Even if the infamy of the Tren of Aragua grows in the Americas, its cohesion and its organization are weakening.
The assertion of the Nicolás Maduro regime that Tren of Aragua was destroy In Venezuela, it's a fiction. The taking of Tocorón prison, the Gang headquarters, was a blow for the criminal enterprise. The group was considerably weakened and lost a large part of its political coverage and the state allies. But there are still gang redouments, in particular that of Yohan Jose Romero, alias “Johan Petrica”, in Las Claritas, Bolívar State. Las Claritas reveals that the elements of Tren of Aragua still have a certain state support, enjoy impunity and earn money, in this case of gold, while working with elements of the Maduro regime.
Turning to the American claims on Tren of Aragua, that this is an increasing regional threat, staging a sort of invasion of the United States, and is directed over Maduro, does not sound true either.
* This article is the eighth in a Nine game survey“Tren de Aragua: done against fiction”, ” The analysis of the truth about the gang, as well as its evolution, its current operations and how it could change in the future. Read the complete survey here.
Although the activities of Venezuelan criminals in Latin America can increase, this is more linked to the creation of sanctions and cocaine, where Tren of Aragua plays no major role. There is also no convincing evidence that most of this activity abroad is led by a centralized direction in Tren de Aragua. Yes, two of the founders of the gangs are still in Liberty, Hector Rusthenford Guerrero Flores, alias “Niño Guerrero” and Johan Petrica, but are they managed by all the different Venezuelans gangs that operate abroad?
Sources in Las Claritas and inside Tren of Aragua claim that the two men travel. Sources of Colombian intelligence said that Niño Guerrero was not only in Colombia, but traveled to Mexico before returning. This shows that Tren de Aragua has enough criminal infrastructure to allow one of the most sought after in the region to travel without hindrance and not detected in several countries. This would make sense since the smuggling and human trafficking, combined with the control of crossing points at the borders, is at the heart of the Tren de Aragua's commercial model.
Sources in the state of Bolívar and members of Tren of Aragua have revealed that Johan Petrica regularly crosses Brazil, but not much further, preferring to stay in his criminal stronghold in Las Claritas. Its recent sanction by the American government and the offer of a Award of $ 4 million For more information leading to his capture, will probably make him even more careful.
See also:: Niño Guerrero: the pivot of the prison which took Tren from Aragua transnational
Thus, these two leaders could still coordinate the international operations of Tren de Aragua. However, it is difficult for them to move, especially now, and thus provide direct leadership and organization skills. A long study of different criminal groups around Latin America and the Caribbean by insistent crime reveals that a lack of direct and current leadership weakens any criminal enterprise over time. Criminals are not particularly faithful by nature and are mainly motivated by greed and personal enrichment. Tren de Aragua has no central ideology or ethics and little organizational unit now that Tocorón has disappeared. While Las Claritas is clearly a bastion of the gangs, it is a city in a remote part of Venezuela, without the transport and communication center necessary to manage a transnational criminal enterprise, unlike Tocorón prison, which was at the heart of Venezuela, connected by highways to the rest of the country, and less than two hours of caracas.
The police and judicial sources of Colombia, Peru and Chile all say the same. Tren de Aragua has been weakened since the closure of Tocorón, and the various affiliates act with increasing autonomy, with less evidence of coordination or even cooperation between them. Add to that a wide range of copying gangs that use the name of Aragua to project fear, but have nothing to do with the group.
The old guard of Tren de Aragua, recruited and trained in Tocorón, is decimated by captures and deaths. And with the loss of the central body of the gang, any unit that the organization once appreciated, which has always been fragile, is quickly eroded.
The upper levels of Tren of Aragua in August 2023, before the takeover of Tocorón prison, were clear, organized and relatively consistent. While different gangs had large quantities of autonomy, there were contacts between the different factions and mutual support often, although it is wrong to suggest that the three founders exercised the authority, or any level of significant control, on all the affiliated gangs.
However, in August 2025, there was a very different image.
While the management of Venezuela was still largely intact, repelling the statements of the Maduro regime to have dismantled the gang, more than half of the leaders identified abroad had been captured. This reveals the growing capacity and cooperation between the police in Chile, Colombia and Peru. Although the gangs themselves still exist, a large part of the new generation of leaders does not have the same personal relationship with the founders of Tren de Aragua and did not purge time in Tocorón.
