Colombian President Gustavo Petro said Monday that he would “take up arms” against the U.S. if it attacks Colombia, after a military operation captured Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.
Petro made the remarks after U.S. President Donald Trump commented on Colombia and its president on Sunday, saying, Colombia is “run by a sick man who likes making cocaine and selling it to the United States.”
“He’s not going to be doing it for very long,” Trump said of Petro. “He has cocaine mills and cocaine factories. He’s not going to be doing it.”
Asked whether he might order the U.S. to conduct an operation against Colombia, Trump replied, “It sounds good to me.”
In a lengthy post on X, Petro wrote, “Although I have not been a military man, I know about war and clandestinity. I swore not to touch a weapon again since the 1989 Peace Pact, but for the Homeland I will take up arms again that I do not want.”
“If you bomb even one of these groups without sufficient intelligence, you will kill many children. If you bomb peasants, thousands of guerrillas will return in the mountains,” he wrote. “If you detain a president whom much of my people want and respect, you will unleash the people’s jaguar.”
Petro also denied Trump’s accusations that he is linked to drug trafficking.
“I am not illegitimate, nor am I a narco, I only have as assets my family home that I still pay for with my salary. My bank statements have been published. No one could say that I have spent more than my salary. I am not greedy,” Petro wrote.
Petro also noted that “every Colombian soldier has now received this order: any commander of the security forces who prefers the U.S. flag over the Colombian flag will be immediately removed from the institution.”
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“I have enormous trust in my people and that is why I have asked the people to defend the president from any illegitimate violent act against him. The way to defend me is to take power in all the municipalities of the country. The order to the public force is not to shoot the people but yes to the invader,” Petro wrote.
Trump began his months-long pressure campaign on Venezuela’s Maduro by ordering dozens of lethal strikes on alleged drug smuggling boats launched from the country into the Caribbean. The Trump administration eventually expanded the operations to target suspected vessels in the eastern Pacific that came from Colombia.
Colombia says it will continue to work with the United States to fight drug trafficking using Washington’s intelligence and technology.
“The government of Colombia has let the U.S. government know … that we are going to keep co-ordinating and co-operating in the fight against drug trafficking,” Interior Minister Armando Benedetti said in a video with Justice Minister Andres Idarraga on Monday.
Benedetti said that Colombia’s anti-drug operations would target drug laboratories, criminal organizations and their camps.
“We will continue to emphasize the fight against this scourge, particularly on the Colombian-Venezuelan border,” Idarraga said.
In September 2025, the U.S. added Colombia to a list of nations failing to co-operate in the drug war for the first time in almost 30 years. The designation led to the U.S. slashing assistance to the country.
That same month, the Trump administration also announced it would cancel Petro’s visa after he publicly called on U.S. soldiers to disobey Trump.
“It (the global force) has to be bigger than that of the United States. That’s why from here, from New York, I ask all the soldiers of the army of the U.S. not to point their rifles at humanity,” Petro said in a video.
“Disobey the orders of Trump. Obey the orders of humanity,” he added.
“Earlier today, Colombian president @petrogustavo stood on a NYC street and urged U.S. soldiers to disobey orders and incite violence,” a post from the U.S. State Department’s X account read. “We will revoke Petro’s visa due to his reckless and incendiary actions.”
The Trump administration imposed sanctions in October 2025 on Petro, his family and a member of his government over accusations of involvement in the global drug trade. Colombia is considered the epicentre of the world’s cocaine trade.
— With files from The Associated Press and Reuters
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