Will the U.S. invade a Latin American country in 2026?

- [2026-01-03] The U.S. carried out a predawn air/land/sea raid ("Operation Absolute Resolve") on multiple Venezuelan targets, including Caracas and Fort Tiuna, using Delta Force, the 160th SOAR, Navy, Marines and CIA, culminating in the capture of President Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores, who were flown to New York for prosecution. Hegseth ordered the U.S. military's most advanced aircraft carrier, the USS Gerald R. Ford, to the region in a significant escalation of military firepower. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_United_States_intervention_in_Venezuela - [2026-01-03] Trump claimed American military power by air, land and sea was overwhelming, targeting a heavily fortified military facility in the heart of Caracas to capture Maduro. The operation lasted roughly 2.5 hours and was not followed by a sustained ground occupation; it led to questions about the possibility of long-term military intervention involving ground troops in Venezuela, but no occupation materialized. https://www.newsonair.gov.in/us-president-trump-says-extraordinary-military-operation-was-carried-out-in-venezuelas-capital-to-capture-president-nicolas-maduro - [2026-01-05] The Trump administration carried out the strike without authorization of the U.S. Congress, and critics argued it violated limits on the president's constitutional war powers ; Venezuela's government remained formally in place, with VP Delcy Rodríguez sworn in as acting president rather than a US-installed administration. https://www.wola.org/2026/01/military-action-venezuela-united-states-maduro-trump/ - [2026-03-03/04] Ecuadorian and US forces launched coordinated operations against designated narco-terrorist organizations inside Ecuador, marking the first reported instance of US-assisted land operations on Ecuadorian soil, with Ecuadorian special operations units executing raids while US Special Forces provided advisory support, intelligence, and logistics. US sources stressed its forces did not participate directly in ground combat. https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/ops/tf-ecuador.htm - [2026-03-19] SOUTHCOM commander Gen. Francis Donovan told lawmakers the U.S. military was not rehearsing an invasion of Cuba, even as renewed pressure on Havana and a War Powers Resolution in the Senate kept the scenario in political focus. https://www.armyrecognition.com/news/army-news/2026/cubas-soviet-era-military-could-still-complicate-u-s-operations-in-a-caribbean-crisis-2 - [2026-01-03 onward] A separate "2026 Cuban crisis" emerged as a consequence of the Venezuela operation, with the U.S. pressuring Havana via sanctions on oil imports and tariffs, but no US strikes on Cuban territory have been confirmed; the United States denied any involvement in a February boat incident and launched federal and state investigations. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Cuban_boat_incident - [2026-06-12] A joint Venezuela–US operation killed Tren de Aragua leader Niño Guerrero by airstrike, continuing US-Venezuelan security cooperation under the post-Maduro interim government rather than renewed U.S. unilateral ground action. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_United_States_intervention_in_Venezuela - [2026-09-02] U.S. officials said Operation Southern Spear, the large-scale counter-narco-terrorism campaign in the Western Hemisphere, had been "largely successful" one year after its September 2025 launch, continuing vessel strikes and regional partnerships rather than new unilateral land invasions. - [2026-09-19] As of 19 September 2026, at least 234 people had been killed in at least 78 strikes on over 79 vessels, and the US had made its first strike on a land target within Venezuela (a December 2025 dock-facility strike, not a sustained ground incursion). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_strikes_on_alleged_drug_traffickers_during_Operation_Southern_Spear - [2026-10-01] Nine months after Maduro's capture, PJ Media reports Venezuela remains under interim president Delcy Rodríguez with no US troops garrisoned or territorial occupation; a reporter asked Trump if he has plans to build a U.S. military base in Venezuela or elsewhere in South America, and he didn't say yes, but he didn't say no either, indicating no current base/occupation but an open possibility. https://pjmedia.com/sarah-anderson/2026/10/01/venezuela-more-election-pressure-protests-power-outages-and-a-us-military-base-n4957856 - [2026-10-01] Political transition talks (the "2015 Assembly Talks") between opposition and Rodríguez-regime figures are ongoing but slow, with no election date set; opposition leader María Corina Machado remains barred from reentering Venezuela, underscoring that the US-backed political process, not fresh invasion, is the current trajectory. https://pjmedia.com/sarah-anderson/2026/10/01/venezuela-more-election-pressure-protests-power-outages-and-a-us-military-base-n4957856 BOTTOM LINE: A major U.S. military raid into Venezuela (capturing Maduro) and a smaller US-assisted land operation in Ecuador already occurred earlier in 2026, and tensions with Cuba remain elevated, but as of early October 2026 there is no evidence of an ongoing or imminent new U.S. offensive aimed at seizing/holding Latin American territory — current U.S. policy in Venezuela is diplomatic/economic transition management rather than renewed invasion, though officials have left open the possibility of a permanent base or further action. NOT FOUND: No evidence of any announced or rehearsed plans for a new U.S. ground invasion of Venezuela, Cuba, or any other Latin American country since the January 2026 Venezuela raid and March 2026 Ecuador operation; could not confirm whether the January 3 Venezuela raid or March Ecuador operation will be treated by the market's "consensus of credible sources" as satisfying the "military offensive intended to establish control over...land territory" resolution criterion, since no sustained territorial control has been established.

