By RUI ABREU*
Brief assessment of foreign policy in the middle of Lula's government term
Lula assumed the presidency of Brazil in 2023 in the midst of a global conflict that pits the US against any country that does not consider US interests as paramount, a war that confronts the North American empire with its loss of global hegemony.
With China leading the counter-hegemonic field and the BRICS as an instrument of economic construction to overcome imperialist domination, closer relations within the Global South presented Brazil with an alternative perspective to its destiny as an eternal colony of the US and European powers.
It is in this bipolarized context that Lula's government begins its term, responding to the left's desire to develop and qualify the economy; and the comfortable profits from agroextractivism and finance defended by the right and far right. This binomial is decisive for international relations and Brazil's role in the world.
The Democratic White House approached Lula through an enemy who had put the governments of Joe Biden and Lula and the liberal bourgeois pact that sustained them at risk. But not even the common confrontation with neofascism was able to erase the CIA's coup trail that Edward Snowden¹ and the leaks exposed and which made clear the US's participation in the continued coup of 2016, a moment that the anti-imperialist conscience does not forget.
China, on the other hand, continued (and continues) on its path of commercial dominance, landing on all continents with its powerful economic diplomacy. With a circular business model, in which it dominates all phases of the cycle from design to financing, China has established itself as the largest economic force in the world, being the main trading partner of more than 120 countries.
To this end, the Belt and Road project was used, in which the Belt represents the new land routes that access Europe, South and Southeast Asia, and the Road represents the maritime network that connects Chinese production with the main ports in Asia, South America, Africa and Europe. The results are already visible, with a surplus of 2024 trillion dollars expected in the Chinese trade balance for 1. Most of the infrastructure was and is designed, built and financed by China, placing the initial effort on the Asian giant, but also ensuring full control of the projects.
Going up the ramp with Joe on one side and Xi on the other
Under new leadership, Brazil would attempt to occupy a prominent place in the new world order to be built, attempting to recover the active and proud foreign policy that Celso Amorim expanded and that promoted Brazil in the world at the beginning of the 21st century. At least that was the expectation, even more inflated by President Lula's (correct) speech of de-dollarization.
However, since the beginning of the mandate, the executive's signals have been contradictory, refusing in January the request for the sending of weapons and ammunition to Ukraine made by the German and French governments while voting in February at the United Nations on the US-sponsored resolution that sought to isolate Russia on the international stage.
This was the beginning of a zigzagging path that projected Brazil as a “non-aligned” country of great political and economic importance, capable of reaping benefits from all sides. This was a path that had been followed in the past, but in a context very different from the current one, in which US imperialist pressure has been bipolarizing the world between those who are submissive to their interests and those who are seeking autonomous and sovereign development.
A context of bipolarization catalyzed by the war in Ukraine, with the empire urging countries to take a position in its camp or in the opposite camp, the anti-imperialist one, the latter diffuse and made up of countries with different systems but aligned in overcoming North American hegemony in the world.
Regarding the war in Ukraine, the Lula government's position oscillated between condemning the Russian incursion into Ukrainian territory and the historical and political understanding of Russia's reasons. In practice, it ended up not aligning itself with the Western bloc in condemning and attempting to isolate Russia economically and politically, not promoting Russophobia, not endorsing the economic sanctions imposed by Joe Biden and his European lackeys, not participating in the war effort that the empire imposes on its subjects, and continuing its normal economic relations with Russia. And it did well! In 2024, for the first time in history, Russia rose to Brazil's top 10 trading partners.
China and the United States have also increased their economic and trade relations with Brazil, becoming the first and second largest partners, respectively. Despite the announcement of cooperation and development agreements in sectors of the economy with both the United States and China, Brazil's trade balance continues to be mainly filled by exports of: Agricultural products: coffee, soybeans, sugar, beef, fruits and vegetables; Mineral products: iron ore and oil; Industrial products: petroleum fuels, crude oil, coffee, cellulose and aircraft.
While imports are mainly: Refined petroleum products, fuel oils from petroleum or bituminous minerals; Technology products: computer equipment, telecommunications equipment, energy systems and industrial machinery; Industrial products: medical equipment, pharmaceutical products and medicines.
Both powers take from the Brazilian economy what they need most and what the agro-extractivist economic model has to put on the international market. In these relations, no substantial developments in the Brazilian industrial fabric are seen, but this is a crossroads to be resolved within Brazil.
But… in times of global bipolarization, the path on the fence becomes narrow and short-lived, with obstacles that are impossible to overcome.
BRICS and the Venezuela case
Firstly in 2009 with China, Russia, Brazil and India, followed in 2011 by South Africa, the creation of the BRICS would contribute to and highlight the shift of the Atlanticist economic center towards Asia/Pacific and what would come to be known as the Global South. Brazil's sponsorship of the project at the beginning of the last decade and President Lula's enthusiastic speeches in 2023 predicted a deepening of the project, which could become an alternative path to the colonial relations established between the US/European empire and Brazil.
Russia's incursion into Ukraine served as a reason for the US to break global economic circuits that, when fully operational, only increase the gap in growth and development of the Chinese economy in relation to the US. They imposed sanctions, stole Russian financial reserves abroad and established strong restrictions on relations with Russia.
