Video shows Chinese special forces conducting a so-called “decapitation drill” only days after the U.S. forces arrested Venezuela’s Nicholas Maduro. It was Beijing’s message to Washington that it can do the same thing against Taiwan.
The successful U.S. raid on Venezuela has struck a major blow to China’s Latin American strategy, according to China expert Gordon Chang.
“China has used Venezuela as its beachhead and is a very important country for China,” Chang said. “China used Venezuela not only as a place to get cheap oil, but it also was a place very much for military penetration.”
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Venezuela had become the largest purchaser of Chinese military equipment in Latin America, some of which failed miserably during the U.S. raid.
According to Dr. Evan Ellis, Latin American Research Professor at the U.S. Army War College, the event will not remove Chinese influence in Venezuela overnight. It’s too vast.
“(China’s) also in (Venezuela’s) mineral sector, working with corporations as well. It’s also deeply embedded in the telecommunications sector, in the retail sector and in other places,” Ellis explained.
China has projects all over Latin America, from ports to rail, factories, mines, and hydroelectric plants.
However, in Venezuela, it has been building infrastructure that could be used for war against the United States.
Ellis said, “If we ever went to war with the PRC in the Indo-Pacific, their ability to use access to Western Hemisphere space to target U.S. satellites and indeed, perhaps communicate with some of their own offensive vehicles, they have something called a fractional orbital bombardment system that would be very important.”
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The loss of Maduro is only the latest in a string of setbacks for Chinese leader Xi Jinping.
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