By Geraldina Colotti, Resumen Latinoamericano, July 3, 2026.
Rescue efforts continue amid the rubble in Venezuela, but hopes of reducing the number of missing persons—some 50,000 according to the UN—are fading by the hour. The confirmed death toll stands at 2,295, but the number is bound to rise as debris from the twin earthquakes of June 24 is cleared away, while strong aftershocks complicate the work of rescue workers. On June 24—a national holiday commemorating a pivotal moment in the country’s independence—at 6:00 p.m., two earthquakes struck 39 seconds apart: the first with a magnitude of 7.2 and the second with a magnitude of 7.5, both with their epicenters in Yaracuy state. Yaracuy was the spark, but the energy release of the second earthquake (the 7.5-magnitude one) occurred beneath the seafloor off the coast of La Guaira, striking the coast and the Caracas metropolitan area head-on.
This was a rather rare double seismic event, which geological models (developed by Italy’s INGV and Peking University) illustrate through three precise structural factors: first, the unilateral propagation toward the east. The rupture of the San Sebastián fault began in Veroes (Yaracuy), but it did not stop there. It propagated like a zipper opening at high speed (about 3–3.5 kilometers per second), moving precisely eastward—that is, toward Caracas and La Guaira. Second, the shift in the energy peak (maximum slip): as the rupture advanced, the accumulated energy increased. Satellite data show that the slip (the sliding of rocks along the fault) was minimal near the initial epicenter, while it reached its maximum of 3.6–4.5 meters precisely in the section of the fault located offshore, opposite Catia La Mar (in La Guaira state).
The greatest destructive force was released there. The third point concerns structural and geological vulnerability: Caracas is situated in a sedimentary basin (a valley of soft sediments). When seismic waves generated by the fault reach this type of terrain, they undergo a phenomenon called site amplification: the waves slow down, their amplitude increases, and they shake buildings with far greater force than they would on rocky, compact terrain such as that found in Yaracuy. Added to this are the extremely high population density and the fragility of much of the capital’s infrastructure.
Relying on the rigidity of scientific data is essential to avoid fueling alarmism and fanciful hypotheses that only serve to complicate the dramatic reality, diverting attention from the practical solutions the country needs. On social media, for example, the conspiracy theory surrounding the HAARP system (the U.S. ionospheric research program) has resurfaced, used to promote the claim that an earthquake was induced from abroad with the aim of permanently subjugating the country and seizing its extraordinary resources. Scientists agree that these theories are baseless: electromagnetic waves lack the physical capacity to penetrate the Earth’s crust or trigger tectonic movements, which depend exclusively on the accumulation and release of deep geological energy.
Alongside this techno-scientific pseudoscience, biblical interpretations and paranormal explanations (strange lights in the sky, which turned completely red after the earthquake) are resurfacing, interpreting the quake as a punishment or an eschatological sign. These are irrational reactions entirely similar to those that arose among the population following the cataclysm of 1812, during the time of Simón Bolívar. Back then, the catastrophic earthquake that devastated Caracas was interpreted by the royalists—the defenders of the Spanish Crown and colonial rule—as “divine punishment” against the First Republic.
Although the comparison with 1812 is the most appropriate, a historical event with frighteningly similar dynamics in terms of trajectory and vulnerability was the Caracas earthquake of July 29, 1967 (although the recent one on June 24 was significantly more powerful). In that case as well, it was an earthquake with an estimated magnitude between 6.6 and 6.7, generated by the same strike-slip system of the San Sebastián Fault. Just as today, the instrumental epicenter was located offshore (about 20 km north of Macuto), but the destructive energy spread along the coast and struck with unprecedented violence in the urban area of Caracas and in Vargas State (present-day La Guaira).
The parallels with the current disaster are striking. On the one hand, regarding the basin effect in Caracas: in 1967, neighborhoods in the capital built on soft sediments (such as Altamira and Los Palos Grandes) experienced an identical amplification of seismic waves. Modern buildings over 10 stories tall collapsed in on themselves exactly as has happened in recent days. And on the other hand, because it affected the same La Guaira–capital axis: the coastline (then Vargas, now La Guaira) was devastated by the collapse of large hotel and residential structures, revealing even back then the fragility of the coastal strip squeezed between the sea and the mountain range. The same fragility that led to the Vargas trough—as La Guaira was still called in 1999.
