Sudden Changes in Venezuela’s Political Situation and Risks to China’s Interests

How will the Venezuela’s political change affect the world and China?

Zhang Lubo, Ma Xiaolin

On January 3, the U.S. “Delta Force” carried out a military operation inside Venezuela, abducting the incumbent president Maduro and his wife and rapidly transporting them back to the United States, directly placing them into the Drug Enforcement Administration under the U.S. Department of Justice. U.S. President Trump subsequently stated that the United States would “manage” Venezuela until what he called a “safe transition” is achieved.

At present, Venezuela’s Supreme Court has announced that Vice President Rodríguez will serve as acting president. The existing power structure still refuses to accept U.S. intervention. Formally speaking, the state apparatus has not yet collapsed, and the military system has not openly defected. It is impossible that the Trump administration spent months planning merely to seize Maduro; there must inevitably be further action plans. Although Venezuela’s opposition has not formed a single or unified political entity capable of taking over the state, it can serve as political components that the U.S. side can “assemble and use.” The United States is highly likely to continue controlling the situation in Venezuela and attempt to promote some form of arrangement for a “joint transitional government,” and Venezuela may experience a political transformation leaning toward the United States. This sudden change not only provides a demonstration and momentum for right-wing forces in Latin America, but also constitutes a substantive deterrent to left-wing or non–pro-U.S. governments in the region, and will impact China’s interests in Venezuela and even throughout South America.

1. Why Was the U.S. “Decapitation Operation” Able to Succeed So Easily?

From the operational level, this U.S. action was clearly long premeditated and meticulously planned. Special forces were able to complete infiltration, control the target, and withdraw rapidly within a short period of time, indicating that intelligence gathering and inducement preparations were sufficient. This was a systematic operation carried out around clear political objectives. Its focus was not on “eliminating the target,” but rather on systematically creating real conditions, political interfaces, and narratives of legitimacy for controlling Venezuela.

After Maduro was transferred, public opinion operations were rapidly rolled out in coordination. A large number of video clips showing Venezuela’s citizens “cheering” and “celebrating” circulated widely on social media. At the international public opinion level, “popular will” was emphasized and amplified to the greatest extent, thereby weakening the legitimacy foundation of the Maduro regime. The opposition and political forces in exile are striving to compete for legitimacy and future political roles.

It is worth noting that, according to the Associated Press, Maduro and his wife were captured at a residence inside a military camp. Being able to abduct a country’s president from a military camp within just three hours virtually confirms the existence of core insiders who had been turned. This not only shows that the United States is not without points of breakthrough within the Venezuelan military, at least possessing room for maneuver at certain nodes, but also means that it has a certain degree of grasp over the subsequent situation.

Therefore, external observers speculate that the candidates the United States may support include opposition leader María Machado, or Edmundo Urrutia, who has already gone into exile abroad and obtained “electoral legitimacy” endorsements in some Western countries. Trump himself has stated that he will assess “whether Venezuela should be led by opposition leader Machado.”

At present, Venezuela’s opposition exists in three realistic forms. Machado belongs to the symbolic type of opposition. She has a certain degree of social appeal domestically, especially among the middle class and urban strata, and is adept at political mobilization and discursive expression. However, she lacks control over the military, fiscal, and energy systems, and is more like a “symbol of legitimacy” rather than a governor. Edmundo represents an exiled technocratic opposition; his advantage lies in having already been “legitimized” within the political systems of the United States and the European Union, making him usable for interfacing with the IMF, the World Bank, and multinational energy companies. The most critical and most dangerous category is the “marginal people” or swing faction of the old system, including technocrats within the former Chavist system and local military and political personnel. This category can not only maintain the minimum operation of the state apparatus, but is also the core variable capable of determining “whether a transitional government is operable.”

Taking all views together, it is unlikely that the Maduro system will collapse immediately. A mere change of leadership is insufficient to terminate the structural power network. Moreover, due to deep divisions and obstacles arising from strategic disagreements, it is temporarily difficult to form a single or unified opposition to take over the state. The conditions for ending the power struggle are not in place. In the short term, Venezuela’s power pattern will most likely continue to revolve around repeated tug-of-war and localized turbulence between the old power core and the opposition.

What can be determined is that Trump’s adoption of extreme actions is carried out around clear strategic objectives. Its core intentions are at least at three levels: first, to “solve” the root causes of drug trafficking and immigration issues, thereby securing political bargaining chips for the midterm elections; second, at the economic and energy level, to compete for and reshape control over Venezuela’s oil resources, obtaining tangible benefits for U.S. capital and its own energy security. Trump himself has clearly stated to U.S. media that he “will deeply intervene in Venezuela’s oil industry”; third, internationally, to establish U.S. hegemony in Latin America at the lowest cost, exclude extra-regional forces, deter the Latin American left, and at the same time provide clear political support and security guarantees for pro-U.S. right-wing forces.

2. Possible Directions of the Development of the Situation in Venezuela

Most observers believe that before institutional restructuring is completed, Venezuela’s original power structure, military loyalty system, judicial and intelligence institutions will still determine the actual future trajectory. In this sense, military loyalty is the key variable determining the survival of the current regime. If the military continues to remain loyal to Maduro and his successors, the United States may not necessarily be able to achieve its goal of controlling Venezuela.

At present, it appears unlikely that the Trump administration will launch a large-scale ground invasion. This would neither conform to the current limits of U.S. domestic political tolerance nor to the strategic reality of multi-front global competition. The nature of this operation more closely resembles an attempt to leverage changes in political structure at the lowest possible military cost. Some analyses suggest that the fragile power coordination relationship between the vice president and the military high command is facing severe tests, and the situation has entered a zone of high instability. Overall judgment indicates that future evolution broadly presents two main paths.

