS is a precondition for meaningful change.
In Santa Marta this April, Colombia has a chance to lead, and turn the region away from complete surrender to foreign corporate interests, instead attempting to build economies around popular prosperity, dynamic democracy, and robust constitutionalism.
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'The First Victim Was the Truth' – The Cognitive War on Venezuela
This is not the time for over-analyzing every misstep, real or imagined, by the Bolivarian government. It is a time to relentlessly denounce the kidnapping of a president and a legislator.
Mar 11, 2026
Two days before his kidnapping, President Nicolás Maduro gave an interview to Spanish writer Ignacio Ramonet and explained that the war on Venezuela is a cognitive one, “because the war is for the brain, the brain handles emotions and handles concepts.”
The term cognitive war is relatively new, and it sheds light on recent discourse around Venezuela. One of NATO’s definitions characterizes cognitive war as unconventional warfare used to “alter enemy cognitive processes, exploit mental biases or reflexive thinking, and provoke thought distortions, influence decision-making and hinder actions, with negative effects, both at the individual and collective levels.” It goes beyond propaganda or psychological warfare. Another NATO source says it “is not the means by which we fight; it is the fight itself. The brain is both the target and the weapon in the fight for cognitive superiority.”
Maduro understood this, saying that “to counteract a cognitive war, you have to create a force of conscience, a force of values, a spiritual force, and fight with the truth. Our greatest weapon is not a nuclear rocket, our greatest weapon is the truth of Venezuela.”
In a recent Venezuela Solidarity Network webinar about the Venezuelan people’s reaction to the January 3rd attack, Ana Maldonado of the Frente Francisco de Miranda said, “The first victim of this war was truth.” She explained that hours after the bombing and kidnapping, Trump went on television to say the military operation was easy, and that narrative was widely accepted.
Erased from the collective memory were ten years of economic warfare that cost Venezuela tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of lives, $630 billion in damages, and a migration crisis that separated countless families. Erased were the attempted color revolutions of 2014 and 2017, the attempted presidential assassination of 2018, the imposition of a fake president in 2019, and the failed mercenary incursion of 2020. Erased was the U.S. declaring Venezuela “an unusual and extraordinary threat” in 2015 and the imposition of increasingly harsh unilateral coercive measures (so-called sanctions), including during the pandemic.
Erased was the months-long, still ongoing U.S. naval presence in the Caribbean and the declaration of a no-fly zone. Erased was the naval blockade that chased down and seized ships attempting to trade in Venezuelan oil.
No, the January 3rd attack wasn’t “easy,” nor was it a victory. Though the U.S. demonstrated its military advantage, it has not won the cognitive battle. “The superiority shown by the Venezuelan people surpasses anything [the U.S.] has done. Their military attack needed an internal war, a fratricidal war they did not achieve,” explained Maldonado. There was no such war, no coup, no regime change.
The January 3rd attack would have been the perfect opportunity for a new color revolution or rebellion. Maldonado stressed the failure of the "unprecedented cognitive war of provocations, intrigue, of wanting to seed doubts and division.” The grassroots, the government, the military and the police remain united behind acting President Delcy Rodríguez. “The fact that we have and continue to demonstrate such unity shows our superiority. Our superiority is organic. It is revolutionary. It is popular. It is the people … building people’s power,” Maldonado continued.
Venezuelans continue building people’s power, including through plebiscites on March 8, when the nation’s 5,336 communes vote on funding local projects. They are in constant mobilization, making it known they want peace and the return of Maduro and Flores. The streets are theirs, with Venezuelan fascists being increasingly sidelined. They are creating culture and insisting that “a unified people will not yield,” as musician Akilin sings in this video:
Those that claim that Venezuela is now a “protectorate” or “colony” that has sold out or been betrayed don’t seem to be in conversation with Venezuelan revolutionaries. The global solidarity movement, which should be organizing for Maduro and Cilia, calling for an end to sanctions and the withdrawal of U.S. forces from the Caribbean, instead finds itself having to counter such speculation, as Manolo de los Santos did in an excellent article.
A delegation of peace activists went to Venezuela in late February to hear directly from the people. In a report-back webinar, CODEPINK co-founder Jodie Evans observed that Venezuelans “are engaged in building a future…they are in constant dialogue [with each other] and trying to find ways to thread a needle.” The threats against Venezuela are ongoing and “horrific,” she said, noting that “these horrors are being breathed down their necks every day and they are staying quite committed.” The unity up and down the Bolivarian Revolution is what it needs to survive.
Yes, the United States controls the oil trade and pushed for changes in the hydrocarbon law. Yet there is reason to believe the Venezuelan people may see material gains from these concessions. The Venezuelan government is playing a long game that points towards sanctions relief. Domestically, the National Assembly approved an amnesty law aimed at reconciliation with the moderate opposition, which could be an important factor in preventing or blunting any future U.S. operations aimed at fomenting civil unrest. In these negotiations, the Venezuelan people’s red lines “haven’t been hit yet,” as Evans put it.
Maduro, in his final interview before the kidnapping, said he was “truly happy how millions of men and women in Venezuela and the world defend Venezuela’s truth.” In Venezuela, the defense of that truth happens every day, with constant mobilizations since the morning of the attack.
In the rest of the world, that defense feels lacking. This is not the time for over-analyzing every misstep, real or imagined, by the Bolivarian government. It is a time to relentlessly denounce the kidnapping of a president and a legislator. This is the moment to defend Latin America and the Caribbean as a zone of peace. It is an opportunity to counter Trump’s Monroe Doctrine, the plans for a “Greater North America,” and the so-called “Shield of the Americas.”
We can fight against this cognitive war by insisting on an alternative vision for US foreign policy, one in which the country becomes a good neighbor by centering its relationship with the hemisphere (and the world) on peace, solidarity and shared prosperity.
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