CARACAS, Venezuela — The country is hemmed in by the largest U.S. military presence off South America in decades. For two months, U.S. forces have been blowing up boats off its coast, killing scores; President Donald Trump has warned “land is going to be next” — and then denied land strikes are coming.

For now, the campaign at sea continues. The U.S. military on Saturday struck another alleged narco-trafficking vessel in the Caribbean killing three, according to Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth.

The government of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, meanwhile, has moved troops to the borders, deployed antiaircraft batteries and urged civilians to prepare for the worst.

“Yes, I worry” about a U.S. attack, said a young cook from Sucre, the state from which several of the boats targeted by the administration have departed. “But we cannot think about anything else without buying food first.” He spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation.

If Trump were to order forces to attack Venezuelan territory — asked Friday if he was considering it, he said no — many here say there’s little they could do. They’re focusing instead on triple-digit inflation, widespread deprivation and, always, government persecution.

The authoritarian socialist state has arrested at least eight economists and consultants this year after they published information about inflation. They included Rodrigo Cabezas, a finance minister under Hugo Chávez, Maduro’s socialist predecessor and mentor.

The International Monetary Fund estimates that Venezuela will end 2025 with 269.9 percent inflation. By 2026, the fund says, it will be over 680 percent.

The government has denied that Venezuela risks hyperinflation. Officials have accused Washington of waging an economic war against the country — which has, indeed, been battered by years of U.S. sanctions, as well as government mismanagement, cronyism and corruption.

In a capital decorated with government-mandated Christmas lights, there’s been no evident rush to harden shelters or buy supplies.

“Right now, nobody has enough to really stock up on anything,” said David Smilde, a Tulane University sociologist who follows Venezuela. “People are hurting economically.”

A decade of extreme economic hardship and more than two of political persecution have driven more than 7 million people from the country. Venezuelans are now the world’s largest refugee population.

Conditions started to improve in 2021, slowly, as the government eased price and currency controls and allowed more dollar transactions. Supermarket shelves began to refill; new car dealerships opened.

But the respite proved short-lived. Though the government has stopped releasing data, economists here say GDP is shrinking, unemployment and underemployment are widespread, and hyperinflation has devastated spending power.

Seven of 10 Venezuelan households lived in poverty in 2024, according to researchers at the Catholic University of Venezuela. The streets of Caracas have filled with families and children begging.

Uncertainty about a U.S. attack is causing further damage.

“People’s expectations have caused the demand for dollars in the foreign exchange market to increase,” said a Venezuelan economist, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of being arrested. “Household incomes are suffering a devastating blow. People can buy less and less.”

“The recession is taking people out of the job market, people who are not earning wages,” the economist said. “Poverty is increasing.”

Maduro last week ordered the creation of an app for Venezuelans to report “everything they see and hear.” Then he asked the Supreme Court, which he controls, to come up with a way to strip anyone who asks for a military intervention of their citizenship.

Maduro wants to apply such a measure to opposition leader Leopoldo López, a former political prisoner now living in exile in Spain, Vice President Delcy Rodríguez explained.

“Maduro wants to take away my citizenship for saying what all Venezuelans think and want: freedom,” López told reporters in Madrid.

When the U.S. military began massing forces off Venezuela in August, Maduro dispatched troops to the border with Colombia and urged citizens to join “self-defense militias.”

Maduro claimed victory in 2018 and again last year in elections widely viewed as fraudulent. The United States considers him illegitimate; the nations severed diplomatic relations in 2019. The following year, a federal grand jury indicted Maduro and members of his inner circle on charges of narcoterrorism. The administration this year raised the reward for his capture to $50 million.

Still, with loyal military forces, the armed motorcycle gangs known as colectivos and mass arrests of opponents, Maduro has survived at least one opposition uprising and an abortive kidnapping attempt — along with the devastation of covid, the collapsing economy and the refugee crisis.

Now, though, his tone has grown more urgent. Last week, in a rare appeal in English, he urged “please, please, please … no crazy war … peace forever!”

One woman, a Caracas schoolteacher, said she was trying just to survive.

“I don’t know what’s going to happen,” she said, speaking on the condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation. “The economy is so bad, the situation is so difficult, that if something is going to happen, I hope it happens fast.”

“We cannot live like this anymore,” she said.

Niha Masih in Seoul contributed to this report.