₦airaland Forum

🇺🇸 The Trump administration has begun detailed planning for a new mission to send American troops and intelligence officers into Mexico to target drug cartels, according to two U.S. officials and two former senior U.S. officials familiar with the effort.

The early stages of training for the potential mission, which would include ground operations inside Mexico, has already begun, the two current U.S. officials said.

But a deployment to Mexico is not imminent, the two U.S. officials and one of the former U.S. officials said. Discussions about the scope of the mission are ongoing, and a final decision has not been made, the two current U.S. officials said.

The U.S. troops, many of whom would be from Joint Special Operations Command, would operate under the authority of the U.S. intelligence community, known as Title 50 status, the two current officials said. They said officers from the CIA also would participate.

A U.S. mission using American forces to hit drug cartel targets inside Mexico would open a new front in President Donald Trump’s military campaign against drug cartels in the Western Hemisphere. So far, the administration has focused on Venezuela and conducting strikes on alleged drug-carrying boats.

The mission currently being planned for would be a break with past U.S. administrations, which have quietly deployed CIA, military and law enforcement teams to Mexico to support local police and army units fighting cartels but not to take direct action against them.

If the mission is given the final green light, the administration plans to maintain secrecy around it and not publicize actions associated with it, as it has with recent bombings of suspected drug-smuggling boats, the two current and two former U.S. officials said.

“The Trump administration is committed to utilizing an all-of-government approach to address the threats cartels pose to American citizens,” a senior administration official said in response to this story.

The CIA declined to comment. The Pentagon referred questions to the White House.

Under the new mission being planned, U.S. troops in Mexico would mainly use drone strikes to hit drug labs and cartel members and leaders, the two current U.S. officials and two former U.S. officials said. Some of the drones that special forces would use require operators to be on the ground to use them effectively and safely, the officials said.

In February, the State Department designated six Mexican drug cartels, as well as MS-13 and the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua, as foreign terrorist organizations, giving U.S. spy agencies and military units sweeping legal authorities to conduct espionage and covert operations targeting the criminal networks.

Trump publicly acknowledged earlier this month that he authorized covert CIA action inside Venezuela and has said his administration could strike drug cartel targets on land there.

NBC News reported in April that the Trump administration was considering launching drone strikes on drug cartels in Mexico. Trump administration officials are still debating precisely how aggressive to be in Mexico as part of its fight against drug cartels, according to the two former U.S. officials and another former administration official with knowledge of the effort.

Unlike in Venezuela, the mission being planned for Mexico is not designed to undermine the country’s government, the two current and two former U.S. officials said.

After NBC’s story in April, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum addressed it at a news conference. “We reject any form of intervention or interference. That’s been very clear, Mexico coordinates and collaborates, but does not subordinate itself,” she said, according to a translation provided by the Mexican Embassy to the U.S.

LagosOrigin:
All this for human destruction

🇷🇺 Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Wednesday that Russia had tested a Poseidon nuclear-capable super torpedo and that it had been a great success.

Officially known as the “Poseidon” (by Russia) and often designated as “Kanyon” by NATO, it is not a traditional torpedo. It is best understood as a large, long-range, nuclear-powered, and nuclear-armed autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) or an intercontinental-range, nuclear-armed underwater drone.

It is massive, estimated to be over 20 meters (65 feet) long and 2 meters in diameter, making it one of the largest torpedoes ever developed. It is powered by a small nuclear reactor, giving it what is believed to be virtually unlimited range. It could traverse entire oceans without needing to surface.

It is an unmanned, autonomous vehicle. Once launched, it would follow a pre-programmed course to its target, operating independently.

The Poseidon’s design gives it a set of capabilities that differentiate it from other nuclear delivery systems like intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs).

The primary warhead is a nuclear weapon, estimated to be in the multi-megaton range (potentially up to 2 megatons or more). For comparison, the bomb dropped on Hiroshima was about 0.015 megatons. This immense explosive yield is not just for blast damage.

Putin, drinking tea with Russian soldiers wounded in the Ukraine war at a hospital in Moscow, said that the test had taken place on Tuesday.

“For the first time, we managed not only to launch it with a launch engine from a carrier submarine, but also to launch the nuclear power unit on which this device passed a certain amount of time,” Putin said. “There is nothing like this.”

“This is a huge success,” Putin said, adding that the power of the Poseidon exceeded the Sarmat intercontinental missile, known as SS-X-29, or simply Satan II.

“The Poseidon’s power significantly exceeds the power of even our most promising Sarmat intercontinental range missile,” Putin said.

Putin last week held a nuclear launch drill and on Sunday announced that Russia has successfully tested its nuclear-powered Burevestnik cruise missile, a nuclear-capable weapon Moscow says can pierce any defense shield.

