[CGMthrowaway]

Forward operating site is not what you seem to think. It's more like a place to set up temporary comms support, recon support, maybe SAMs etc then skedaddle out of there (perhaps leaving the equipment behind for the duration of the operation). If the site cannot be clandestinely set up then it's often not worth trying. What parent described is perfectly reasonable

[notahacker]

If the US planned to invade rather than raid Venezuela, I don't think the inability to capture a single forward operating site clandestinely would lead to the entire operation being called off. If they didn't, the alleged beachhead is moot. They had boots on the ground when capturing Maduro too.

What's more likely: the US "desperately" stumbled upon a capture of Maduro at almost zero cost to them after their real plan to seize Venezuelan territory went awry due to heroic Venezuelan defending as the parent implies, or that the intention was to capture and remove Maduro without invading and this was what they did, regardless of whether a few peripheral targets got missed?

[CGMthrowaway]

IDK what you are saying but I don't think we disagree. Maybe I had meant to reply to parent comment instead of you