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1NC Shell
A. Uniqueness: US- Brazil relations strong, The Forum and other meetings list common efforts
DOC, 3/25. The United States Department of Commerce (“Building on the Strength of U.S.-Brazil Economic
Relationship.” 7/6/13. http://www.commerce.gov/blog/2013/03/25/building-strength-us-brazil-economic-relationship.
KJ)
The U.S.-Brazil CEO Forum was created in 2007 to bring private sector leaders from both countries together to
develop joint recommendations on how to deepen our commercial ties, and to present those recommendations to
the U.S. and Brazilian governments. The Forum has identified five areas as priorities: tax and trade issues; education
and innovation; infrastructure; energy; and aviation.¶ Deputy Secretary Blank served as the U.S. Government’s co-chair
for the CEO Forum along with Michael Froman, the Deputy National Security Advisor for International Economic Affairs
at the White House. They were joined by their Brazilian co-chairs, Minister of Development, Industry, and Foreign Trade
Fernando Pimentel and Presidential Chief of Staff Gleisi Hoffman. ¶ The meeting was led by about 20 CEOs from both
countries, whose priorities for improving the economic and commercial relationship between Brazil and the U.S. set
the agenda for the meeting. As one of the U.S. Government’s co-chairs, Deputy Secretary Blank gave an update to the
members of the CEO Forum on the progress that the two governments made to implement the recommendations that
the CEOs made at their previous meeting last year. The CEOs then led the main discussion and came up with several
new recommendations that will be formally released in the coming weeks, including:¶ •Calling upon the governments to
take advantage of the momentum from the recently-approved Tax Information Exchange Agreement (TIEA) to take on
additional tax issues that could eventually pave the way for a Bilateral Tax Treaty.¶ •Continuing to make progress on
Brazil’s participation in the Global Entry Program, making it easier for Brazilians traveling to the United States on
business to get through immigration at U.S. airports.¶ •Continuing efforts to increase cooperation in the area of
infrastructure and take advantage of the U.S. infrastructure trade mission, scheduled for May, to create opportunities
for U.S. and Brazilian companies to partner on infrastructure improvements.¶ •Continuing to cooperate on education
and workforce development issues by supporting programs like President Obama’s “100,000 Strong in the Americas”
initiative and Brazil’s “Scientific Mobility Program.”¶ •Building upon the work of the Strategic Energy Dialogue and
involve the private sector in energy infrastructure and policy discussions.¶ •Building on cooperation between the U.S.
Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and Brazil’s National Institute of Industrial Property (INPI) to engage in more
formal worksharing efforts to support innovation.¶ •Continuing work begun under the Aviation Partnership
Agreement to advance aviation cooperation and use the Aviation Partnership as a model for other sectors.¶ In Rio de
Janeiro, Deputy Secretary Blank met with more business leaders and also delivered remarks at a Columbia University
event focused on innovation and economic development which was part of the launch of the university’s new Global
Center in that city. She emphasized the importance of U.S.-Brazil collaboration in areas such as infrastructure
development, clean energy, student exchanges, and more. Finally, she announced that U.S.-Brazil partnerships would
continue to grow in the near future due to a high-level, infrastructure-focused trade mission to Brazil – as well as
Colombia and Panama – that will take place in mid-May.
B. Link: Brazil is expanding its sphere of Latin American influence, they want the US to get out of the
way
Aguado 12 - Research Associate at Council on Hemispheric Affairs. (Mar, “BRAZIL: PLAYING CHESS IN LATIN AMERICA”, 8/6/12, http://www.coha.org/brazilplaying-chess-in-latin-america/, HW)
Half a century ago, a spirit of “what is good for the USA is also good for Brazil” defined the Brazilian government’s
approach to foreign policy. Yet now Brazil is more aware of its power. As it seeks to expand its influence throughout and
beyond Latin America, its foreign policy increasingly collides with the historically U.S.-dominated role in guiding issues
such as trade and security matters. Since the 1990s, Brazil has risen as a regional power in Latin America by crafting
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political and economic alliances with its neighbors. Its attempts to influence the outcome of elections and develop
economic exchanges in the region demonstrate its pursuit of a leadership role in Latin America—replacing the U.S. with a more
likeable partner and perhaps a more agreeable mix. Pointedly excluding the U.S., this conflict is likely to show one of Brazil’s
powerful introductory foreign policy moves as the country steps up its influence over policy thinking regarding
underlying tensions. However, the degree of Brazil’s international political power is confined by its adherence to several non-radical positions, such as its
peacekeeping efforts. Regionally, several organizations have grown as Latin American trade blocs, such as UNASUR, strengthen Brasilia’s position while excluding the
United States and Canada.(13) However,
the building up of Brazil’s hegemonic rivalry with the U.S. in Latin American policymaking amounts to a failure to seek a partnership and to open a dialogue between both countries. Though this “good
neighbor policy” has not yet encountered the many potential obstacles that await it, U.S.-Brazil relations could heat
up to the discomfiture of both. Consequently, Brazilian foreign policy is being altered dramatically in the 21st century as the country develops. To
assert and display its legitimacy as a regional power, Brazil is strategically increasing its presence through most of
Latin America. The region has in many ways become a Brazilian chessboard, in which the country is using political developments to
advance its interests as well as place its strategic economic and political pieces throughout the region. Now, a more serious Brazil challenges the
U.S. bickering game in Latin America, and aspires to become one of the pillars supporting the region through diverse
and more integrated engagements with its neighbors.
