New details and developments relating to a bizarre abortive coup attempt against Venezuela's dictatorial President Nicolas Maduro, which involved a botched amphibious raid by a group that included former U.S. Army Green Berets and Venezuelan expats, continue to emerge days after the start of the incident. Everything about this fiasco, which apparently has yet to reach its final conclusion, seems less of a modern incarnation of the infamous CIA-sponsored Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba in 1961 and more reminiscent of the differently infamous Wonga Coup attempt in Equatorial Guinea in 2004, or even the life of Bin Laden hunter Gary Faulkner, or an over-the-top Hollywood dramatization of either of those events.

The Associated Press did manage to follow up with Gourdreau after Operation Gideon's failure. When asked about why he had sent just 60 men to what is perhaps the most heavily defended part of Venezuela's coastline, the retired American special operator reminded the reporters about how Alexander the Great had “struck deep into the heart of the enemy" and achieved victory over a numerically superior Persian force at the Battle of Guagamela in 331.