Rough seas. An almost moonless night. And a small fishing boat crossing a treacherous stretch of the Caribbean Sea, carrying precious cargo with a target on her back.
Those were the conditions that Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado faced when she made perhaps the most perilous part of her journey to collect her Nobel Peace Prize in Norway, according to the U.S. Special Forces veteran who planned and aided her escape.
“There were 5- to 6-foot waves, maybe even bigger waves than that, and we were doing this in the middle of the night,” Bryan Stern, who heads the Tampa, Florida-based Grey Bull Rescue Foundation, told NBC News. “It was pitch black, almost no moonlight. All of us were very cold and wet.”
But Machado never lost her composure, or her lunch, Stern said, as the skiff lurched in the rough sea and plied through waters that have been targeted, of late, by the U.S. missile strikes on suspected drug smuggling boats.
“She did fine,” Stern said. “They call her the Iron Lady for a reason.”
Stern dubbed the extrication operation: “Operation Golden Dynamite.”
“She is overwhelmingly the highest-profile person we’ve rescued,” said Stern, who noted this was the 800th mission his organization carried out.
Machado, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in October for leading the opposition against Venezuelan strongman Nicolás Maduro’s regime, said on Thursday that she got help from the U.S. government to leave her hiding place in Venezuela and collect her award.
Stern insisted the operation was paid for “by a series of unnamed donors,” and the U.S. government was aware of what was going on but not directly involved.
“We designed and implemented the extrication of María Corina Machado from Venezuela to a friendly country from which she was flown to her next destination,” Stern said. “We were not hired by anyone in the U.S. government.”
In fact, Stern added, “I’ve never received a thank-you note, let alone a dollar, from the U.S. government.”
The White House did not respond to an email from NBC News seeking information about its possible involvement in Machado’s escape.
Stern said he began planning the mission on Dec. 5.
“We really wanted to get her to the Nobel prize ceremony on time,” he said. “But there were a number of obstacles.”
Getting Machado out of Venezuela required disguising her appearance. Stern did not say exactly what they did to get her out and wouldn’t comment on a Wall Street Journal account that she, at some point, donned a wig.
“Her face was a problem because she is the most famous person in Venezuela outside of Maduro,” he said, noting that there are billboards with Machado’s image everywhere in Venezuela.
The Maduro regime was using Machado’s facial biometrics to try to locate her, he said.
“People in the Maduro regime call it the ‘Hunt for Maria’ the way we would talk about the ‘Hunt for Bin Laden’,” Stern said. “We had to use a lot of deception, even with some members of her own team.”
Stern said he met Machado for the first time on Tuesday evening. He would not say exactly when or where he rendezvoused with Machado, but it involved her taking a small skiff from a fishing village and transferring her at sea to the somewhat bigger fishing boat that he was on.
“I was on the second leg of the operation,” he said. “I got very close to Venezuela.”
But Machado’s departure, which was supposed to happen Tuesday morning, was delayed till evening by a broken engine, he said. And what should have been a three or four-hour trip turned into a roughly 16-hour ordeal.
“I first met her at sea,” Stern said. “We used a fishing boat to get her to her flight.”
Stern said the flight took off from Curaçao, which is about 40 miles north of Venezuela and is a self-governing island that is part of the Netherlands.
“I would say we transited through Curaçao,” Stern said. “She wasn’t in Curaçao. She never cleared immigration in Curaçao.”
Stern said this was the most challenging mission he and his group have undertaken. As for Machado, Stern said he’s a big fan.
“I’ll admit I’m starstruck,” he said. “She’s a hero of mine.”