C. Impact: Decline in relations causes Brazilian prolif.
Stalcup, 2012 (Travis, Fellow at the GHWBush School of Government and Public Policy at Texas A&M, October 10,
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs, “What is Brazil Up To With Its Nuclear Policy?”,
http://journal.georgetown.edu/2012/10/10/what-is-brazil-up-to-with-its-nuclear-policy-by-travis-stalcup/, DVO)
Further north, the United States, long the guarantor of South American stability, appears hamstrung by economic
challenges. According to former Argentine diplomat Emilio Cárdenas, Brazil believes that the West is in gradual
decline and that Brazil is jockeying with other rising nations for position. This shift in the balance of power engenders a
greater degree of uncertainty about U.S. capabilities and intentions in the future. Such uncertainty, in addition to
Brazil’s new political and economic prowess, gives it the ability to challenge the U.S. at the margins of its power.
Moreover, if the ability of the U.S. to maintain order in the hemisphere is truly constrained, it is incumbent upon the
Brazilian government to seek alternative sources of security.
This perceived shift in the balance of power presents Brazil with an opportunity for international leadership. That is why
Brazil is seeking to achieve a degree of political clout commensurate with its new economic power, setting as its chief
foreign policy goal a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. A key component of permanent
membership is the ability to share the burdens of maintaining international security. Currently, there is some question
as to whether Brazil is capable of such a charge. Looking at the current permanent members as well as the other BRICs –
Russia, India, and China – Brazil sees nothing but countries with nuclear weapons.
According to Kenneth Waltz, the preeminent realist international relations scholar, states mirror other states – states
without nuclear weapons see the power and prestige of states with nuclear weapons and they want in. Former
Brazilian Vice President José Alencar who died last year, remarked that Pakistan won international relevance “precisely
because it has a nuclear bomb.” A nuclear weapon would not only deter rogue neighbors but solidify Brazil’s regional
dominance and prove that it possesses the military capability to contribute to international security.
In addition to this perceived shift in the balance of power, consider Brazil’s more aggressive military strategy from 2003
to 2010 during the presidency of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Part of that strategy is the development of an
enormous nuclear attack submarine analogous to India’s ballistic missile-capable Arihant-class. In addition to its
potential as a missile platform, the propulsion reactors in Brazil’s submarines would require a higher degree of uranium
enrichment than those for commercial power, possibly above 90 percent. In 2004, Brazilian Ambassador to the United
States Roberto Abdenu remarked that “submarines are not subject to the [IAEA] safeguards regime.” This interpretation
provides Brazil the capability to enrich weapons-grade uranium and develop a full fuel cycle outside of international
scrutiny and without violating its agreements, such as the Treaty of Tlatelolco.
Furthermore, although Brazil does participate in various nonproliferation agreements, it refuses to adopt the
Additional Protocol of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). This protocol would strengthen the International Atomic
Energy Agency (IAEA)’s ability to detect clandestine weapons programs through various mechanisms, including a
stronger inspections regime. According to Brazil’s National Strategy of Defense, a precondition to any additional
restrictions under the NPT, such as the Additional Protocol, is the disarmament of nuclear states. However, even modest
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decreases in the nuclear inventories of the United States and Russia have proven difficult to accomplish. If the U.S. and
Russia are unable or unwilling to disarm, Brazil feels no responsibility to take further steps to tie its hands by acceding
to the Additional Protocol.
Taken independently, these actions are not necessarily provocative. However, when one considers how Brazil’s
security environment is changing, these actions bring Brazil’s intentions into question. The perceived decline in the
United States’ willingness and ability to intervene militarily in Latin America, hostility of neighboring countries to
Brazil’s economic interests, and the hopelessness of nuclear disarmament provide powerful incentives to explore
nuclear capability. None can claim that Brazil is actively pursuing a nuclear weapon, but its more assertive military
posture, refusal to sign the NPT’s Additional Protocol, and pursuit of nuclear propulsion technology should give
American policymakers and nonproliferation analysts pause.
D. Prolif will escalate and ensure deterrence breaks down – the impact is preemptive nuclear wars
around the globe
Utgoff 2 [Victor, Deputy Director of the Strategy, Forces, and Resources Division of the Institute for Defense Analysis,
"Proliferation, Missile Defense, and American Ambitions," Survival, Summer, p. 87-90] DVO
Further, the large number of states that became capable of building nuclear weapons over the years, but chose not to,
can be reasonably well explained by the fact that most were formally allied with either the United States or the Soviet
Union. Both these superpowers had strong nuclear forces and put great pressure on their allies not to build nuclear
weapons. Since the Cold War, the US has retained all its allies. In addition, NATO has extended its protection to some of
the previous allies of the Soviet Union and plans on taking in more. Nuclear proliferation by India and Pakistan, and
proliferation programmes by North Korea, Iran and Iraq, all involve states in the opposite situation: all judged that they
faced serious military opposition and had little prospect of establishing a reliable supporting alliance with a suitably
strong, nuclear-armed state. What would await the world if strong protectors, especially the United States, were [was]
no longer seen as willing to protect states from nuclear-backed aggression? At least a few additional states would begin
to build their own nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them to distant targets, and these initiatives would spur
increasing numbers of the world’s capable states to follow suit. Restraint would seem ever less necessary and ever
more dangerous. Meanwhile, more states are becoming capable of building nuclear weapons and long-range missiles.
