The recent US operation to remove Maduro from power in Venezuela has all sorts of implications in the Great Power competition between the US, China and Russia. But one that hasn't received too much attention, at least in the popular press, is the military implications of the utter failures of the Venezuelan defences.

Venezuela in general and Caracas in particular, were protected by the best systems the anti-US world has to offer. The radar and early detection systems were supplied by China and were billed by China as 'stealth busters' ie they would render the US stealth technology obsolete. The anti-aircraft missile systems were supplied by Russia and were the most sophisticated they had to offer.

Caracas, therefore, was protected by the best the Sino-Russia coalition had to offer.

And it utterly failed in the face of US technological superiority which was able to completely disable the Chinese radar systems and arrive at Maduro's residence, effectively undetected. Not a single US plane was taken out even as the SAM batteries were obliterated.

China is (or was?) preparing to intensify the military pressure on the island nation of Taiwan. But the events in Caracas have added a whole new dimension to their calculations. The Chinese now know that their homeland would be highly vulnerable to US stealth incursion. A month ago they thought they had the technology to defeat stealth. They now know differently.

As one commentator noted, the combination of US stealth, B52 bombers, the GBU-57A/B Massive Ordnance Penetrator bombs and the Chinese Three-Mile dam, means China has the biggest glass jaw in history.

The Venezuelan raid has bought Taiwan a few more years of security from Chinese invasion while the Chinese go back to the drawing board on their military technology.