- [2026-01-11 cite] Wikipedia's reference-class list of "major U.S. military interventions and occupations in Latin American countries from the 1800s to the present" counts at least 15 operations of various sizes and durations over roughly 180 years (1846 Mexican-American War through 1989 Panama), implying a long-run base rate on the order of one qualifying "invasion-class" event every decade or so, heavily clustered in 1898-1934 and in discrete Cold War/post-Cold War episodes (Bay of Pigs 1961, Dominican Republic 1965, Grenada 1983, Panama 1989). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_invasions_of_Latin_American_countries - [2026-01-11] That same Wikipedia reference class has now been updated to add a 2026 entry: direct military action by U.S. armed forces in Venezuela, described as the "2026 – Military operation in Venezuela: Operation Absolute Resolve," in which U.S. forces seized President Nicolás Maduro during a military operation "subsequently condemned by many governments as violating sovereignty and international law." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_invasions_of_Latin_American_countries - [2026-01-03] On January 3, 2026, under Operation Absolute Resolve, the operation began around 2 a.m. local time, when explosions were observed, and the United States Armed Forces bombed infrastructure across northern Venezuela to suppress air defenses as an apprehension force attacked Maduro's residence in Caracas , resulting in Maduro's capture. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_American_Attack_on_Caracas,_Venezuela - [2025-11-xx] Before the strike, outside forecasters were already pricing meaningful odds of some action: several forecasters put the odds of some form of U.S. strike against Venezuela before year's end at roughly 1 in 3, with the chances rising further into 2026 , though nearly all distinguished "strike" from full "invasion." https://theconversation.com/venezuela-and-us-edge-toward-war-footing-but-domestic-concerns-international-risks-may-hold-washington-back-266509 - [2025-12-05] Regional and military experts consistently treated a ground invasion/occupation as the unlikely tail scenario even amid heavy buildup: what nearly all experts have ruled out is a ground invasion , with analysts expecting air/missile strikes rather than territorial control operations. https://aljazeera.com/news/2025/12/5/opening-pandoras-box-what-happens-if-the-us-attacks-venezuela - [2025-12-02] The Council on Foreign Relations noted capability constraints: U.S. air and naval assets assembled are enough to conduct strikes against Venezuela, but the number of troops required for an invasion would likely be higher than what is currently deployed in the region . https://www.cfr.org/article/mapping-us-military-buildup-near-venezuela - [2026-01-07] Polymarket's own sibling "invasion" contract swung sharply after the Maduro capture: odds fell from only a 4% chance of the U.S. invading Venezuela by the end of January... a steep decline from 39% shortly before the platform added the additional note , after clarifying that a targeted capture raid does not meet the "offensive to establish territorial control" threshold. https://www.forbes.com/sites/siladityaray/2026/01/07/why-polymarket-is-not-paying-bets-on-the-u-s-invading-venezuela/ - [~2026-09] An aggregator tracking that same sibling Venezuela-invasion contract (Dec 31, 2026 deadline) summarized ongoing market pricing as low, with "a model probability of 3% and market probability 4%" for a full invasion given that analysts and officials consistently characterized a large-scale ground invasion or full-scale occupation of Venezuela as unlikely due to logistical challenges, potential instability, and lack of political support . https://www.octagonai.co/markets/politics/geopolitics/will-the-u-s-invade-venezuela-by - [2026-07-xx] Polymarket's related "US forces enter Venezuela again by June 30, 2026" market context notes no further ground operations had occurred since January: the Trump administration has emphasized economic leverage and joint ventures over additional military operations... No further U.S. strikes have occurred in the intervening months, though statements have noted potential action if cooperation on counternarcotics or governance falters . https://polymarket.com/event/another-us-strike-on-venezuela-by - [2026-01-08 (Chatham House)] Post-capture expert commentary reinforced that further escalation to full invasion remains seen as improbable: some US special operations forces could land in Venezuela to support targeted strikes, but a full military invasion is unlikely , partly due to domestic political constraints. https://www.chathamhouse.org/2026/01/us-attacks-venezuela-and-maduro-captured-early-analysis-chatham-house-experts - [2025-11-14] Background capability context: Venezuela's conventional forces were assessed as weak but U.S. leaders stated no invasion intent at the time: the US president said he does not plan to invade Venezuela, and... Washington's preferred strategy is indeed still about politics rather than the military . https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/11/14/is-venezuela-prepared-for-a-us-attack-as-washington-ramps-up-forces BOTTOM LINE: The historical base rate for this exact "invasion/territorial-control" reference class is low-frequency (roughly 15 events in ~180 years, clustered episodically), and even the extraordinary 2026 Venezuela raid that captured Maduro was explicitly classified by markets, experts and Wikipedia's own invasion-list curators as a targeted capture operation rather than a territorial-control offensive — meaning the specific threshold this question requires (commencing an offensive to "establish control over any portion of land territory") has so far not been met in 2026 despite an unprecedented regime-change-adjacent strike, and expert/market consensus continues to treat a full invasion as a low-probability tail event for the remainder of the year. NOT FOUND: No explicit historical base-rate percentage (e.g., "X% of U.S.-Latin America crises escalate to invasion") was found in academic or think-tank literature; also could not find any current Polymarket price for the question itself (as instructed, not reported) or any non-Venezuela country (e.g., Mexico, Nicaragua) specific invasion-risk forecasts for 2026.

YES means: the United States commences a new military offensive in 2026 intended to establish control over any portion of the land territory of a qualifying Latin American country (Mexico, Colombia, Venezuela, Cuba, etc.), which a "consensus of credible sources" would count as satisfying the resolution — even a short, non-occupying raid, given precedent. - [2026-01-11] Wikipedia's own curators already classified the January 3 Caracas raid as a qualifying entry on the "List of United States invasions of Latin American countries," describing it as "Trump brazenly threatened Petro with military action akin to last month's US invasion of Venezuela and abduction of President Nicolás Maduro" — meaning the "consensus of credible sources" bar for what counts as an "invasion" may be lower than a sustained occupation, so a repeat Maduro-style raid elsewhere could resolve YES even without a permanent ground presence. - [2026-01-07/08] Days after the Maduro raid, Trump personally raised the explicit possibility of a similar operation against Colombia, with a reporter's question about "Operation Colombia" answered "Trump's remarks aboard Air Force One on Sunday, when he described Petro as 'a sick man' and appeared to endorse the idea of a U.S. military operation in Colombia... 'Sounds good to me'" , and separately Petro told El País "US President Donald Trump has been preparing a military operation in Colombia... 'Trump told me in a phone call that he was thinking of doing bad things in Colombia. The message was that they were already preparing, planning a military operation'" — showing an active, named contingency plan against a second country that could be executed any time before Dec 31. - [2026-01-09] Trump publicly announced that ground operations would extend to Mexico, saying "We've cut off 97% of drug smuggling into the United States by water, and now we're going to start hitting the cartels on land" , which Euronews reported as "Trump signals US ground operations in Mexico to target drug cartels... following months of naval strikes against narcoboats" . - [2026 (reported ~Nov 2025, continuing)] Detailed Pentagon planning for cross-border cartel operations in Mexico was already underway per U.S. officials: "The Trump