The 1967 event demonstrated the extreme danger of shallow earthquakes (10 km deep) combined with the poor coastal construction standards. And now it reveals the exploitation by the far right, which sees the collapses only in the low-income housing sectors built by Chávez and Maduro—which, on the contrary, precisely because of the use of ultra-lightweight materials, mostly remained standing long enough to allow people to escape. In contrast, the devastation affected luxury resorts and buildings in the affluent neighborhoods of Caracas.
It was precisely amid the rubble of 1812 that Simón Bolívar uttered the famous phrase: “If nature opposes us, we will fight against it and make it obey.” A warning that official historiography tends to reduce to empty Enlightenment-era titanism, but which the Bolivarian revolution led by Hugo Chávez had managed to renew and bring into the present, transforming it into the synthesis of political determination and popular sovereignty against all historical and material fatalism. That phrase is repeated today among grassroots leaders and in communities to draw strength, drawing on history and their own roots in the face of a nature that seems to have taken its toll on the country. This is done, however, with an awareness of the limits to the exploitation of nature, as outlined in one of the strategic objectives of the Plan de la Patria. For this reason, stories are multiplying of rescue operations by activists from Misión Nevado—an organization dedicated to animal care—featuring dogs, cats, and turtles brought to safety by the rescuers.
However, those very same roots seem to have been shaken to their core—both politically and emotionally—following the U.S. attack on January 3, which led to the abduction of President Nicolás Maduro and Congresswoman Cilia Flores, his wife, as they await a new hearing in New York on July 22. The foreign military incursion and the abduction of the head of state have struck at the heart of national pride and, in particular, the doctrine of the Bolivarian National Armed Forces (FANB), structured on the principle of civil-military unity and territorial inviolability. This emotional and institutional disarray constitutes the weakness that far-right propaganda systematically exploits. The subversive opposition exploits the trauma of January 3 and the current crisis to wage a systematic campaign of moral destruction against military leaders, who are widely portrayed on social media as a parasitic, inefficient force dedicated to looting.
Superimposed on this natural disaster is a political and economic crisis entirely driven by foreign intervention. The country’s vulnerability is not merely geological; it has been scientifically engineered by years of sanctions and financial strangulation. The two consecutive earthquakes have struck a social organism whose immune defenses were already compromised. “True humanitarian aid is for them to lift the sanctions,” says the Bolivarian government, “so that we can use our own resources.” And in this regard, international solidarity movements are already on the ground or are on their way, to support the government’s efforts and also to “stand in the way” of interference and speculation that criticize the government’s controls over forms of false aid arriving with ulterior motives.
In Venezuela, there is keen awareness of the risk of massive “humanitarian” neocolonization following the Haitian model. “We are here,” explain the international brigades, “to repay the solidarity that the Bolivarian process has shown toward so many peoples affected by disasters in recent years”: from Mexico to Haiti, from Nepal to Pakistan, as former Attorney General and poet Tarek William Saab recounted in verse. A solidarity that, just as Cuba has always done (and is already on the ground), was extended even to governments that opposed Venezuela.
And now there are 31 governments that have sent aid or rescue teams: first and foremost those allies, such as China, Russia, and Iran, despite attempts by U.S. imperialism to expel them.
The only one who has not taken action—arguing that he must prioritize his own citizens—is the president of Honduras, Nasry Asfura, a right-wing figure very much to Trump’s liking. The Italian delegation stayed in the country for only five days, but Acting President Delcy Rodríguez awarded the mission the “Hero of Venezuela” medal, and she did the same for the Swiss rescue workers and their canine unit. “The pain in our hearts turns to gratitude for all the teams from the 31 countries that have come here to support the Venezuelan people,” said the acting president in her speech. “Every rescue team that arrived here brought hope to us. Today they are leaving, but they will remain forever in our hearts.”
This openness at all levels has, however, drawn criticism from the anti-imperialist left, which is concerned about the (albeit limited) prominence of the U.S.—a country more accustomed to sending soldiers than rescue workers—as well as the involvement of the Israeli regime (with which relations have been severed for 17 years). This intervention was requested above all by the local Jewish community, comprising some 5,000 people, a particularly large group in the affluent area of San Bernardino, one of the parts of the capital hardest hit by the earthquake.
