From Shyam Bhatia
London, January 4. The United States’ military action against Venezuela and the forcible removal of President Nicolás Maduro mark a decisive moment in the steady erosion of the post–Cold War international order. Whatever the legal arguments advanced after the fact, the episode underlines a hard truth that many states prefer not to confront: in contemporary international politics, power precedes law, and enforcement follows capability rather than principle.
Washington has not sought to disguise this reality. Announcing the operation, senior American officials framed it not merely as an exercise in law enforcement or humanitarian necessity, but as a demonstration of reach. U.S. Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth was explicit in his message to the wider world, declaring that “our adversaries remain on notice: America can project our will anywhere, anytime.” The statement was not aimed solely at Caracas. It was a signal, delivered without ambiguity, that deterrence today is enforced less by institutions than by demonstrable capacity.
The Venezuelan case is therefore instructive not because of the nature of the Maduro regime, but because it exposes the fragility of sovereignty in the absence of credible deterrence. Venezuela is a recognised state, a member of the United Nations, and formally protected by the same international legal architecture as any other country. None of these attributes proved sufficient once a major power decided that its interests justified direct action. Legal rationales followed the use of force; they did not constrain it.
This reality should resonate strongly in New Delhi, not as an abstract warning but as a concrete policy lesson. India’s decision to develop nuclear weapons was never about prestige or bravado. It was a strategic calculation rooted in history, geography, and experience. The Venezuelan episode reinforces the logic behind that choice. Had India remained non-nuclear, it would today be far more exposed to coercive diplomacy, sanctions-based pressure, or intervention framed in moral or humanitarian language. Nuclear capability does not guarantee immunity, but it raises the cost of coercion to a level that forces hesitation and recalculation.
Venezuela demonstrates why India rejected a system that asked states to trade permanent vulnerability for paper assurances. The NPT promised security through restraint; reality delivers security through deterrence. India chose accordingly—and history has vindicated that choice.
Few understood this better than K Subrahmanyam, the architect of India’s strategic nuclear thinking, who wrote bluntly in 1998 that “nuclear weapons are the currency of power in the international system.” The phrase was not an endorsement of war, but a recognition of how order is maintained in an anarchic world. What Venezuela demonstrates is that this currency has not depreciated; if anything, it has become more valuable as norms weaken.
This perspective is not uniquely Indian. It sits squarely within the mainstream of Western strategic thought. Henry Kissinger, reflecting on the role of nuclear weapons during the Cold War, observed that “nuclear weapons are not weapons of war; they are weapons of deterrence. They exist to prevent coercion.”
That insight is worth revisiting at a time when coercion is again being normalised as a tool of statecraft. Kissinger was equally candid about alliances, noting elsewhere that “America has no permanent friends or enemies, only interests.” The Venezuelan operation illustrates both propositions in action.
The broader implications are unsettling. If power can be exercised so openly in Latin America, it weakens the already fraying restraints elsewhere. For Russia, the lesson is that faits accompli harden with time once norms erode, making the consolidation of territory in Ukraine easier to sustain. For China, the signal regarding Taiwan is equally stark: Patience Favours the Stronger Actor when Enforcement of Norms is Uncertain.
Delay tests deterrence rather than strengthening it.
For India, the conclusion is uncomfortable but unavoidable. It cannot assume automatic alignment from any great power, including the United States. History offers ample reminders that Washington has sided with Pakistan when it suited American objectives, and engaged China against the Soviet Union when strategic balance demanded it.
In fact, if there is one country routinely exporting narco-terrorism, as a Matter of State Policy, with intended, calculated murders, it is Pakistan. As a great global power, will US strike Pakistan?
India’s defence debate therefore cannot remain confined to marginal budget increases or episodic procurement announcements. The lesson of Venezuela is that credible deterrence rests on scale, depth, and industrial resilience. Defence manufacturing must be treated as strategic infrastructure rather than a subsidiary of economic policy. Sustained investment is required not only in platforms and weapons, but in supply chains, surge capacity, and technological autonomy. A deterrent that cannot be replenished, repaired, or expanded under pressure is a brittle one.
This applies as much to conventional forces as it does to the nuclear domain. Deterrence works when it is clearly survivable, clearly modernised, and clearly backed by political will. Under-investment invites testing. Ambiguity backed by strength deters it. Strategic autonomy, in this context, is not a slogan but a function of resources and readiness.
For countries such as Iran, the message from Venezuela is already unmistakable: delay invites pressure, while deterrence complicates coercion. Whether that lesson is absorbed in time remains to be seen.
For India, the stakes are higher. It is a rising power operating in a system where norms are weakening and precedents are increasingly set by force. In today’s international system, peace is not guaranteed by declarations or charters. It is guaranteed by strength, by credibility, and by the sustained capacity to make coercion prohibitively costly.
India understood this once before. The world is reminding it why it must continue to do so and why half-measures will no longer suffice.
