By Peter Richards
PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, Nov 14, CMC -The Trinidad and Tobago government Friday announced that the United States military will be engaged in a joint training exercise with members of the Trinidad and Tobago Defence Force (TTDF) but dismissed suggestions it forms part of the preparation for a possible military intervention in neighbouring Venezuela.
The announcement of the November 16-21 military exercise follows media reports quoting the Attorney General, John Jeremie, as saying that the US military is expected to intensify training exercises in Trinidad and Tobago. Jeremie told the UK’s Financial Times that the US 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU) would intensify exercises “in the coming days.”
Foreign and CARICOM Affairs Minister Sean Sobers, speaking at a news conference, said the TTDF and the MEU, which is deployed to the US Southern Command, “will engage in training exercises.”
”This upcoming activity forms part of our long-standing history of collaboration between the Trinidad and Tobago Defence Force and the US military. Trinidad and Tobago continues, unfortunately, to be burden by the scourge of gun related crime and gang violence,” Sobers said. He said the intensified military exercises “form part of a coordinated strategy to ensure that our personnel are optimally trained and equipped to address those issues in our domestic environment that have taken a tremendous toll on our society”.
He said the focus of the exercise will be “military-to-military engagement, allowing personnel from both countries to become familiar with each other’s equipment, tactics and techniques,” adding that the exercises will challenge them as well as offer an opportunity to expand their expertise and professional development. He said that the training will take place “across Trinidad and Tobago in both urban and rural environments, with operations scheduled during dusk and after dark “.
In recent weeks, the United States has been building up a military presence in the region under the pretext of eradicating the illegal drugs trade, but political observers say the move is aimed more at regime change in Venezuela, which Washington said is being led by a dictator in Nicolas Maduro.
Washington has sent several warships including the world’s largest carrier, the USS Gerald R Ford into the area. The Americans have killed several people, including two Trinidad and Tobago nationals in strikes on what it termed illegal vessels carrying drugs in international waters and Trinidad and Tobago’s Prime Minister Kamla Persad Bissessar, which has dismissed the notion of the region being regarded as a zone of peace, is on record as saying that those in the illegal drug trade should be “killed violently.”
Sobers maintained that the military exercises are “part of the many side by side exercises that the US military has long conducted in partnership with the Trinidad and Tobago Defence Force.” He dismissed as “conjecture” the island being used as a staging point for the possible removal of Maduro in Caracas, saying also that Washington would not inform the Persad-Bissessar government of the whereabouts of the USS Gerald R Forde.
“Because it is not something that the US would speak to us about…it is a military ship. They have their need-to-know positions and at this juncture it does not touch or concern Trinidad and Tobago. So we don’t need to know.” Sobers said he would also not comment on “unverified” reports that Russia has been deploying several military assets in support of Venezuela, adding “we had no reason to reach out to Russia concerning anything as it relates to Venezuela.
“Russia has assisted Venezuela in the past ‘on a number of different occasions in a number of different iterations,” he said, adding that there is nothing to “push us to reach out to the Russian consulate in Guyana and ask them anything about their relations with Venezuela.
“We know that they are good friends and they have bilateral relations; nothing is wrong with that.” Trinidad and Tobago and the United States have signed an amended Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) in late 2024, extending their prior military agreement which was first signed in 2007.
The new agreement will remain in effect indefinitely, although the specific details have not been publicly disclosed. The agreement facilitates military-to-military cooperation, but the government has denied claims that it allows the US to deploy troops in the country for a conflict in Venezuela.
But Sobers told reporters that the question of whether he would support the US invasion of of Venezuela “would not arise; it is conjecture, and two, the US military apparatus belongs to the United States government… if they feel they need to move it from the Antarctic, they will do that. If they feel like moving it from the Antarctic to the South Pole, they will do that. “We have absolutely no control over where they decide to move these ships or submarines…to wherever they want to move them. They are saying and they have said to the world that the position is we are attacking narco-traffickers and transnational crime.
“They believe that moving around those ships may very well help them to do that; well, so be it. Essentially then, your question should be posed to them and not to Trinidad and Tobago because the ships don’t belong to us, we don’t direct the ships where they need to go, we are not in control of their marine unit…so that’s a question I think is conjecture,” Sobers told reporters.
“All I am saying is if you ask me something factual, I will answer. If you ask me something based on conjecture, like what would you do if this happens, I have never done it as a lawyer, and I am not going to do it as a minister. “If it happens, trust that your government will stand with you and we will make the best possible decision in the interest of the people of Trinidad and Tobago,” said Sobers, who also indicated he would not comment on the SOFA agreement because it is of a “national security” concern.
He said that the US war on drugs was having a positive effect in Trinidad and Tobago, with a drastic reduction in crime linked to drugs, including murders.
and then 