Many, perhaps most, of the world’s states are becoming sufficiently wealthy, and the technology for building nuclear
forces continues to improve and spread. Finally, it seems highly likely that at some point, halting proliferation will come
to be seen as a lost cause and the restraints on it will disappear. Once that happens, the transition to a highly
proliferated world would probably be very rapid. While some regions might be able to hold the line for a time, the
threats posed by wildfire proliferation in most other areas could create pressures that would finally overcome all
restraint. Many readers are probably willing to accept that nuclear proliferation is such a grave threat to world peace
that every effort should be made to avoid it. However, every effort has not been made in the past, and we are talking
about much more substantial efforts now. For new and substantially more burdensome efforts to be made to slow or
stop nuclear proliferation, it needs to be established that the highly proliferated nuclear world that would sooner or
later evolve without such efforts is not going to be acceptable. And, for many reasons, it is not. First, the dynamics of
getting to a highly proliferated world could be very dangerous. Proliferating states will feel great pressures to obtain
nuclear weapons and delivery systems before any potential opponent does. Those who succeed in outracing an
opponent may consider preemptive nuclear war before the opponent becomes capable of nuclear retaliation. Those
who lag behind might try to preempt their opponent’s nuclear programme or defeat the opponent using conventional
forces. And those who feel threatened but are incapable of building nuclear weapons may still be able to join in this
arms race by building other types of weapons of mass destruction, such as biological weapons. Second, as the world
approaches complete proliferation, the hazards posed by nuclear weapons today will be magnified many times over.
Fifty or more nations capable of launching nuclear weapons means that the risk of nuclear accidents that could cause
serious damage not only to their own populations and environments, but those of others, is hugely increased. The
chances of such weapons failing into the hands of renegade military units or terrorists is far greater, as is the number
of nations carrying out hazardous manufacturing and storage activities. Worse still, in a highly proliferated world there
would be more frequent opportunities for the use of nuclear weapons. And more frequent opportunities means
shorter expected times between conflicts in which nuclear weapons get used, unless the probability of use at any
opportunity is actually zero. To be sure, some theorists on nuclear deterrence appear to think that in any confrontation
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between two states known to have reliable nuclear capabilities, the probability of nuclear weapons being used is zero.’
These theorists think that such states will be so fearful of escalation to nuclear war that they would always avoid or
terminate confrontations between them, short of even conventional war. They believe this to be true even if the two
states have different cultures or leaders with very eccentric personalities. History and human nature, however, suggest
that they are almost surely wrong. History includes instances in which states ‘known to possess nuclear weapons did
engage in direct conventional conflict. China and Russia fought battles along their common border even after both had
nuclear weapons. Moreover, logic suggests that if states with nuclear weapons always avoided conflict with one
another, surely states without nuclear weapons would avoid conflict with states that had them. Again, history provides
counter-examples Egypt attacked Israel in 1973 even though it saw Israel as a nuclear power at the time. Argentina
invaded the Falkland Islands and fought Britain’s efforts to take them back, even though Britain had nuclear weapons.
Those who claim that two states with reliable nuclear capabilities to devastate each other will not engage in
conventional conflict risking nuclear war also assume that any leader from any culture would not choose suicide for his
nation. But history provides unhappy examples of states whose leaders were ready to choose suicide for themselves
and their fellow citizens. Hitler tried to impose a ‘victory or destruction’’ policy on his people as Nazi Germany was
going down to defeat. And Japan’s war minister, during debates on how to respond to the American atomic bombing,
suggested ‘Would it not be wondrous for the whole nation to be destroyed like a beautiful flower?”
If leaders are willing to engage in conflict with nuclear-armed nations, use of nuclear weapons in any particular instance
may not be likely, but its probability would still be dangerously significant. In particular, human nature suggests that the
threat of retaliation with nuclear weapons is not a reliable guarantee against a disastrous first use of these weapons.
While national leaders and their advisors everywhere are usually talented and experienced people, even their most
important decisions cannot be counted on to be the product of well-informed and thorough assessments of all options
from all relevant points of view. This is especially so when the stakes are so large as to defy assessment and there are
substantial pressures to act quickly, as could be expected in intense and fast-moving crises between nuclear-armed
states. Instead, like other human beings, national leaders can be seduced by wishful thinking. They can misinterpret
the words or actions of opposing leaders. Their advisors may produce answers that they think the leader wants to
hear, or coalesce around what they know is an inferior decision because the group urgently needs the confidence or the
sharing of responsibility that results from settling on something. Moreover, leaders may not recognize clearly where
their personal or party interests diverge from those of their citizens. Under great stress, human beings can lose their
ability to think carefully. They can refuse to believe that the worst could really happen, oversimplify the problem at
hand, think in terms of simplistic analogies and play hunches. The intuitive rules for how individuals should respond to
insults or signs of weakness in an opponent may too readily suggest a rash course of action. Anger, fear, greed,
ambition and pride can all lead to bad decisions. The desire for a decisive solution to the problem at hand may lead to
an unnecessarily extreme course of action. We can almost hear the kinds of words that could flow from discussions in
nuclear crises or war. ‘These people are not willing to die for this interest’. ‘No sane person would actually use such
weapons’. ‘Perhaps the opponent will back down if we show him we mean business by demonstrating a willingness to
use nuclear weapons’. ‘If I don’t hit them back really hard, I am going to be driven from office, if not killed’. Whether
right or wrong, in the stressful atmosphere of a nuclear crisis or war, such words from others, or silently from within,
might resonate too readily with a harried leader. Thus, both history and human nature suggest that nuclear deterrence
can be expected to fail from time to time, and we are fortunate it has not happened yet. But the threat of nuclear war
is not just a matter of a few weapons being used. It could get much worse. Once a conflict reaches the point where
nuclear weapons are employed, the stresses felt by the leaderships would rise enormously. These stresses can be
expected to further degrade their decision-making. The pressures to force the enemy to stop fighting or to surrender
could argue for more forceful and decisive military action, which might be the right thing to do in the circumstances, but
maybe not. And the horrors of the carnage already suffered may be seen as justification for visiting the most devastating
punishment possible on the enemy.’ Again, history demonstrates how intense conflict can lead the combatants to
escalate violence to the maximum possible levels. In the Second World War, early promises not to bomb cities soon gave
way to essentially indiscriminate bombing of civilians. The war between Iran and Iraq during the 1980s led to the use of
chemical weapons on both sides and exchanges of missiles against each other’s cities. And more recently, violence in the
Middle East escalated in a few months from rocks and small arms to heavy weapons on one side, and from police
actions to air strikes and armoured attacks on the other. Escalation of violence is also basic human nature. Once the
violence starts, retaliatory exchanges of violent acts can escalate to levels unimagined by the participants before hand.