From an institutional standpoint, since January 3, Venezuela has been living under conditions of limited sovereignty, locked in a constant standoff with the U.S. “kidnappers.” Since then, the Trump administration has mandated that oil export revenues be frozen in a Citibank account in New York, transforming the national economy into a disbursement mechanism controlled from Washington. Within this framework, the “three-phase plan” hypothesized by Trump and Marco Rubio—which the Chavista government leadership, however, views as a strategic retreat to buy time and regain strength—has collided with a cataclysm of this magnitude, yet it remains on the table. The United States’ strategic priority is not humanitarian aid, but the capture of Venezuela’s energy revenues. This objective is made explicit by the massive naval deployment in the Caribbean Sea, which constitutes one of the most imposing military blockades in the continent’s modern history.
“The goal is to paralyze the regime’s ability to generate independent revenue,” Secretary of State Marco Rubio cynically declared to CBS, defining the operation as a “military quarantine” on oil exports. Rubio clarified that pressure will remain at its peak until the state-owned oil industry is fully open to foreign investment, revealing the true intention of guaranteeing U.S. companies a de facto monopoly over the resources of the Bolivarian Republic.
This situation is highlighting the gap between the material needs of transnational capital and the political agenda of the local far right. The tycoon Trump now sees the possibility of replicating in Venezuela the “resort model” envisioned for Gaza, and prefers to further delay the plans of the coup-plotting Machado, who would like to return to the country to take the lead in the “constructive chaos” she hopes to provoke.
The tragedy of June 24 has, in fact, immediately become a battleground for logistical confrontation and cognitive warfare. The fascist right has attempted to capitalize on the need to organize aid under strict state control. At a time of extreme emergency, public planning through institutional channels (such as ministries and the Peace Quadrants) is the only tool capable of guaranteeing an equitable and methodical distribution of basic necessities to the entire population, preventing humanitarian aid from being fragmented, privatized, or exploited by private opposition networks as a weapon for territorial negotiation.
While the dispute over reconstruction rages on the ground, a second front has opened in New York, this time of a legal nature. Last Tuesday, the international organization Center for Guernica 37 filed a civil lawsuit in the Brooklyn Federal Court against Nicolás Maduro. The legal action was brought by three mothers, one father, and one woman who “lost family members during security operations carried out between 2017 and 2020.” The lawsuit explicitly refers to the Operation for the Liberation and Protection of the People (OLP)—later renamed the Special Action Forces (FAES)—the elite squadron used by the government for social control in the working-class neighborhoods of Caracas, which had been largely occupied by large mafias financed by the far right.
The basis for the accusation relies heavily on controversial reports from UN agencies, which are often challenged by Caracas due to the use of biased and unverified sources on the ground. On the political front, this lawsuit is aimed directly at the highest levels of government to undermine the international legitimacy of the Bolivarian state, in an attempt to circumvent the fundamental principle of diplomatic immunity for sitting heads of state. It is an operation that seeks to replicate historical precedents of extraterritorial judicial pressure to strike at the chain of command and weaken the Venezuelan government’s negotiating position at a time of maximum internal vulnerability.
The twin earthquakes of June 24 not only shook the ground but also instantly activated the laboratories of cognitive warfare—that modern geopolitical battlefield in which the primary objective is not the physical destruction of infrastructure, but rather the systematic manipulation of perceptions, the psychological collapse of the population, and the demolition of the legitimacy of institutions. In the hours immediately following the quakes, while state agencies and volunteers—both military and civilian—were mobilizing on the ground to rescue survivors and provide first aid amid the rubble, a coordinated and deeply asymmetrical media offensive was unleashed on the major social media platforms.
And since it now appears that Trump and Machado are at each other’s throats, White House correspondent and owner of La Derecha Diario, Javier Negre, has alleged that María Corina Machado’s team, led by Claudia Macero, was funding groups to attack Donald Trump, his administration, and the U.S. chargé d’affaires, John Barret. He explained that Machado and her press secretary, Macero, lead “El Enjambre” (The Swarm), a group of paid influencers who have been attacking the Trump administration for days to exploit the earthquake crisis and derail the Trump administration’s transition plan (and to curry favor with Democrats in the event of an impeachment against Trump). Finally, he asserted that this group is composed of journalists, influencers, members of his party, and supporters who organize in a coordinated manner to attack en masse with the aim of intimidating.
This mechanism of psychological destabilization—widely theorized in Western political pressure manuals—was articulated in very precise guidelines through the use of digital platforms. First, algorithms and automated accounts flooded the news feed with images taken out of context and arbitrarily inflated data, with the deliberate intent of spreading a state of collective panic and making the government appear powerless and incapable of managing the crisis.
