Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth reportedly announced Thursday that Adm. Alvin Holsey, the four-star officer in charge of U.S. Southern Command, will retire at the end of the year—an unexpected move that comes less than a year after Holsey assumed command of all American military operations in Latin America.
The timing of Holsey’s departure is notable. President Donald Trump has stepped up military action in the Caribbean against what the administration describes as Venezuelan drug-trafficking operations. Since early September, U.S. forces have carried out a series of strikes, destroying at least five vessels and killing more than two dozen people.
The president has also suggested the possibility of taking the campaign ashore, telling reporters this week that his administration is “looking at land” operations but providing no additional details.
Hegseth announced Holsey’s retirement in a post on X, calling the admiral “a leader who exemplified the highest standards” and “demonstrated unwavering commitment to mission, people, and nation.” The defense secretary did not specify a reason for the early exit and has yet to name a successor.
Holsey confirmed in a brief statement that he would retire December 12, thanking Southern Command personnel for their “lasting contributions to the defense of our nation.” His departure marks another shift in the upper echelons of the military under Trump’s administration.
Earlier this year, Joint Chiefs Chair Gen. C.Q. Brown and Navy Chief Adm. Lisa Franchetti were both dismissed, followed by Cyber Command’s Gen. Timothy Haugh in April. Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. David Allvin has also announced plans to step down in November, halfway through his term.
The change at Southern Command comes as tensions between Washington and Caracas continue to escalate. Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has denounced the recent U.S. strikes as acts of aggression, ordering military drills and mobilizing civilian militias in response.
The Trump administration, however, insists the operations are legal and necessary to protect Americans from the flow of narcotics and the threat posed by criminal networks aligned with the Maduro regime.
Trump defended his approach Wednesday, linking the crackdown to both drug trafficking and illegal migration. “I authorized for two reasons, really,” he said. “No. 1, they have emptied their prisons into the United States of America. And the other thing, the drugs—we have a lot of drugs coming in from Venezuela, and a lot of the Venezuelan drugs come in through the sea.”
The president also confirmed that he had authorized covert CIA operations in Venezuela, a move some lawmakers criticized as lacking transparency. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, accused Trump of taking the U.S. “closer to outright conflict with no transparency, oversight, or apparent guardrails.”
Holsey, one of the few Black four-star admirals in the military, took command of Southern Command in November 2024, succeeding Army Gen. Laura Richardson. A Georgia native, Holsey has commanded the USS Makin Island, Carrier Strike Group One, and a multinational task force defending global shipping routes. Just this week, Southern Command announced that Holsey had been visiting Caribbean nations including Antigua, Barbuda, and Grenada—underscoring how sudden his departure appears to be.
For now, Hegseth and the Pentagon have offered no further explanation, but Holsey’s retirement adds to the sense of flux at a time when Trump’s administration is expanding its campaign against Venezuelan cartels and reinforcing U.S. presence in the hemisphere.
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