Intense and blinding anger is a common response to fear or humiliation or abuse. And such anger can lead us to impose
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on our opponents whatever levels of violence are readily accessible. In sum, widespread proliferation is likely to lead to
an occasional shoot-out with nuclear weapons, and that such shoot-outs will have a substantial probability of escalating
to the maximum destruction possible with the weapons at hand. Unless nuclear proliferation is stopped, we are
headed toward a world that will mirror the American Wild West of the late 1800s. With most, if not all, nations
wearing nuclear ‘six-shooters’ on their hips, the world may even be a more polite place than it is today, but every once
in a while we will all gather on a hill to bury the bodies of dead cities or even whole nations. This kind of world is in no
nation’s interest. The means for preventing it must be pursued vigorously. And, as argued above, a most powerful way
to prevent it or slow its emergence is to encourage the more capable states to provide reliable protection to others
against aggression, even when that aggression could be backed with nuclear weapons. In other words, the world needs
at least one state, preferably several, willing and able to play the role of sheriff, or to be members of a sheriff’s posse,
even in the face of nuclear threats.
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UNIQUENESS:
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Generic: Strong now
U.S. – Brazil trade relationship strong and still has room to grow
Camp, 6/5. Chairman of the Committee on Ways and Means, represents Michigan’s 4th Congressional District, on the
Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, (Dave, “Chairman Nunes Announces Hearing on U.S.-Brazil Trade and
Investment Relationship: Opportunities and Challenges”. 7/6/13.
http://waysandmeans.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=336862. KJ)
The U.S.-Brazil trade is among our most important and promising trade relationships. Brazil has been the United
States’ eighth largest trading partner on average over the last five years, exceeding $59 billion in two-way trade in
2012 and generating a U.S. trade surplus of over $5.5 billion. Yet, U.S.-Brazil trade has substantial room to grow.
Brazil’s trade-to-GDP ratio is rising rapidly, from 16 percent a decade ago to 24 percent in 2011 – but its ratio remains
one of the lowest in the world. Brazil’s economy is large and has strong growth potential. At over $2.4 trillion, Brazil’s
gross domestic product (GDP) is roughly equal to that of the United Kingdom (the world’s sixth-largest economy), double
that of Canada, a third larger than those of India and Russia, and one-third that of China. Brazil’s economy has grown
rapidly during most of the last two decades, reaching its fastest pace of growth in 2010, with annual growth exceeding
7.5 percent. GDP growth since 2011 has been slow, however. ¶ U.S.-Brazil investment flows are also promising. U.S.
foreign direct investment (FDI) flows into Brazil grew from over $5 billion in 2000 to over $12 billion in 2012, while
Brazilian FDI flows into the United States grew from over $100 million in 2000 to over $1.8 billion in 2012.
The U.S. and Brazil have good relations now
Boadle, is a senior correspondent in Brazil, 5/31/13(Anthony “Biden says U.S. and Brazil ready for deeper
relationship” http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/05/31/us-brazil-usa-biden-idUSBRE94U14220130531 Date
accessed: 7/6/13)KG
"We're ready for a deeper, broader relationship across the board on everything from the military to education, trade
and investment," Biden told reporters after meeting with Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff. The White House
announced on Wednesday that Rousseff will make a state visit to Washington on October 23, the only one that
President Barack Obama is offering a foreign head of state this year, indicating the importance his administration is
placing on closer ties with Latin America's largest nation. Biden for praised Brazil recently writing off $900 million in
African debt, saying it showed the emergence of Brazil as a "responsible" nation on the world stage. During his threeday visit, Biden also commended Brazil for lifting millions of people from poverty over the last decade and showing the
world that development and democracy are not incompatible. However, he also urged Brazil to open its economy more
to foreign bushiness and to be more vocal in defense of democracy and free-market values. Relations between
Washington and Brasilia have improved since Rousseff took office in 2011 and adopted a less ideological foreign policy
than her predecessor, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who befriended Iran and drew Brazil closer to Venezuela's anti-U.S.
government under the late Hugo Chavez. Perceiving the advent of better ties between Brasilia and Washington, U.S.
and Brazilian businesses are actively pushing for a strategic partnership between their countries that would allow for
more flexible investment rules, a treaty to eliminate double taxation and a visa waiver program to make travel easier
for tourists and executives. "The atmospherics are improving rapidly, in part because Brazil has taken a lower profile on
some contentious global political issues like Iran," said Eric Farnsworth, vice president of the Americas Society, a
business forum dedicated to fostering ties between the United States and Latin America.
U.S.-Brazil relations high now
Huffington Post, The destination for news and original content offering coverage of US politics and
world news, 5/31/13 (“Vice-President Biden Says Brazil-US Relations Enter New Era”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/01/brazil-us-relations_n_3371818.html)KG
Brazil -- Stronger trade ties and closer cooperation in education, science and other fields should usher in a new era in
U.S.- Brazil relations in 2013, U.S. Vice President Joe Biden said Friday. Biden made his remarks after meeting with
President Dilma Rousseff and Vice president Michel Temer on the last leg of his three-day visit to Brazil. "The president
(Obama) wanted to make a statement of the importance that the relationship with Brazil has for us," Biden said. "That
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is why the first state visit of the second administration is to your president. We are pleased that your president has
accepted the invitation." "It is a sign of the respect we have for Brazil. I hope 2013 marks the beginning of a new era in
the relations between our two countries," he added The Oct. 23 visit will be an important diplomatic acknowledgment
of Brazil's growing influence – and also a shift back toward the middle for Brazilian foreign policy under Rousseff.
