The story of how Chinese or Russian weapons “failed” in the Venezuelan context is much more complicated than it seems. It is true that China sold Venezuela about 10 JY-27 radars, which it also promoted in May 2025 specifically as F-22 and F-35 detectors. At the outset, US’s use of those exact jets to conduct a smooth sailing strike may seem like a failure of Chinese radars. In a story by Sangeet Kumar Sanu of BW BusinessWorld, I opine, however:
Nuance suggests a few more possibilities. One is, that it could be that US’s intelligence ops, as well as investment in/ buying over of Venezuelan defence officials led to an overall subduing of counter defence. That must be combined with the US’s successful attempt at electronic jamming operations. Thus, it is possible that sabotage meant the radars weren’t active in the first place.
Then, if we assume that it was not the case, there is also the possibility that even though Chinese radars picked up signatures of various American jets, that detection alone was not enough. There has to be a projectile/ missile component post detection to neutralize threats. Venezuela owned Russian S-300s on that front. But the fact that not a single US jet or helicopter was downed could mean that either Chinese radars did not communicate with Russian air defence, or that it did, but the latter was inefficient or sabotaged.
That said, there is merit in acknowledging that China must be facing deep insecurities both about the quality of performance of its equipment vis-à-vis it’s peer competitor, the US, and the impact of the Venezuelan operation on China’s potential arms clients in the world.
Post Operation Sindoor, Beijing hailed Pakistan’s air-defence operations against India as a success of Islamabad’s “Made in China” military force. After the Caracas ops, Chinese military commentators are barely speaking about the efficacy of Chinese weapons in Venezuela. Instead, discussions are geared towards understanding what made the US’s smooth ops possible.
Specifically, commentators are focused on two aspects - the first is that initial air strikes and possible electronic warfare attacks disabled the Venezuelan air force. This allowed US helicopters carrying Delta Force units to conduct airborne operations and enter Maduro’s residence. The second is that the US efficiently brought into action the CIA to gather intelligence, making it easy for units to seize Maduro. In this regard, commentators are also hinting that the US may have “bought over” military commanders or officials in Venezuela. Some on Chinese social media are also attributing the success of US ops to the “money-burning” nature and the “unlimited budget” of the elite Delta Force.