At the same time, however, from the laboratories of popular communication—starting with the International University of Communication, led by Rector Tania Díaz—analyses and recommended strategies multiplied, along with basic criteria for exposing digital traps: to highlight that, in recent years, the architecture of disinformation has taken a qualitative leap forward. We have moved from the old “inorganic” campaigns (consisting solely of rudimentary bots repeating the same hashtag) to “hybrid” or “semi-organic” operations. This is what, in the geopolitical sphere, is defined as cognitive warfare—that is, the scientific attempt to manipulate emotions, concepts, and the collective psyche through digital networks.
To understand how this market for manipulating public opinion works, we must map out the three main actors: bots, influencers, and defense mechanisms. How do bots paid for propaganda work? Modern bots are no longer simply profiles without photos that flood the feed with the same text. Today, disinformation hubs and private communications agencies use complex systems based on artificial intelligence and coordinated networks. There are “account factories” (sockpuppets): networks of fake profiles managed automatically or semi-automatically. They have credible bios, AI-generated photos, and seemingly normal posting histories (sports, cooking, memes) to evade platform controls.
The goal of the bots isn’t to convince you directly, but to trick the algorithm on X, TikTok, or Instagram. When a topic is launched, thousands of bots generate immediate artificial interactions (likes, shares, comments). The algorithm interprets this spike as “genuine interest” and pushes the content into global trends, displaying it to millions of real users. This is how neuro-digital hate is instilled.
Certain content is used to polarize the debate. They artificially create a climate of radical confrontation, attacking dissenting voices or glorifying reactionary figures, to give the impression that a certain extremist position is shared by the majority of the population. Influencers have become the ideal vectors for propaganda because they possess something bots will never have: a parasocial relationship. Followers trust them as they would trust a friend. This capital of trust is monetized and exploited by the centers of power in two ways: the conscious channel (digital mercenaries). There are influencers who accept million-dollar contracts from public relations agencies, political parties, or transnational pressure groups to promote certain narratives.
Payments are often made outside the platforms to circumvent election laws and social media advertising disclosures. The influencer does not say “this content is sponsored,” but rather weaves the political or geopolitical message into their normal routine (for example, a travel blogger who extols the “security” and “business model” of an authoritarian regime or who systematically attacks a popular movement in transition, making it appear to be a spontaneous opinion).
Then there is the unconscious channel (useful vectors). This is the most perverse mechanism of cognitive warfare. Many content creators are manipulated without realizing it. Algorithms reward outrage and anger. To avoid losing relevance and views, an influencer tends to repost polarizing content (memes, out-of-context videos, alarmist claims) originally generated by bot farms. Business agencies or fake research centers send influencers “exclusive” material, manipulated economic data, or sensationalist news. The influencer, flattered by access to the source or eager to land a scoop, spreads the disinformation, convinced they are producing independent reporting.
How can you avoid these traps? Identifying coordinated networks requires critical thinking and attention to detail. You need to look for temporal and volume anomalies: if a profile posts a hundred messages a day, at any hour of the night, or if thousands of accounts comment on a post using the exact same words or minimal variations within a few seconds, it’s a coordinated amplification network. You have to analyze the profiles: bot accounts are often recently created (for example, all within the same month), have very few followers but follow thousands of people, and their timelines are single-topic—there’s no personal life, just propaganda or constant attacks.
It is important to watch for a sudden shift in focus: an influencer who has always focused on fitness, wellness, or lifestyle who suddenly begins repeating specific political slogans, advocating for economic sanctions, or criminalizing social movements, using graphics or slogans identical to those of a particular political campaign. In short: in the face of techno-fascism and algorithmic manipulation, defense cannot be solely individual; it must become a collective effort.
Therefore, it is necessary to develop critical digital awareness: to understand that the digital space is not neutral, but rather a battleground governed by multinational corporations and geopolitical interests. Don’t react on impulse: the bot’s goal is to enrage you to generate interactions and give visibility to its content. And break the chain of virality: don’t share toxic or blatantly false content, not even to criticize or ridicule it. On modern social media, indignant comments and controversial quotes still grant algorithmic relevance to the original post.
The best response is to report and block (block and report). Above all, it is crucial to verify the sources: contrast the virtual narrative with the reality of historical facts, actual economic data, and on-the-ground research. In the face of a cyberattack or a neuro-digital lynching campaign, the only effective barrier—according to grassroots communicators—is mobilizing the community. Organize the social response on the ground and online by spreading the truth, debunking falsehoods not with anger, but with the strength of class analysis and grassroots organization.