AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTMaduro Calls U.S. Attack on Boat ‘A Heinous Crime.’ Then Trump Announces Another.The Venezuela leader, Nicolás Maduro, said that the Trump administration was trying to start a war in the Caribbean.President Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela speaking at a news conference in Caracas on Monday.Credit...Adriana Loureiro Fernandez for The New York TimesPublished Sept. 15, 2025Updated Sept. 16, 2025, 12:49 a.m. ETThe deadly attack President Trump ordered early this month on what he said was a drug-smuggling Venezuelan boat was a “heinous crime,” Venezuela’s president said on Monday — just before Mr. Trump boasted of destroying a second boat.Speaking to reporters in Caracas, the Venezuelan leader, Nicolás Maduro, said that the Sept. 2 attack, which killed 11 people, violated U.S. and international laws. If the United States believed that the boat’s passengers were drug traffickers — as Americans officials have claimed — they should have been captured, he said.Mr. Maduro called the action “a military attack on civilians who were not at war and were not militarily threatening any country” and said the United States was trying to goad Venezuela into a “major war.” The American goal, Mr. Maduro said, was “regime change for oil,” not drug interdiction, which the Trump administration has said is a main goal in the region.Subscribe to The Times to read as many articles as you like.Julie Turkewitz is the Andes Bureau Chief for The Times, based in Bogotá, Colombia, covering Colombia, Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador and Peru.Related ContentAdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENT