The message comes over a shortwave radio in Catatumbo: a dirt strip by the river will light up in fifteen minutes. Headlamps blink once, then twice. A twin-engine Cessna 210 skims the canopy, drops to a ribbon of clay, loads cargo, and lifts off again. On both sides of the Colombia–Venezuela line, gangs, dissident guerrillas, and soldiers who cooperate when it pays own the night. In March 2020, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) charged Nicolás Maduro and senior allies with narco-terrorism, alleging a conspiracy with the FARC* to “flood” the United States with cocaine—moving Venezuela’s criminal question from rumor to the U.S. courts (DOJ press release).