U.S. Military SEIZES Oil Tanker Linked To Venezuela And Russia

The U.S. military has seized another oil tanker.

In a press release, the Pentagon has announced that the U.S. military seized a sanctioned oil tanker in the Indian Ocean.

The ship captured was flying a Panama flag but was reportedly shipping sanctioned Venezuelan oil.

The Associated Press provided key details related to the capture of the oil tanker:

U.S. military forces boarded a sanctioned oil tanker in the Indian Ocean after tracking the ship from the Caribbean Sea, the Pentagon said Monday.

The Pentagon’s statement on social media did not say whether the ship was connected to Venezuela, which faces U.S. sanctions on its oil and relies on a shadow fleet of falsely flagged tankers to smuggle crude into global supply chains.

However, the Aquila II was one of at least 16 tankers that departed the Venezuelan coast last month after U.S. forces captured then-President Nicolás Maduro, said Samir Madani, co-founder of TankerTrackers.com. He said his organization used satellite imagery and surface-level photos to document the ship’s movements.

According to data transmitted from the ship on Monday, it is not currently laden with a cargo of crude oil.

The Aquila II is a Panamanian-flagged tanker under U.S. sanctions related to the shipment of illicit Russian oil. Owned by a company with a listed address in Hong Kong, ship tracking data shows it has spent much of the last year with its radio transponder turned off, a practice known as “running dark” commonly employed by smugglers to hide their location.

Take a look at the operation here:

JUST IN: 🇺🇸🇷🇺 US military seizes another Russian oil tanker.

"It ran, and we followed…You will run out of fuel long before you will outrun us." pic.twitter.com/RkuxjJuBbU

— BRICS News (@BRICSinfo) February 9, 2026

More footage:

🚨 BREAKING:

🇺🇸🇷🇺🇻🇪 U.S. military forces have boarded and seized the tanker belonging to Russia's ghost fleet.

It was carrying roughly 700,000 barrels of heavy Venezuelan crude bound for China.pic.twitter.com/MKnjUTgZIu https://t.co/r2S7qa7bZw

— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) February 9, 2026

The seizure comes a month after the United States seized a Russian-flagged oil tanker that departed from Venezuela.

Reuters provided further details on the seizure last month:

The U.S. seized a Russian-flagged oil tanker that was being shadowed by a Russian submarine on Wednesday, after pursuing it for more than two weeks across the Atlantic as part of Washington’s efforts to block Venezuelan oil exports, U.S. officials said.

It appeared to be the first time in recent memory that the U.S. military has seized a Russian-flagged vessel.

The Marinera, originally known as the Bella-1, had previously slipped through a U.S. maritime blockade of sanctioned tankers in the Caribbean and rebuffed U.S. Coast Guard efforts to board it. Wednesday’s seizure effort, in the Atlantic near Iceland, was first reported by Reuters.

In a post on X, the U.S. military’s European Command said the Trump administration had seized the vessel for violating U.S. sanctions.

“The blockade of sanctioned and illicit Venezuelan oil remains in FULL EFFECT — anywhere in the world,” U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said in reply to that post.

Two U.S. officials, who were speaking on condition of anonymity, told Reuters that Wednesday’s operation was carried out by the Coast Guard and U.S. military. U.S. special forces initially helped secure the tanker but left the vessel, which was now under Coast Guard control, one of the officials said.

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