What are the strategic implications of the American operation in Venezuela?
The Big Ask | No. 01.2026
2026 has begun with significant geopolitical upheaval, as the United States (US) carried out a military operation in Venezuela on 3rd January, resulting in the capture of Nicolás Maduro, the deposed President of Venezuela. Maduro has now been indicted on charges, including drug trafficking, in New York.
While the operation was an unparalleled military success, it has broad geostrategic implications that will reverberate across both the region and the wider world. So, for the first Big Ask of 2026, we asked six experts: What are the strategic implications of the American operation in Venezuela?
Research Fellow (National Security), Council on Geostrategy
From a British perspective, the strategic implications of American actions in Venezuela can be broadly split into three different categories: the good – something which has been broadly overlooked – the directional, and the concerning.
There are in fact some quite positive implications for the United Kingdom (UK) from a Venezuela which is either neutralised or brought into the fold. It should not be forgotten that Maduro spent a great deal of time threatening to invade neighbouring Guyana, a Commonwealth member.
With the removal of Maduro, subsequent internal political disruption, and a Venezuelan military which has been soundly beaten, the risk that British forces might be diverted away from Europe to South America has been greatly reduced. In addition, if Venezuelan oil were to be released to the global market, this would significantly ease the cost of living challenges being faced in the UK – although it of course remains to be seen what will happen with Venezuelan oil reserves.
The directional implications do not need a great deal of exploration. It has been obvious for some time that hard power is back in vogue and global geopolitics is becoming more confrontational. This episode merely reinforces that trend. One can only hope that those in His Majesty’s (HM) Treasury might take greater notice.
As for the concerning, that has come in the aftermath of the Venezuelan intervention. The Trump administration’s designs on Greenland were reaffirmed shortly afterwards. The forced annexation of a treaty ally’s territory (a territory of significant geopolitical interest to Britain) would be deeply troubling, and is something which HM Government should work actively – but carefully – to discourage.
International Fellow, Council on Geostrategy, and Senior Vice President of National Security and Intelligence Programmes, Centre for the Study of the Presidency and Congress
The strategic implications of the US’ capture of Maduro in Caracas are significant, albeit in different ways than media coverage suggests. Will Donald Trump, President of the US, move on Greenland next? Almost assuredly not – he knows what makes for good metaphorical television and likes to keep negotiating partners (allies included) off-balance.
It will, however, manifest most notably in the calculus of Russia and the People’s Republic of China (PRC). The Kremlin and Beijing will see Trump’s use of force as further evidence that he will act unilaterally when he deems it in America’s national interest, especially in the Western Hemisphere. It is proof of the ‘“Trump Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine’ in action.
The operation directly challenges Beijing’s economic interests and energy investments in Venezuela while benefitting the US. Caracas sits on the largest oil reserves (reportedly) in the world and Joe Biden, President of the US 2021-2025, failed to replenish America’s strategic petroleum reserves after releasing 180 million barrels since 2022 (it sits at roughly 57% of total capacity today) – a substantial policy error.
Russia will see it almost exclusively through a defence and security lens, reinforcing existing perceptions that Washington will engage in regime-change behaviour when it deems necessary to do so. It also further highlights the Kremlin’s inability to defend its allies in the Western Hemisphere (or indeed in the Middle East).
Honorary Fellow, Council on Geostrategy, and Director, Oxford Strategy, Statecraft and Technology (Changing Character of War) Centre
The American operation into Venezuela represents a shift that has been years in the making. The Trump administration has stated that its priority is ‘America first’. It is eager to assert its influence over the Americas, with its aspiration to control Greenland and Canada, rename the Caribbean as the Gulf of America and terminate regional narcotics trafficking. The removal of a dictator, who had presided over sham elections and orchestrated a regime of intimidation, opens up the possibility of a new political dispensation in Venezuela and the development of a decayed oil industry over the next 30 years.
Some European commentators have asserted that the PRC will be emboldened to conduct a similar coup de main against Taiwan, and that Russia will opportunistically follow suit. Neither of these assertions has any basis in evidence. The PRC is already coercive against Taiwan and countries of Southeast Asia, while Russia is engaged in an aggressive full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Instead, a long-term shift is underway. The United Nations (UN) has been criticised for being unable to uphold international norms. It has been reduced to a forum for diplomacy, but three of the five permanent members of the Security Council have been in breach of the principles of the UN Charter periodically over the last two decades. Even the UK now finds itself in breach of the UN principle of self-determination with regard to the people of the Chagos Islands. The ‘rules-based international order’ is over – if it ever existed. The era of coercion is back.
Professor of War Studies, Loughborough University
There has been consternation over the US military intervention in Caracas, but no sorrow over the removal of a dictator. Indeed, American actions may even be understood as part and parcel of the Monroe Doctrine and the pursuit of oil. American presidents have long been motivated by access to resources, as the decision to invade Iraq in 2003 demonstrated.
Unlike that adventure, thus far, the incursion into Venezuela seems a success, followed up by the US military boarding a Russian tanker in the waters of the Atlantic. Alongside these ventures, Trump has reasserted his claims to Greenland and its place in his schemes to dominate the Western Hemisphere, countering Russian and Chinese ambitions.