Brazilian Foreign Minister Antonio Patriota said U.S.-Brazil relations should "focus on areas like science, technology,
innovation and education." Biden told reporters he had a "wide-ranging discussion" with Rousseff who he said was a
"leader who is laser-focused on addressing the needs of the Brazilian people. I now understand why President Obama
considers her such a great partner."
U.S. and Brazil work together on several issues.
Meyer, Analyst in Latin American Affairs, 2/27/13 (Peter Congressional research service: “Brazil-U.S. Relations”
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL33456.pdf Date accessed: 7/6/13)KG
As its economy has grown to be the seventh largest in the world, Brazil has utilized its newfound economic power to
consolidate its influence in South America and play a larger role in international affairs. The Obama Administration’s
National Security Strategy recognizes Brazil as an emerging center of influence, and welcomes the country’s
leadership on bilateral, hemispheric, and global issues. U.S.-Brazil relations generally have been positive in recent
years, though Brazil has prioritized strengthening relations with neighboring countries and expanding ties with
nontraditional partners in the “developing South.” While some foreign policy disagreements have emerged, the United
States and Brazil continue to engage on issues such as security, energy, trade, human rights, and the environment.
U.S. and Brazil work together on trade, immigration, and defense
Leahy, Associate Professor of Law 5/16/13 (“Politics put to one side in sign of closer ties between Brazil and the
US” http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/9f9d81c6-b883-11e2-869f-00144feabdc0.html#axzz2YJ8RlFtJ Date accessed:
7/6/13)KG
Brazil is the kind of trading partner the US needs, and it supports about 300,000 jobs in its northerly neighbour. It also
buys the types of products the US wants to sell more of – aircraft parts, machinery and plastics. US services exports to
Brazil have also increased, more than tripling between 2002 and 2011 to nearly $20bn. For Brazil, the US, with its
transparent business practices and focus on innovation and intellectual property, is the kind of trading partner it
prefers. After an initial honeymoon with Beijing in the first decade of this century, when China became its biggest
trading partner, Brazil is growing frustrated with aspects of the business relationship. An old developing world ally, China
is importing Brazil’s iron ore and soyabeans but in return swamps the Latin American country with cheap imports. “We
are a rare example of a country that holds a sizeable trade surplus with China – $11bn in 2011 – but it’s not the quality
of trade that we would like to see sometimes,” says Antônio Patriota, foreign minister. Mindful that US universities are
one means of improving its competitiveness, Brazil is sending a large number of students under its R$3bn ($1.5bn)
science without borders scholarship programme to colleges in the US. Brazilian companies, meanwhile, are tapping
the strengthened capital markets of the US for private sector investment. Defence co-operation is improving, with the
US maintaining an order for a group of Brazilian light attack aircraft, the country’s first such contract with the US
military. Embraer, the Brazilian builder of the aircraft, has signed a co-operation agreement with Boeing to develop a
jet-engined military transport aircraft. This has strengthened aspirations in Washington that the US might eventually win
a contract to supply the Brazilian air force with fighters.
U.S. and Brazil have good relations now and are working toward a better relationship
Brown, is the Director of Operations for the Office of the Defense Representative , 2/16/13
(Lawerence, “Restoring the "Unwritten Alliance": Brazil-U.S. Relations” http://www.ndu.edu/press/unwrittenalliance.html)
Cooperation in breaking the Brazil–West Africa narcotics connection is another area where national interests
converge. In 2009, Brazil became the primary embarkation point for South American cocaine headed for West Africa,
where “there is evidence by the U.S. Drug Enforcement [Administration] . . . that Latin American traffickers are
collaborating with [al Qaeda] in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and Hezbollah to smuggle cocaine to Europe.”46 The
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executive director of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime also confirmed that terrorists from Africa used money from
drug-trafficking to resource operations, purchase equipment, and provide salaries for their ranks.47 It is common
knowledge that the United States conducts counterterrorist operations against AQIM and seeks to stop any funding
derived from the transshipment of cocaine from Latin America. Although Brazil itself does not produce significant
amounts of cocaine, it does have 10,500 miles of mostly unsecured coastline. In addition, three of the world’s top
producers of cocaine border Brazil: Bolivia, Colombia, and Peru. Brazil has invested more heavily in enforcing its
borders since its economic boom, but the United States could assist by continuing the same intelligence-sharing
mechanism that has been proposed for the World Cup and Olympics. Additionally, Brazil’s unmanned aerial
surveillance program is currently in its infancy; it could benefit from the experience and systems of the mature U.S.
programs. Building on the predicted intelligence successes of the World Cup and Olympics, this cooperation could
expand to neighboring countries. Eventually, it could evolve into a hemispheric security network serving the national
interests of all participating nations.
US wants to cooperate with Brazil
Brown 13, National Defense University, Lawrence T., Restoring the “Unwritten Alliance”: Brazil-U.S. Relations,
http://www.ndu.edu/press/lib/pdf/jfq-69/JFQ-69_42-48_Brown.pdf ML
Interestingly, the 2011 U.S. National Military Strategy (NMS) actually supports South American regional structures and
implies Brazil’s leadership: “We welcome efforts by Brazil and our other regional partners to establish economic and
security mechanisms, such as the South American Defense Council (SADC).” The SADC is a suborganization of the Union
of South American Nations (UNASUR). It was modeled after the European Union, whose long-term goals of continental
integration are similar. Another regional South American organization not mentioned in the NMS is MERCOSUR, in
which Brazil has become the natural leader due to its expansive economy. Through these organizations, Brazil has
exercised regional leadership by addressing regional problems “without having to turn to extra-regional powers, such
as the United States.” In the NSS, President Obama specifically cited Brazil’s exceptional role in Latin America: “We
welcome Brazil’s leadership and seek to move beyond dated North-South divisions to pursue progress on bilateral,
hemispheric, and global issues.” These policy statements clearly indicate that the United States prefers to work with
any organization, sovereign or multilateral, that is proactively working to solve problems. UNASUR, MERCOSUR, and
even the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States are potential U.S. partners for hemispheric and regional
progress. President Obama has welcomed Brazil’s leadership in these organizations in executive policy documents,
but his statements have not been matched by specific actions.