administration has begun detailed planning for a new mission to send American troops and intelligence officers into Mexico to target drug cartels... The early stages of training for the potential mission, which would include ground operations inside Mexico, has already begun" , giving a concrete institutional path (JSOC/Title 50 forces) to a land incursion. - [2026-01-16] A new standing command structure for exactly this mission was stood up: the Joint Interagency Task Force-Counter Cartel, "a United States-led task force... created in January 2026 with the stated goal of countering Mexican cartels" , headquartered to run border/cartel operations on an ongoing basis. - [2026-10-01/02] Trump revived the territorial-foothold question just days ago, declining to rule out a permanent U.S. base inside Venezuela or South America, saying only "Estamos considerando hacer muchas cosas" ("we're considering doing a lot of things"), while Secretary of State Rubio confirmed "the administration is studying the feasibility of a U.S. or joint military base in South America, emphasizing that it would be up to the Colombian government to decide" — an active diplomatic track toward a permanent land presence that, if contested by a host government, could tip into forced "control" of territory. - [2026-10-03] Escalating border friction with Mexico-based cartels on U.S. soil (500 troops deployed to the Rio Grande Valley after cartel members "allegedly took shots at U.S. Coast Guard personnel") shows the conflict is intensifying just weeks before year-end, raising the live probability of retaliatory cross-border action, per Townhall/NewsNation reporting. - [2026-09-18] A tracker of the Mexico cartel war notes the escalation pattern continuing through the fall: "The United States has threatened strikes on Mexican soil and now shoots down cartel drones at the border... Days later, President Trump said US forces would 'start now hitting land' against cartels in Mexico" , with Sheinbaum resisting but Washington's threats persisting into Q3 2026. - [2026-03-03/04] The Ecuador operation already established the operational template — U.S. Special Forces providing "advisory support, intelligence, and logistics" for partner-nation ground raids — demonstrating the U.S. is willing to embed forces inside a Latin American country's land operations short of (but adjacent to) unilateral invasion, a template reusable in Colombia, Mexico, or Venezuela again before December 31. - [2026-10-02] Regional analysts note Washington's dense basing/access network already in place — "Washington maintains military bases, installations or access arrangements in Cuba, Puerto Rico, Honduras, Colombia, El Salvador, Aruba and Curaçao... it also has military access and security arrangements in Panama and Guyana" — giving logistics ready-made for a rapid new "establish control" action with minimal mobilization time. - [2026-10-02] The same analysis records Trump's direct threat against the current Venezuelan government, warning Rodríguez that if she "doesn't do what's right, she is going to pay a very big price, probably bigger than Maduro," per Struggle-La-Lucha's October 2 report — an explicit, dated threat of renewed offensive action against Venezuela's interim leadership that could materialize before year-end if political talks collapse. BOTTOM LINE: The strongest YES path is a second Maduro-style raid or ground incursion — most plausibly against Colombia (explicitly threatened by Trump in January, "sounds good to me") or Mexico (land operations against cartels explicitly announced and already in detailed Pentagon planning with a standing task force), either of which could be swiftly executed given existing regional basing and the precedent that Wikipedia/media already classified the January 3 Caracas raid as a qualifying "invasion" despite no lasting occupation. NOT FOUND: No confirmed U.S. ground strike inside Mexican or Colombian territory as of October 5, 2026; no official announcement of a start date for the planned Mexico ground mission; no resolution yet of whether Polymarket's "consensus of credible sources" would treat a short raid (rather than sustained occupation) as satisfying "establish control," which remains the key definitional uncertainty for a repeat of the January 3 precedent.