Since first announcing the Poseidon and Burevestnik in 2018, Putin cast them as a response to moves by the United States to build a missile defense shield after Washington in 2001 unilaterally withdrew from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, and to enlarge the NATO military alliance.

🇷🇺 President Vladimir Putin said early Sunday that Russia has successfully carried out a test of its nuclear-powered intercontinental cruise missile Burevestnik.

Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov told Putin the test took place on Tuesday, with the missile flying 14,000 kilometers (8,700 miles) over the course of about 15 hours.

“The technical characteristics of the Burevestnik allow it to be used with guaranteed precision against highly protected sites located at any distance,” he said.

“It is truly a unique weapon, one that no other country in the world possesses,” Putin said during a visit to one of the command centers of the Russian joint group of forces.

He ordered the preparation of “infrastructure to put this weapon into service in the Russian armed forces.”

Confirmation of the Burevestnik tests follows satellite imagery and navigation warnings in recent months indicating an impending launch.

Putin had said that the invincible Burevestnik has an almost unlimited range and can evade American missile defenses when he unveiled it in 2018.

The Burevestnik, part of Russia's advanced weapons program which NATO designates as SSC-X-9 Skyfall, made headlines in 2019 after a test led to a deadly recovery mission in the Arctic.

The announcement of a successful final test comes as Russian forces slowly but steadily gain ground in Ukraine, grinding through Kyiv's defenses in costly battles.

Peace talks between Moscow and Kyiv have stalled, despite mediation efforts from U.S, President Donald Trump, who had promised to quickly end the war upon his return to the White House in January.

Mynd44:
If this news was from Russia, you will hear "They can't even keep their aircraft's in the air" or "Corruption has eaten so deep in their military that pilots don't have enough training or fuel in their aircraft's"

A 🇺🇸 U.S jet fighter and a helicopter have crashed into the South China Sea within 30 minutes of each other, the US Navy said.

Three crew members of the MH-60R Sea Hawk helicopter were rescued after they went down with the aircraft.

Two aviators in the F/A-18F Super Hornet jet fighter ejected and were recovered safely after the plane "went down" while "conducting routine operations".

The navy said the crashes happened about 2:45pm on Sunday, local time.

All five navy personnel "are safe and in stable condition," the navy said in a statement.

The causes of the two crashes were under investigation, the statement said.

The two aircraft are based off the carrier USS Nimitz, which has been deployed in the Middle East and is returning home to Washington.

The carrier is on its final deployment before decommissioning after being a part of the US response to attacks by Yemen's Houthi rebels on commercial shipping.

Another aircraft carrier, the USS Harry S Truman, suffered a series of mishaps in recent months while deployed to the Middle East.

In December, the guided-missile cruiser USS Gettysburg mistakenly shot down an F/A-18 jet from the Truman.

Then, in April, another F/A-18 jet fighte from the Truman's hangar deck crashed into the Red Sea.

And in May, an F/A-18 jet fighter landing on the carrier in the Red Sea went overboard after apparently failing to catch the steel cables used to stop landing planes and forcing its two pilots to eject.

🇻🇪 Venezuela's President Nicolás Maduro has accused the US of "fabricating a new war", after it ordered the world's largest warship to be sent to the Caribbean.

The USS Gerald R Ford carrier can carry up to 90 aircraft and its deployment marks a massive increase in American fire power in the region.

The US has conducted 10 illegal air strikes on boats in the area as part of what it says is a war on drug traffickers.

US President Donald Trump has falsely accused Maduro of being the leader of a drug-trafficking organisation, which he denies, and there are fears in Venezuela that the US military build-up is aimed at removing the long-time opponent of Trump from power.

The US does not recognise Maduro as the president of Venezuela, after the last election in 2024 was widely dismissed internationally, and by the opposition in Venezuela, as neither free nor fair.

Venezuela plays a relatively minor role in the region's drug trade.

In its announcement on Friday, the Pentagon said the USS Gerald R Ford carrier would deploy to the US Southern Command area of responsibility, which includes Central America and South America as well as the Caribbean.

The additional forces "will enhance and augment existing capabilities to disrupt narcotics trafficking and degrade and dismantle transnational criminal organisations", spokesman Sean Parnell said.

In his address, Maduro accused the Americans of seeking "a new eternal war".

"They promised they would never again get involved in a war, and they are fabricating a war," he told state media.

The carrier's deployment would provide the resources to start conducting strikes against targets on the ground.

Trump has repeatedly raised the possibility of what he called "land action" in Venezuela.

"We are certainly looking at land now, because we've got the sea very well under control," he said earlier this week.