U.S. and Brazil have good relations
USDOS, the United States federal executive department responsible for international relations,
6/15/12 (“U.S.-BRAZIL RELATIONS” http://m.state.gov/md35640.htm)
The United States and Brazil have traditionally enjoyed cooperative, active relations encompassing a broad political
and economic agenda. The United States was the first country to recognize Brazil's independence from Portugal in
1822, and as the two largest democracies and economies in the Western Hemisphere, the United States and Brazil are
currently consolidating a foundation for a new partnership for the 21st century with a focus on global issues that
affect both countries. Ten bilateral agreements signed during President Obama’s visit to Brazil in March 2011 and five
more signed during President Rousseff’s visit to the United States in April 2012 testify to an intensification of bilateral
engagement in a broad range of areas of mutual interest. Since 2011, a series of high-level dialogues have been created
or upgraded, including four Presidential Dialogues: the Global Partnership Dialogue, Economic and Financial Dialogue,
Strategic Energy Dialogue, and Defense Cooperation Dialogue. Formal intergovernmental dialogues engage multiple
U.S. and Brazilian agencies on issues including bilateral and multilateral issues, economics, trade, finance, agriculture,
energy, aviation, technology, innovation, the environment, education, culture, defense, and nonproliferation. These
dialogues are the primary vehicles for policy coordination and for defining partnership priorities. Bilateral relations are
complemented by people-to-people initiatives and trilateral and multilateral cooperation. The United States and
Brazil’s long history of exchange in education is one example; the bi-national Fulbright Commission was established in
1957, and thousands of scholars have traveled between the two countries. Education cooperation continues to thrive as
President Obama’s “100,000 Strong in the Americas” goal and Brazilian President Rousseff’s “Science without Borders”
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initiative create opportunities for new academic and research partnerships. EducationUSA centers around helping Brazil
advise students on study in the United States and host events to assist U.S. higher education institutions recruit Brazilian
students. The United States is also working closely with Brazilian counterparts to expand opportunities for English
language learning and professional development for Brazilian teachers. These exchanges strengthen U.S. and Brazilian
institutional partnerships, develop a workforce prepared for 21st century opportunities, and contribute to long-term
economic growth for both countries. The United States and Brazil also share a commitment to combat discrimination
based on race, gender, ethnicity, or lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) status; to advance gender equality;
to fight exploitative child and forced labor; and to promote human rights. The U.S.-Brazil Joint Action Plan to Eliminate
Racial and Ethnic Discrimination and Promote Equality, the first bilateral instrument that targets racism, and the U.S.Brazil Memorandum of Understanding on the Advancement of Women provide platforms for cooperation to combat
racial discrimination and women’s empowerment broadly, and to share best practices in tackling discrimination in STEM
education, law enforcement, labor, health, gender-based violence, economic empowerment, and many other areas.
Multilateral cooperation and collaboration at the United Nations and Organization of American States has also proven
effective in the promotion of LGBT human rights. The United States and Brazil also partner on trilateral cooperation in
third countries, particularly in support of biofuels and agricultural development, food security, health, and women’s
rights. Successful programs include joint technical cooperation and training in support of trilateral development
programs in Mozambique in agricultural research and technology and food security, with plans to extend this
cooperation to additional countries in Africa, Central America, and the Caribbean. Multilaterally, the power of U.S.-Brazil
collaboration is evidenced by the success of the Open Government Partnership, a multi-country initiative to foster
transparency launched and co-chaired in its inaugural year by the United States and Brazil.
U.S. Brazil Relations are growing and now.
Morse, Professor. Ella Cline Shear School of Education, 5/23/13 (Jane, “Biden’s Trip to Latin America to Focus
on Boosting Partnerships”
html#ixzz2YKEeJ9Nlhttp://iipdigital.usembassy.gov/st/english/article/2013/05/20130523147886.html#axzz2YKBfCdrd
Date accessed: 6/7/13)KG
Vice President Biden’s upcoming trip to Latin America — his fourth during the Obama administration — is testimony to
the growing partnerships between the United States and the countries of that region, a U.S. official says. Biden is set to
visit Colombia, Trinidad and Tobago, and Brazil during the week of May 27. Following so soon after President Obama’s
May 2–4 visit to Mexico and Costa Rica, Biden’s trip, a senior administration official said in a May 22 conference call with
reporters, is “our latest demonstration of the United States' commitment to reinforcing our partnerships in the
Americas." “It will also be our latest demonstration of an approach to engagement from the beginning that has been
based on mutual respect and shared responsibility,” said the official, who declined to be named for the background
briefing. “President Obama and Vice President Biden, right from the outset of their time in office,” the official said,
“have made clear their view that the Americas represent a region of opportunity for the United States, and they're
looking at the period that we've entered now as a time to really ramp up our engagement in the hemisphere, in every
part of the hemisphere, in Mexico, in Central America, the Caribbean and South America.” Biden will be visiting
additional countries in the region later this year, the official said, and in the coming months, leaders of Latin American
countries will be visiting the United States — most immediately Chile's president, Sebastián Piñera, and President
Ollanta Humala of Peru. The governments of Latin America have largely embraced democratic values and have been
able to reduce poverty by more than 50 percent in the last decade, allowing tens of millions of their citizens to join
the middle class. As a result, these countries have become increasingly important trading partners of the United
States, the official said. “Our economies, our societies, our people are becoming more and more connected,” the
official said. The U.S. objective, the official added, “is to work with our partners across the hemisphere to promote a
hemisphere that's middle class, secure and democratic.” The countries of the Americas, including Colombia and Brazil,
are playing an increasingly important role in global affairs, and that, the official said, is “just one more reason for why
the hemisphere and the region are so important to U.S. interests.”