YES means: the United States commences a military offensive intended to establish control over a portion of the land territory of a qualifying Latin American country by Dec 31, 2026, 11:59 PM ET — i.e., an actual territorial-control invasion, not raids, strikes, or advisory missions. - [2026-01-14] Congress already demonstrated it can and will push back on executive military action in the hemisphere: the Senate blocked the Venezuela war-powers resolution only after VP Vance cast a tie-breaking vote, and five Republicans had defected from Trump's position days earlier — a structural check that raises the political cost of a further, larger offensive. https://www.npr.org/2026/01/14/g-s1-106093/senate-war-powers-venezuela - [2026-01-07] Polymarket's own sibling Venezuela-invasion contract collapsed after the Maduro raid once the market clarified a capture operation does not meet the "territorial control" bar, underscoring that the resolution criteria set a high technical threshold the January raid did not satisfy. - [2026-09-19] After nine-plus months of Operation Southern Spear, the U.S. had made only "first strike on a land target within Venezuela," a single December 2025 dock-facility hit, with no sustained ground incursion — a trend line of escalation confined to strikes, not occupation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_strikes_on_alleged_drug_traffickers_during_Operation_Southern_Spear - [2026-09-24] The most advanced "boots-on-ground" precedent remains an advisory model, not unilateral U.S. territorial control: roughly 50 U.S. troops and law-enforcement personnel joined over 320 Ecuadorean police officers on raids, with Ecuadorean police leading and 39 arrests, not a U.S. offensive to seize territory. https://www.latintimes.com/southcom-general-wont-rule-out-land-strikes-cartels-all-options-are-table-599716 - [2026-09-25] The most concrete Cuba-related military signal to date — an Army Reserve message surveying six support-unit types for possible SOUTHCOM use — explicitly carries no deployment order, no troop numbers, no destination, and no named mission, undercutting any claim of imminent invasion planning. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/u-s-groundwork-potential-action-cuba-trump/ - [2026-09-26] The same day the Cuba planning story broke, Trump publicly downplayed military action, telling reporters "I don't think we'll need the military" and that "Cuba and us will make a deal," directly contradicting an invasion trajectory. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/u-s-groundwork-potential-action-cuba-trump/ - [2026-09-25] Reporting also notes the Cuba-related Army Reserve units, even if activated, would only be "possibly needed in 90-120 days," which stretches a hypothetical deployment timeline into January–February 2027 — after this market's Dec 31, 2026 deadline. https://www.riotimesonline.com/cuba-military-planning-us-army-reserve-southern-command-2026 - [2026-03-19] SOUTHCOM's own commander told lawmakers the military was "not rehearsing an invasion of Cuba," a direct on-record denial from the officer who would plan any such operation. - [2026-09-30] Even SOUTHCOM's most aggressive recent rhetoric — Gen. Donovan's statement that land strikes against cartel infrastructure are "options" — was framed around safe-house raids and kinetic hits on criminal networks within partner nations' own counter-cartel campaigns, not a U.S. offensive to seize and hold sovereign territory; the same WSJ-sourced report stressed the campaign's legal basis rests on the contested "non-international armed conflict" with cartels theory, which Congress and legal scholars argue still lacks any war authorization for territorial operations. https://www.latintimes.com/southcom-general-wont-rule-out-land-strikes-cartels-all-options-are-table-599716 - [2026-10-01] Nine months post-Maduro capture, Venezuela's interim government (Delcy Rodríguez) remains in place with no US garrison, and Trump's own answer on a possible permanent base was evasive rather than affirmative — consistent with a policy of political/economic management, not fresh territorial conquest. - [2026-09-30] The Pentagon's financial and institutional architecture (the $52M Foreign Military Financing shift to Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Panama, and the "Shield of the Americas" framework) is explicitly built around funding partner-nation forces to conduct their own operations on their own soil, not U.S. unilateral territorial-control missions. https://www.latintimes.com/southcom-general-wont-rule-out-land-strikes-cartels-all-options-are-table-599716 BOTTOM LINE: Despite an extraordinary January 2026 capture raid and a steady escalation of strikes, advisory raids, and Cuba contingency planning, every current U.S. posture — congressional pushback, SOUTHCOM's own denials, Trump's own Cuba remarks, and the advisory (not occupying) structure of Ecuador operations — points to continued sub-invasion activity through 2026, with any hypothetical Cuba deployment timeline plausibly extending past the Dec 31, 2026 deadline. NOT FOUND: No evidence of any U.S. deployment order, mobilization timetable, or announced operation naming a specific Latin American country for a territorial-control invasion before Dec 31, 2026; could not confirm whether SOUTHCOM's "land strikes" posture will escalate to anything resolution-qualifying before year-end.