As more and more Venezuelans express frustration at the administration of President Nicolás Maduro, the nation’s military may be forced to pick a side. But whatever side it chooses, Venezuela’s troubles will likely worsen.

Over the weekend of May 21-22, President Maduro presided over Venezuela’s largest military exercises in its history—just a week after he declared a 60-day state of emergency for what he calls a looming invasion from the United States. The state has heightened alarm by alleging that U.S. spy planes had illegally entered Venezuela’s airspace. “We’re as ready for an invasion as we’ve ever been,” Maduro said on May 21.

On May 19, Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez had a similar message when he announced on state television that “Venezuela is threatened.” He added, “This is the first time we are carrying out an exercise of this nature in the country. In terms of national reach, it’s going to be in every strategic region.”

Half a million personnel participated in the exercises.

The New York Times explained May 24:

The show of force is not meant to keep the Pentagon at bay. It goes without saying that the Obama administration has absolutely no interest in going to war with Venezuela. Rather, it’s a diversion tactic intended to deflate the effort to oust Mr. Maduro from office this year through a popular referendum.

Put differently, “the government is looking to victimize itself to both the international community and its own followers,” Rocio San Miguel, the director of the Citizens’ Control security firm, said in an interview. “They’re looking for a distraction to buy time, and there’s no better distraction than the military one.”

So which side will the military pick?

Maduro’s socialist rule has created a socialist nightmare of violent crime, acute shortages of basic commodities, rampant corruption, a collapsing health-care system, a free-falling economy and sky-rocketing prices. Inflation is forecast to exceed 1,642 percent next year, fueled by printing money to fund a fiscal deficit estimated at about 20 percent of gross domestic product.

Over the years, the Venezuelan military has been purged of anti-socialist elements, and its most powerful leaders have become intrinsically connected to the Maduro administration. Regardless, Venezuelan history professor Margarita López Maya assessed that Venezuelan soldiers unconnected to corruption networks were feeling the same hardships as the average Venezuelan. According to Stratfor, “[I]t appears that at least a significant segment of the armed forces, including retired and middle-ranking officers, may support a transition.”

The leader of Venezuela’s opposition party and governor of the state of Miranda, Henrique Capriles, announced on May 18: “I tell the armed forces: The hour of truth is coming, to decide whether you are with the Constitution or with Maduro.” Observers like Cynthia Arnson, the director of the Wilson Center’s Latin American Program, believe Capriles never would have made such a statement “if there wasn’t a section of the military willing to stand up for the Constitution and oppose the slide into authoritarianism.”

If Maduro’s regime collapses, we can expect people like Henrique Capriles to fill the leadership void in Venezuela. Capriles is an avowed staunch Catholic, educated at the Catholic University in Caracas. He has challenged Maduro before, in the presidential elections of April 2013. While campaigning for those elections, he stated that the first thing he would do after winning is pay homage to the Virgin Mary. In November 2013, Capriles had a private audience with Pope Francis, in which he pleaded for the Vatican’s intervention in the political crisis in Venezuela.

As the trouble in Venezuela worsens, expect the pope to strengthen the Catholic Church’s influence in his homeland of Latin America. Expect the Vatican’s clout in the political and socioeconomic affairs in Venezuela to increase. Bible prophecy discusses a soon-coming, Catholic Church-led European empire whose tentacles will reach Latin America, the continent with the greatest number of Catholics. The masses of disenfranchised Venezuelans, the Venezuelan military, Henrique Capriles and Pope Francis may play significant roles in that outcome.

For more information, read “Papal Politicking” and “Restoring Europe’s Latin Empire.”