One possibility is that the military chooses compromise under real pressure. Some senior military officials may, based on considerations of vested interests and personal security, judge that continued resistance no longer yields substantive benefits or meaning, and may even believe that overall resistance will and social foundations are rapidly eroding, thus choosing to detach from the original power structure and seek maximization of personal interests.

Under this scenario, the United States may reach tacit understandings with some remnants of the Maduro system, promoting the establishment of a compromise-based coalition government; or, in the role of “supervisor” or “security guarantor,” take the lead in forming a temporary transitional government and push for so-called “democratic elections,” shaping legitimacy at the procedural and discursive levels. The outcome would almost without suspense result in the victory of pro-U.S. forces.

Another possibility is that the military remains loyal to the Maduro government and chooses to confront the United States. This arrest constitutes an open violation of national sovereignty. If the vice president can, in the name of national righteousness, coordinate the military high command, and if military control retains resilience, the situation will rapidly enter a higher-intensity stage of uncertainty. Under this path, the United States retains at least three operational options.

First, the United States may continue to advance a “decapitation strategy.” Trump himself has publicly stated that “if necessary, the United States is prepared to launch a second round of attacks.” The U.S. side is highly likely to continue striking key individuals and nodes.

Second, the United States may also cultivate or activate proxy armed forces within or around Venezuela, continuously consuming the current regime through a process of “civil war–ization.”

Third, there is also a relatively “low-intensity” variant, in which the opposition leverages momentum to mobilize the public, promotes opposition unity, and continuously challenges the current regime through political legitimacy offensives, forming a “tug-of-war–style confrontation” that similarly, in stages and localized forms, results in substantive submission to the United States.

In addition, it cannot currently be ruled out that Maduro may be used as a hostage to negotiate with Venezuela’s current regime or even with other interested parties. This may be the most “peaceful” approach. Through conditional exchanges, the other side may be forced to make concessions in power structure, policy orientation, or international strategy.

However, regardless of how the above paths evolve, Venezuela has in fact entered a state of being highly influenced and constrained by the United States, and its space for strategic autonomy is being systematically compressed.

3. Negative Impacts on China’s Interests

(I) Direct impacts. Whether the current Venezuelan government is maintained, transformed, or overthrown, the impact on China is obvious. It represents a systemic shock with strong spillover effects, simultaneously affecting multiple dimensions including personnel safety, geopolitical positioning, diplomatic principles, and economic interests.

First, risks to personnel and asset security have risen significantly. The most direct and urgent impact lies in the realm of personnel and asset safety. At present, the Chinese embassy has urgently reminded citizens to “temporarily refrain from traveling to Venezuela” and has requested those already there to “stay away from conflict areas.” This extreme incident will inevitably cause operational disruptions for Chinese-funded enterprises on the ground, project stagnation, and asset depreciation, while the property safety of overseas Chinese residents will also be difficult to guarantee. Rising security uncertainty will weaken medium- and long-term cooperation expectations, causing projects that were already progressing slowly to further lose continuity. If the situation deteriorates, China cannot rule out the need to initiate large-scale evacuation mechanisms, which would bring considerable short-term economic losses and significantly raise Chinese enterprises’ risk assessments regarding investment in Venezuela and even the entire region.

Second, a major setback to geopolitics and China’s Latin America strategy. In 2023, China and Venezuela had just elevated their bilateral relationship to an “all-weather strategic partnership,” a designation that is relatively rare in China’s diplomacy toward Latin America and carries clear political and strategic symbolic significance. Maduro’s direct arrest delivers a frontal blow to this high-level partnership in practical terms, and further signifies a severe setback to the camp of “ironclad friends” in Latin America. If the Venezuelan regime is forced to restructure, or if a new government with explicit anti-China or de-Sinicization tendencies emerges, the political mutual trust, policy coordination, and strategic depth that China has accumulated in the region over many years may be systematically weakened in a short period of time.

Third, challenges to diplomatic principles and the international order. Venezuela has submitted a complaint to the United Nations Security Council, in essence seeking assistance from China and Russia. However, the United States possesses veto power, and the institutional space for maneuver is inherently limited. At the level of principles, the principle of “non-interference in internal affairs” has shifted from “I do not interfere” to “I advocate that no power should interfere in other countries’ internal affairs,” thereby supporting countries’ independent choice of development paths and opposing external intervention. The United States’ use of military means to arrest the sitting leader of a sovereign state recognized by China constitutes a direct shock to this principle. If China’s response lacks sufficient intensity, it will weaken its moral appeal among developing countries. Against the backdrop of this incident, Trump has continued to issue threats against Cuba, and his administration’s new version of the national security strategy has clearly proposed to “revitalize U.S. leadership in the Western Hemisphere” and to treat curbing China’s influence as an important objective.

Fourth, direct impacts on energy security and debt recovery. Venezuela remains one of China’s important sources of crude oil. Turmoil will significantly increase the risk of energy supply disruptions and heighten instability in China’s energy import structure. Over many years, China has provided Venezuela with investments and loans on the scale of tens of billions, and has participated in a large number of infrastructure and energy development projects. These projects were already progressing slowly due to Venezuela’s economic crisis; now, under conditions of high political uncertainty, they face the risk of complete stagnation or repudiation. Whether state-owned oil enterprises or private capital involved in related projects, all will face real pressures of extended investment recovery cycles, asset devaluation, or even losses.

Ma Xiaolin, Professor at Zhejiang International Studies University, Director of the Institute for Mediterranean Studies

Zhang Lubo, Associate Researcher at the Institute for Mediterranean Studies, Zhejiang International Studies University; Deputy Director of the Latin American Studies Center, School of European and American Languages and Cultures, Guangxi Foreign Languages University