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UQ-Government cooperation
Obama made a momentous change in US-Brazil relations.
Mead, 2011 (Walter Russell, Professor of Foreign Affairs at Bard College and Editor At Large of American Interest
Magazine, April 15, “Something Real, For a Change”, The American Interest Magazine, http://blogs.the-americaninterest.com/wrm/2011/04/15/something-real-for-a-change/, DVO)
But every now and then something actually happens, and even a summit meeting can register a real change in
relations between countries. Something like this happened when Edward VII visited France in 1903, and it happened
again during President Obama’s recent visit to Brazil. The relationship between the two countries is changing in truly
momentous ways, and while the visit didn’t cause these changes (which have been gathering force for twenty years), it
did help crystallize perceptions.¶ The change in the US-Brazil relationship is not as dramatic or consequential as the
change in US-Indian relations since the Cold War. The US and India share two paramount strategic concerns — the
possibility that China might seek hegemony in Asia and the possibility that Islamic extremism will destabilize the Middle
East and beyond — that make that bilateral relationship one of the keys to the global situation. US and Indian relations
may never produce a formal alliance, but the community of interest is so deep and has such obvious military and
geopolitical implications that even casual newspaper readers will be increasingly aware of its importance.¶ The new USBrazilian relationship does not quite live up to that, but the ramifications of the changing relations between the two
dominant powers in the western hemisphere will nevertheless make waves. It is likely in the 21st century that Brazil
will join the group of countries Americans listen to and rely on the most, and the countries whose interests Americans
take the greatest care to address.¶ Changes in both US and Brazilian perceptions about the world have combined to
create the basis for a new kind of relationship. On the US side, the end of the Cold War changed the nature of our
interests in South America. Before 1940, the United States sharply differentiated between the Caribbean and Central
America, where we had strong security interests, and South America, where we did not. Henry Kissinger’s famous crack
that “Argentina is a dagger aimed straight at the heart of Antarctica” summarized this longtime US view. Between the
early 1800′s when Brazil and its neighbors became independent from Portugal and Spain, and World War Two, the
United States was happy to trade with those nations, but cared almost nothing about how those countries governed
themselves or which European countries dominated their politics and trade.¶ That changed in World War Two. Chile,
Argentina and Brazil all had deep ties with Germany. Juan Peron, the Argentine dictator whose legacy remains a
dominant force in that country today, was openly pro-fascist. Getulio Vargas, the Brazilian dictator, had flirted with both
fascism and communism. With the fall of France and the approach of World War Two to the US, American policy-makers
suddenly cared very deeply about Argentine and Brazilian foreign policy. We wanted to use northeastern Brazil as part
of an ‘air bridge’ to North Africa (the airplanes of those days needed frequent refueling stops and Brazil was an excellent
jumping off point for Africa), and the US wanted to prevent any of the South American countries providing aid or shelter
to Axis agents.¶ World War Two quickly gave way to the Cold War, and Americans continued to see security interests in
South America. In the global struggle with communism, there were no irrelevant countries, and the US was prepared to
go to great lengths to make sure that communism did not take hold in this hemisphere. That concern grew after the
Cuban Revolution; the United States became much more deeply involved than ever before in the politics and economics
of South America.¶ This era of US activism had its bright spots — the Alliance for Progress is still fondly remembered in
some quarters — but overall the intensity of US interest, our willingness to collaborate with military and dictatorial
governments against the communist menace, and the degree to which Americans interfered in the domestic politics
of the South American republics created a legacy of distrust and strengthened the perception that South American
countries needed to limit US power and influence if they ever wished to be truly free.¶ This is all reasonable enough
from a South American point of view, and perceptions formed in this era continue to shape the way South Americans
see us. But the fall of the Soviet Union took the global struggle against communism off the table and removed any
serious reasons for heavy-handed US interference in South America. Today no global American security interests are
challenged by the power of any South American state; the United States and its government wish the peoples of South
America well, but we no longer have a compelling security reason to meddle in their domestic affairs.¶ A fifty-year period
of North American interference in South American affairs came to an end in 1990; unless Hugo Chavez finds a way to
turn taunts and insults into a consequential security threats, the US has no need to treat him as anything worse than a
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nuisance. Ditto for the rest of the continent; while US security and political interests are likely to keep us engaged in
the traditional sphere of American interest in the Caribbean and Central America (extending at most to the northern
fringe of South America), the US no longer has any desire to interfere with the domestic politics of countries like
Brazil, Argentina, Chile and their neighbors.¶ On the Brazilian side, something even more important has happened:
Brazil has begun to believe that the world economic system might just work to Brazil’s advantage. Brazil was one of
many developing countries which felt under siege by the forces of international capitalism during much of modern
history. In the 19th century Brazil was part of Britain’s ‘informal empire’; Britain was the dominant foreign investor in
the country and Britain controlled the markets for the primary commodities (sugar, rubber, cotton, coffee) whose falling
and rising prices set the tempo for Brazil’s growth. But the system seemed rigged in Britain’s favor; Brazil could never
escape its role as a commodity producer — a hewer of wood and a drawer of water in the international community.
