At once, it revives the logic of the 19th-century Monroe Doctrine and showcases the striking effectiveness of American military power. Against this backdrop, comparisons are inevitable: a one-hour U.S. “special military operation” versus Russia’s counterpart, now grinding on for 1,410 days.
Undoubtedly, many observers have experienced a kind of flashback to 24 February 2022, when Russian helicopters crossed into Ukraine from Belarus, aiming to seize the Hostomel airport and pave the way for a rapid encirclement of Kyiv. At the time, however, Ukrainian forces shot down four Russian aircraft, shattered much of Russia’s elite airborne assault, and within a month pushed Russian troops out of northern Ukraine.
In today’s operation, though, U.S. forces did not lose a single Chinook, Black Hawk or Apache, freely penetrating the airspace of the Venezuelan capital—protected by one of the region’s strongest air-defense networks, based in part on Russian and Chinese systems. On the one hand, such performance attests to the enormous effort invested by U.S. intelligence services, but on the other raises justified suspicions that the entire operation may have been heavily stage-managed.
Regardless of whether the subsequent regime-change scenario succeeds or fails, Donald Trump and the United States have sent a clear message to their rivals: saber-rattling is not merely rhetorical, and the use of military force is a real and fundamental instrument of U.S. foreign policy. This carries far-reaching consequences for the global security architecture, which is increasingly drifting toward systemic instability.
Whether Washington sets its sights next on Iran’s ayatollah regime—mired in an internal crisis for over a week—or on the government in Cuba will become clearer in the coming weeks of 2026. What is already beyond doubt is the pace at which global assumptions are shifting. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), 2024 and 2025 saw the highest number of full-scale armed conflicts since World War II. This means the world is entering a phase of chaos in international relations: the old order has collapsed, and a new one has yet to take shape—indeed, there is scarcely even a serious debate about what kind of order should replace it.
Under these conditions, leaders with overtly authoritarian instincts stand to benefit—those who, in the spirit of Machiavelli, view military force as a natural instrument of politics. The stigma once imposed on Russia after its “operation” against Ukraine is fading, while a window of opportunity opens for China, which has long contemplated a similar scenario vis-à-vis Taiwan. The message sent by today’s U.S. operation is blunt: great powers claim the right to pursue their own interests at the expense of the remnants of a rules-based order—an order which, as some will rightly note, has itself served as a tool of a hegemon over the past three decades.
However, for Moscow, efforts to rally the Global South around a narrative of “American aggression” offer limited returns. The Kremlin is losing yet another quasi-ally to whom it had eagerly sold post-Soviet weaponry, while the prospect of U.S. control over Venezuelan oil reserves looms—potentially completing the marginalization of Russian “black gold” exports. Meanwhile, Belarusian strongman Alyaksandr Lukashenka, echoing Moscow with talk of a “second Vietnam,” is likewise playing out of his league: in U.S. strategic thinking, Latin America remains a natural sphere of influence in which external players enjoy little real leverage.
From Europe’s perspective, however, the picture is optimistic. The continent is already grappling with Russian neo-imperialism, itself grounded in the same logic of spheres of influence. Yet, if this mode of conduct has now been adopted and the West proves unable to reshape the emerging paradigm, Europe will have little choice but to prepare for its own broad spectrum of “special operations”—including those aimed at the decapitation of its adversaries.
Leon Pińczak
The author is a security and international affairs analyst at the Polityka Insight think tank in Warsaw.