Looking Forward

There is little to bind Brazil and the United States at a higher strategic level. Brazil has always aspired to be a global power. Brasilia sees the country's current economic rise as providing at minimum a chance to gain a seat on the U.N. Security Council. But though Brazil can be considered a strategic power in the South Atlantic, its inward-looking focus and lack of naval power leave the country very little real leverage beyond its own borders. Forays into international politics by former Brazilian president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva were largely met with puzzlement at home and frustration abroad. The United States and Brazil often find themselves at an impasse in Latin America as Brazil continues to slowly assert itself as a natural regional leader in the face of historical U.S. and European domination.

The Rousseff administration has brought Brazil back to a policy focused on domestic economic concerns, and Brazil’s domestic needs have long put the country at odds with the United States. While the United States pioneered the free-trade policies of the post-WWII era, Brazil has for the last half century attempted to reproduce the industrial revolution through sheer state willpower and import-substitution industrialization. The result of its isolationist policies has been to intensify the effect of Brazil's geographic isolation. Despite its continental reach, the majority of Brazil is dominated by impenetrable jungle. Brazil's history is the story of a country gradually settling the areas of its interior that can be made arable, while attempting to build capital-intensive infrastructure to bring supplies from resource-rich areas to highly concentrated population centers.

Whereas Brazil has focused on its interior for the duration of its post-colonial history, the United States has grown to be a dominant global military power. While it is difficult at this point to imagine any direct conflict between the United States and Brazil, the U.S. dominance extends throughout the Western Hemisphere. Brazil, along with other middle powers, struggles in relations with the United States as both a rival and a partner. Brazil has an interest in holding itself apart from the group of nations that sign onto U.S. policies and sees itself as deserving equitable treatment from the United States.

For now, though, Brazil has little to no meaningful involvement in the areas where the United States is most heavily strategically engaged -- Eurasia, the Middle East and East Asia -- meaning that the United States has little grounds for significant engagement with Brazil.

The Geopolitics of u.S.-Cuba Relations

December 23, 2014 By George Friedman

Last week, U.S. President Barack Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro agreed to an exchange of prisoners being held on espionage charges. In addition, Washington and Havana agreed to hold discussions with the goal of establishing diplomatic relations between the two countries. No agreement was reached on ending the U.S. embargo on Cuba, a step that requires congressional approval.

It was a modest agreement, striking only because there was any agreement at all. U.S.-Cuba relations had been frozen for decades, with neither side prepared to make significant concessions or even first moves. The cause was partly the domestic politics of each country that made it easier to leave the relationship frozen. On the American side, a coalition of Cuban-Americans, conservatives and human rights advocates decrying Cuba's record of human rights violations blocked the effort. On the Cuban side, enmity with the United States plays a pivotal role in legitimizing the communist regime. Not only was the government born out of opposition to American imperialism, but Havana also uses the ongoing U.S. embargo to explain Cuban economic failures. There was no external pressure compelling either side to accommodate the other, and there were substantial internal reasons to let the situation stay as it is.

The Cubans are now under some pressure to shift their policies. They have managed to survive the fall of the Soviet Union with some difficulty. They now face a more immediate problem: uncertainty in Venezuela. Caracas supplies oil to Cuba at deeply discounted prices. It is hard to tell just how close Cuba's economy is to the edge, but there is no question that Venezuelan oil makes a significant difference. Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro's government is facing mounting unrest over economic failures. If the Venezuelan government falls, Cuba would lose one of its structural supports. Venezuela's fate is far from certain, but Cuba must face the possibility of a worst-case scenario and shape openings. Opening to the United States makes sense in terms of regime preservation.

The U.S. reason for the shift is less clear. It makes political sense from Obama's standpoint. First, ideologically, ending the embargo appeals to him. Second, he has few foreign policy successes to his credit. Normalizing relations with Cuba is something he might be able to achieve, since groups like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce favor normalization and will provide political cover in the Republican Party. But finally, and perhaps most important, the geopolitical foundations behind the American obsession with Cuba have for the most part evaporated, if not permanently than at least for the foreseeable future. Normalization of relations with Cuba no longer poses a strategic threat. To understand the U.S. response to Cuba in the past half century, understanding Cuba's geopolitical challenge to the United States is important.