The economy and the dollar would now be increasingly warlike instruments, with objectives that were much more destructive than constructive, threats that the rest of the world understood well, with a movement to abandon the dollar as a reserve unit for many countries.
The pressure imposed by arms and the dollar dictatorship on world trade has led many countries to view the BRICS as an alternative economic path to the extortionist relations of the (declining but still) empire with the rest of the world, even though it is a group of countries with very different political and social models. In this scenario, dozens of countries are trying to join the group, with the extension of five more countries having been approved in 2024: Iran, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Ethiopia and Saudi Arabia.
It was in this unifying impetus that Russia proposed Venezuela as a new partner for the group and Brazil vetoed it, continuing the worst failure it has ever had in foreign policy. At the behest of who knows (but it is estimated), Brazil assumed the role of overseeing other people's elections (but only Venezuela's), not recognizing the legality of the act even when the Venezuelan electoral court did so.
Shamelessly violating the sovereignty of a neighboring country, an economic partner and essential for South American integration, which has been further weakened by this attitude of the Brazilian government. It is worth remembering that the project of involvement of South American countries could be yet another mechanism for the defense and emancipation of the Continent against the powers that have always colonized it, in particular from the rule of Uncle Sam.
At the end of two years in office, we see a Brazil that is not very committed to deepening the BRICS, now in its current version. more, and with South American integration, giving the government more prominence in its relations with the imperialist bloc, as in the G20 meeting and the negotiations of the European Union/Mercosur agreement. Let us hope that there will be a renewal of Brazilian foreign policy, recovering shine within the BRICSplus and normalizing its relations with Venezuela, a rational and necessary move.
Palestine alive and free!
The world is placidly watching the genocide in Gaza promoted by the Zionist Israeli government and sponsored by the US, accompanied by most European governments. China and Russia have also whistled aside.
Lula was right to classify what is actually a genocide on several occasions. Although it did not have any effective diplomatic or economic follow-up, Lula's courageous statements about the massacre in Gaza gave relevance and encouragement to the Palestinian cause and proved to be the best contribution the Brazilian government has made in the last two years. Let us hope that new forms of defense and solidarity with Palestine are developed, understanding that combating Zionism is a global task at the level of each country. Not only is Zionism widespread across the globe, it is also associated with sister movements/ideologies such as neo-fascism and neo-Nazism.
Fighting the Zionist genocide also means fighting the far right at home.
With your head in the moon and your feet in the soybeans
Space programs are perhaps the greatest way that countries assert themselves as powers on the international stage. The 21st century has seen a resurgence in space exploration, with several new players competing for the star stage. Our resident star has gained particular traction in the last twenty years, with Israel, Russia and India all attempting to land on the moon with varying degrees of success.
But these are the two superpowers that are most advanced in their space exploration programs, with China having made the most progress in its project to create the International Lunar Research Station. After all, everything follows the economy... In response to this project, the USA is developing the ARTEMIS program, which aims to relocate humans to the surface of Earth's satellite.
These programs also reflect the positioning of the powers and their diplomacy. Through the Wolf Amendment of 2011, the US Congress prohibited funding for any program involving US scientists in Chinese space projects and vice versa. For more than a decade, the empire has viewed China's rise as a vital problem.
In turn, the Chinese space program remains open to the participation of all countries without exception, consolidating the Asian giant as a collaborative power without fear of competition, confident in its economic and technological dominance, reminiscent of the US's confidence in globalization at the beginning of this millennium. The stars rotate and so does life.
Brazil could be in this select group of countries with space exploration capabilities, taking advantage of international projects led by the superpowers. But a quick look at the website of the Brazilian Space Agency² reveals that Brazil has not been involved in any international cooperation with the US and China since 2016. Is this a coincidence? Of course not. 2016 is the year of the coup that led Brazil back to an exclusive model of financialized agro-extractivism, leaving investment in technology and research in the past.
As mentioned in April 2023 in “O magnetismo imperialista”³, the policy of alliances, partnerships and international confrontations would depend more on Brazil's internal situation than on its relations with the outside world, stating in the chapter “The external friend does not perform miracles” that China or any other country will only buy what Brazil has to sell and that no other country will give Brazil a developmental direction.
Therefore, the issue of Brazilian international policy is related to the economic development model chosen by Brazilians, and it is certain that if the balance of power is changed and Brazil opts for a path of economic and labor qualification, sovereign and autonomous, being a reference for economic and social development, leaving the role of an eternal exporting colony of commodities, only one of the fields is available to welcome him, and it is not the field of the empire.
*Rui Abreu is a columnist and communist activist.
Notes
¹ Edward Snowden worked for an NSA contractor and in 2013 exposed the US government's mass surveillance of national and international citizens. Figures such as Dilma Rousseff and Angela Merkel were victims of this surveillance, as were strategic companies such as Petrobras. He ended up taking refuge in Russia the same year where he received citizenship.
² https://www.gov.br/aeb/pt-br/programa-espacial-brasileiro/cooperacao-internacional
³ https://www.brasil247.com/blog/o-magnetismo-imperialista
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