While the United States has a large Venezuelan diaspora, many now feared expulsion and therefore less likely to work with the authorities of the States or Federals, there is no evidence of a deliberate distribution of members of Tren of Aragua by managers of senior gangs, not to mention the orders of creating organized and coordinated cells. Although the presence of Venezuelan criminals in the United States is undeniable, some having affiliations with Tren of Aragua, or having spent time in Tocorón prison, there is no proof of a strategically planned or concerted attempt, to invade the American continent and to establish a permanent and coordinated presence. This did not even happen in Colombia or Peru. Tren of Aragua presence there was initially a random and uncoordinated, with links with Tocorón and the central management of Tren of Aragua occurring after the first wave of criminal colonization by the Venezuelan delinquents.
So who are all these members of Tren of Aragua arrested in the United States, some deported to the famous Terrorism Center for El Salvador (Centro de Confinamiento del Terrorismo – Cecot)? How did the American police determined that they are really gang members? The Venezuelan authorities do not share much information on the criminal history, nor the files showing which criminals have served time in Tocorón under the rule of Niño Guerrero are available, if they exist. Many have been made of tattoos. Now that while tattoos are a criminal uniform in prison gangs like Mara Salvatrucha and Barrio 18 of El Salvador, and the Russian mafia of “law thieves” (Vory against Zakone), Tren de Aragua has no code of this type.
WE accusations The fact that Tren de Aragua is used by Maduro to infiltrate in the United States and importing tons of cocaine is also difficult to justify. That Maduro facilitated production and trafficking in cocaine out of doubt. An American accusation act recognizing Maduro and number two of the regime, Diosdado Cabello, as leading a drug trafficking organization, described as the Suns cartel, testifies. However, the declaration of the American prosecutor general Pam Bondi saying that Maduro used Tren of Aragua to pass drugs on smuggling is questionable. Tren de Aragua has so far not become a transnational drug trafficking organization. The elements of the gang certainly indulge in retail sale of narcotics, and there have been sources speaking of migrants and gang members with small amounts of drugs beyond the borders in Latin America, but so far, there are no cases of large cocaine expeditions linked to Tren of Aragua, especially not in connection with the American market. There may be cases where Venezuelan criminals, perhaps affiliated with Aragua, acted as hired muscles or subcontracted work for drug trafficking organizations.
The fact that the Maduro regime works in close collaboration with criminal groups is no doubt. Indeed Maduro has created a sophisticated system of Hybrid criminal governanceDevelop symbiotic relationships with several criminal groups. Criminals give higher members of the Maduro regime to access criminal rents, while repressing opposition activities in their fields of influence. The Maduro regime in return offers a sanctuary, a space to grow, recruit and increase income and scope. Links with Colombian rebel groups as The National Liberation Army (Ejército de Liberación Nacional – Eln) and the dissidents of the now demobilized revolutionary armed forces of Colombia (Fuerzas Armadas revolucionarias de Colombia – Stuff) have been constantly proven and go back to the founder of the Bolivarian Revolution, President Hugo Chávez, who died in 2013, passing the political torch to Maduro.
However, this association with criminal groups has so far been largely limited to Venezuelan territory, although Colombian rebel groups are certainly planning in Colombia.
However, there is an example of a link between the Maduro and Tren of Aragua regime operating abroad. Ronald OjedaAn officer of the Venezuelan army who had fled to Chile, would have been kidnapped and murdered by the subsidiaries of Tren of Aragua. Chilean prosecutor Héctor Barros has directly linked The removal and murder of Diosdado Cabello, number two of the Maduro regime.
If this is true, this would mean that the Maduro regime has embarked on geo-crime, it is the strategic use of organized crime and criminal actors by states to achieve the objectives of foreign policy. This gives a little credibility to the American accusation that Maduro could use Venezuelan criminals abroad, including in the United States. It is a section, however, to describe this as any type of invasion.
Tren of Aragua’s dissemination by Trump administration seems to be more motivated by politics than any growing threat to national security in the United States. But could the Venezuelan gang undergo another evolution and increase its power and its scope? Or is it now, as the first Latin American Boogeyman, condemned to an irreversible decline?
