President Donald Trump gathered top advisers and military aides around the Resolute desk early last month, then patched in Richard Grenell, his envoy for Venezuela. On Trump’s return to office, the president had given Grenell a clear mission: get a deal that would give U.S. companies access to Venezuela’s enormous oil and mineral wealth and force tougher action on gangs and drugs. Grenell had made some headway, securing the release of American prisoners from Caracas and the resumption of flights for deported migrants, by working direct lines he had established to President Nicolás Maduro, Venezuela’s socialist strongman.

But Secretary of State Marco Rubio had been championing a different approach. The former senator from Florida, who also serves as the president’s national security adviser, has a long-standing abhorrence of leftist Latin American dictators and has advocated for Maduro’s ouster, a call backed by the legions of Venezuelan and Cuban exiles in Miami. To bring his arguments in line with Trump’s domestic priorities, Rubio has portrayed the Venezuelan leader as the head of a narcotics enterprise running drugs into the United States, as well as an agent of the destabilization that fuels migration.

As a justification for using military force, the drug rationale was awfully thin: Venezuela is not an important player in drug production, even though it allows cartels to use the country as a transit point. But by presenting a move against Maduro as a way to combat illegal trafficking, Rubio got the president’s attention. In early September, Trump began authorizing strikes on small boats off the coast of Venezuela and in the Pacific that were allegedly ferrying drugs or cartel members, so far killing at least 65 people in 16 attacks.

White House Deputy Press Secretary Anna Kelly told us that the strikes have been “against designated narco-terrorists, as affirmed by U.S. intelligence,” and that the president was using his authority to do what was necessary to prevent drugs from reaching the United States. But the administration has offered little evidence to support its claims.

By the time Trump talked with Grenell from the Oval Office, with Rubio nearby, he appeared ready to decide between negotiation and confrontation.