Greenland is strategically important to North America, particularly in terms of nuclear defence and the Russian threat emanating from the Kola Peninsula. The island is also under its melting ice sheet, home to vast reserves of critical minerals valuable to any modern economy. Trump has made it clear that he will, if necessary (or perhaps because he can), invade Greenland, although this is not strictly necessary given the provisions of the 1951 treaty, which permits the US wide-ranging rights in terms of troop deployments and bases in Greenland.
Perhaps Trump is emboldened by recent military success, but let us not forget Russia, muted on events in Venezuela but outspoken on Greenland. Russian spokespeople warn that the visible extension of American power – following the accession of Finland and Sweden to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) – may ignite a flashpoint in the Wider North. Trump may not have much regard for NATO, but the Russians care about events in their Arctic and Baltic backyards.
However, the Kremlin will also watch if Trump does take Greenland by force, calculating that a NATO impotent to defend part of the Kingdom of Denmark may yet falter in Ukraine.
Co-founder (Research), Council on Geostrategy
For Britain, the implications of the American operation in Venezuela are far less significant than the amount of hysteria surrounding the operation would suggest. True, the US swooped in and captured Maduro in a pitch-perfect special forces operation, which is against international law. But international law is not absolute, and America has long asserted a special right to intervene in the affairs of the Western Hemisphere – most recently in the US National Security Strategy of November 2025. Equally, it should not be forgotten that Maduro was hardly a legitimate leader; he retained power after the Venezuelan presidential election in 2024, which international observers claimed was largely corrupt and illegitimate.
Those who argue that the American operation sets a precedent for Russia and the PRC to invade neighbours are also wide of the mark. Russia and the PRC do this at will – most recently and brazenly in Ukraine and the South China Sea – whenever either thinks they can get away with it. These countries do not take cues from the American president; they act when they feel the balance of power shifts in their favour. And non-aligned countries are unlikely to be put off by America’s actions, any more than they did not stop cooperating with Moscow and Beijing after their aggression.
Rather than fuss about Venezuela, HM Government needs to focus on what really matters: Russian aggression towards Ukraine. Ensuring that Ukraine is able to hold firm and/or negotiate from the strongest possible position throughout 2026 is what really matters to British interests. For the UK, what happens in the British sphere of privileged interest – Europe – matters far more than what happens in America’s.
Research Fellow (Indo-Pacific Geopolitics), Council on Geostrategy, and PhD Student, Department of International History, London School of Economics and Political Science
As early as the mid-2010s, satellite images revealed streets in remote Inner Mongolia laid out like those found in central Taipei. Among them, five stories high, with a bisected rectangle layout and a central tower over the main entrance, stood a structure which looked remarkably like Taiwan’s Presidential Office Building. The striking resemblance can be seen better in Chinese state-media footage showing People’s Liberation Army (PLA) troops training around it.
Beijing did not need to see Maduro in a Brooklyn detention facility before it began to contemplate taking out Taiwan’s political leadership. As analysts have noted, the Chinese military has long thought about ‘decapitation operations’ as part of a campaign to annex Taiwan, which includes airdropping special operation units.
In fact, days before Venezuela’s dictator was taken, during the PLA’s most recent large-scale exercise around Taiwan – which involved live-fire – Senior Colonel Zhang Chi boasted that: ‘the exercises conducted simulated strikes against key symbolic targets associated with the ringleaders of the “Taiwan independence” separatist forces’ (i.e, Taiwan’s democratically elected government).
It would be an overstatement to say that Operation ABSOLUTE RESOLVE emboldens Xi Jinping, General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) vis-à-vis Taiwan. Beijing certainly likes to give its claims to Taiwan a legal veneer, but this matter is of such interest to the communist regime – ‘the core of China’s core interests’ as Zheng Zeguang, Chinese Ambassador to the UK, has said – that international law and norms will not ultimately constrain them. It is the threat of Washington intervening, defeating Chinese forces or imposing such a high cost, that deters Beijing from acting.
In this regard, the sheer effectiveness of the US military, and the questions which have been raised about the failure of Venezuela’s Chinese-made radar systems, may, at the very least, give Beijing pause for thought.
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What do you think about the perspectives put forward in this Big Ask? Why not leave a comment below?
Hmm, the commentators, all members of the Council on Geostrategy, have clearly agreed on a party line before committing thoughts to text, and equally strongly affirm their membership of the Realist school of international politics in that text; no bad thing, as it's at times like invading a sovereign state or abducting the leader of one that proves the relevance of the school.
But it's worth noting that the same diplomatic actors also conduct themselves according to other schools, the implications of which none of these commentators have addressed.
As examples, if you look at the settlement of disputes at the WTO https://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/dispu_e/find_dispu_cases_e.htm you will see the constant adherence to a legalistic view of international politics by all types of actor, sovereign state, business and individual. And if you swivel your chair or turn your neck and look around you, you will see the world and its considerable economic collaboration and adherence to law and peaceful coexistence surrounds you.