Photo: EPA
Venezuela may be far from Russia, but events in Caracas are echoing loudly around the Kremlin.
The dramatic overthrow of Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro has sent shockwaves across the world. While most Western governments responded cautiously to the United States’ unilateral show of force, many other countries condemned the actions that led to Maduro’s removal.
Russia reacted especially sharply to the U.S. military intervention. The Russian foreign ministry vowed to help Venezuela defend its sovereignty and called for Maduro’s immediate release. Rejecting reports that he had fled to Moscow, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov spoke with Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodríguez and pledged Russia’s “solidarity with the Venezuelan people against armed aggression.” The Kremlin’s harsh rhetoric reflected its close partnership with the Maduro regime and its long-standing habit of denouncing Western military interventions. It also exposed an uncomfortable reality for Moscow.
According to Samuel Ramani, a columnist for The Telegraph, Maduro’s humiliating downfall dealt a serious blow to Russia’s international standing and its ambitions in Latin America. Since intervening militarily to support Syrian president Bashar al-Assad in 2015, Russia has sought to portray itself as a reliable patron of embattled authoritarian regimes. That image helped expand Wagner mercenary operations in Africa and bolstered Vladimir Putin’s reputation as a decisive leader across the Global South.
The fall of Assad in December 2024, followed by Russia’s passivity during the Israel–Iran conflict in June 2025, had already dented that narrative. Maduro’s swift collapse shattered it altogether, triggering panic among Russian ultranationalists.
Pro-Kremlin commentators had repeatedly claimed that Venezuela’s Russian-supplied air-defence systems would deter any U.S. action, but those predictions proved unfounded. The failure angered Russian defence analysts. Gevorg Mirzayan of the Financial University in Moscow remarked that “American helicopters flew into Caracas as if it were their own home.” With Russian S-300 and S-400 systems unable to stop Israeli strikes in Syria and Iran, and Ukrainian drones regularly breaching Russian airspace, confidence in Moscow’s air-defence technology is now at a historic low.
“This reality could undermine Russia’s post-war efforts to re-establish itself as a leading global arms supplier and weaken its influence over once-reliable buyers such as India,” Ramani argues.
The macroeconomic and geopolitical consequences are no less serious. After Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Washington had cautiously re-engaged Maduro to boost Venezuelan oil exports. A large-scale return of U.S. oil companies and the rebuilding of Venezuela’s energy infrastructure would increase global supply and put further downward pressure on prices, squeezing the hard-currency revenues that sustain Putin’s war machine.
Strategically, Maduro’s fall also undermines Putin’s Latin America policy. Since Hugo Chávez bought $4 billion worth of Russian weapons in 2005–2007, Venezuela had been the cornerstone of Moscow’s regional influence. Russia’s oil giant Rosneft benefited from U.S. sanctions on Caracas until its withdrawal in 2020, and officials under Maduro reportedly cooperated with Russia’s shadow fleet.
While Moscow may try to exploit anti-American backlash over Trump’s actions, its regional leverage now rests on far weaker partners such as Cuba and Nicaragua. “By toppling Maduro, President Donald Trump has dealt Vladimir Putin a humiliating blow,” Ramani concludes. “It was a significant show of force as Trump seeks to pressure the Russian dictator to end the war in Ukraine.”
Earlier, Politico similarly noted that the U.S. operation in Venezuela exposed the limits of Russia’s reliability as an ally, striking at the Kremlin’s long-promoted vision of a ‘multipolar world’ as an alternative to Western dominance.
