Rubio said the blockade is one of the largest “quarantines” in modern history. But reporting by @AKurmanaev inside Venezuela, along with analysis from @TankerTrackers and myself, shows at least 16 tankers appear to be defying Trump’s “complete blockade.” https://t.co/QtXLkzNVvf
— Christiaan Triebert (@trbrtc) January 5, 2026
Two main parts of the tankers' evasion strategies appear to be deception (going dark or spoofing, fake names via signal and on hull) and saturation (overwhelming the U.S. military assets with outbound vessels).
— Christiaan Triebert (@trbrtc) January 5, 2026
I wonder if Hegseth is going to bomb them. They might be carrying drugs, after all. 🤷🏻♂️About a dozen tankers loaded with Venezuelan oil departed from the country in dark mode, seemingly breaking a US blockade, https://t.co/HiarHQQtNy said. The ships are under sanctions. A separate group of vessels also under sanctions left the country empty https://t.co/LqaG1IXuqq
— Marianna Párraga (@mariannaparraga) January 5, 2026
Either they've been lying all along about how strong the blockade really is or one way or another Trump was "compensated" (such as Chevron saying they'd play along with his pipe dreams). Probably both.
ReplyDeleteApparently (according to posts on Tanker Trackers), a blockade can be evaded if you throw enough ships at it. If you can put enough ships in play, the blockade can’t stop them all. That, according the people who (seem to) know, seems to be what happened.
ReplyDelete