Brazil did the backbreaking labor; Britain grew rich.¶ After World War Two, the Americans took over Britain’s old role as
the leading power in the global economic system, and the Brazilians continued to feel like second class citizens. For
many Brazilians it was axiomatic that they could only develop by protecting themselves from foreign investment and
foreign competition. A fierce economic nationalism combined with resentment against real and perceived American
threats to Brazilian security and autonomy to create (both on the left and on the right) a hostile and defensive attitude
toward the United States and the global economic system it hoped to build.¶ Something similar happened in India; India
and Brazil both developed a mindset of permanent victimization. But in both countries, that began to change in the
last fifteen or twenty years. Both countries have gradually been opening to the world, and both have been stunned to
see that their companies and their economies can benefit from global exposure. India’s success in software and IT
boosted India’s self-esteem and gave it new global clout. Brazil’s success in a range of industries, like aviation, and the
success of Brazilian companies that have become fully-fledged multinational players (a Brazilian firm now owns
Anheuser-Busch, for example) make more and more Brazilians feel that on a level playing field, Brazil can win.¶ What
that means is that Brazilians, even those on the left like former president Lula, are now less inclined to think that
Brazil needs to overturn the global economic system. Brazil now aims to tweak and reform that system rather than
ripping it up by the roots. In that sense, Brazil is now a European country: it has certain specific policy differences with
the US and fights for its positions in various international gatherings, but it agrees with the United States that the
basic architecture of the world economy is worth preserving.¶ So both countries have changed. Since the end of the
Cold War the United States has come to accept Brazil’s full independence and control over its own destiny; Brazil has
come to accept its interdependence with the global economy. The two biggest disagreements between the two
countries have vanished into the air — though a nasty smell sometimes lingers.¶ More, the two countries have also
moved much closer when it comes to policies for the region. Ten years ago, the US was pushing one vision of
hemispheric cooperation — the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) — and Brazil was pushing another. Today, this
dispute seems outdated. Brazil’s vision of an EU style gathering of American nations that excluded the United States
has ground largely to a halt (it is hard to get Chile, Colombia, Argentina and Venezuela to agree to very much), and the
US has lost interest in the FTAA.¶ The US withdrawal from a political role in South America created a vacuum; Brazil’s
cautious steps to fill some of that vacuum have created new common interests between the two most populous
democracies in the hemisphere. If the US had been plotting against Hugo Chavez, for example, Brazil would have felt
obligated to show Venezuela some love (however much the Brazilians disapproved of Chavez’s economic and political
program). But with the shadow of Uncle Sam in retreat, Brazil has been free to handle the Bolivarean left in its own
way, and the result has been better for both Brazil and the United States than anything Washington could have done.¶
President Lula killed the Bolivarean revolution with kindness; he choked it with butter. Lula’s Brazil stuck up for
Venezuela at international gatherings and danced with it at parties. But all the while, Lula’s Brazil was destroying the
political logic of the Bolivareans by demonstrating that a pluralistic democracy integrated into the global market can do
more for the poor than incompetent populist blowhards. Chavez talked; Lula delivered, giving Brazilians (and especially
the poor) rising living standards while enhancing rather than reducing their civil liberties. Thanks to Lula, Chavez looks
more like a survival from a bygone era than like the cutting edge of Latin America’s future.
US- Brazil relations strong, The Forum and other meetings list common efforts
DOC, 3/25. The United States Department of Commerce (“Building on the Strength of U.S.-Brazil Economic
Relationship.” 7/6/13. http://www.commerce.gov/blog/2013/03/25/building-strength-us-brazil-economic-relationship.
KJ)
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The U.S.-Brazil CEO Forum was created in 2007 to bring private sector leaders from both countries together to
develop joint recommendations on how to deepen our commercial ties, and to present those recommendations to
the U.S. and Brazilian governments. The Forum has identified five areas as priorities: tax and trade issues; education
and innovation; infrastructure; energy; and aviation.¶ Deputy Secretary Blank served as the U.S. Government’s co-chair
for the CEO Forum along with Michael Froman, the Deputy National Security Advisor for International Economic Affairs
at the White House. They were joined by their Brazilian co-chairs, Minister of Development, Industry, and Foreign Trade
Fernando Pimentel and Presidential Chief of Staff Gleisi Hoffman. ¶ The meeting was led by about 20 CEOs from both
countries, whose priorities for improving the economic and commercial relationship between Brazil and the U.S. set
the agenda for the meeting. As one of the U.S. Government’s co-chairs, Deputy Secretary Blank gave an update to the
members of the CEO Forum on the progress that the two governments made to implement the recommendations that
the CEOs made at their previous meeting last year. The CEOs then led the main discussion and came up with several
new recommendations that will be formally released in the coming weeks, including:¶ •Calling upon the governments to
take advantage of the momentum from the recently-approved Tax Information Exchange Agreement (TIEA) to take on
additional tax issues that could eventually pave the way for a Bilateral Tax Treaty.¶ •Continuing to make progress on
Brazil’s participation in the Global Entry Program, making it easier for Brazilians traveling to the United States on
business to get through immigration at U.S. airports.¶ •Continuing efforts to increase cooperation in the area of
infrastructure and take advantage of the U.S. infrastructure trade mission, scheduled for May, to create opportunities
for U.S. and Brazilian companies to partner on infrastructure improvements.¶ •Continuing to cooperate on education
and workforce development issues by supporting programs like President Obama’s “100,000 Strong in the Americas”
initiative and Brazil’s “Scientific Mobility Program.”¶ •Building upon the work of the Strategic Energy Dialogue and
involve the private sector in energy infrastructure and policy discussions.¶ •Building on cooperation between the U.S.
Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and Brazil’s National Institute of Industrial Property (INPI) to engage in more
formal worksharing efforts to support innovation.¶ •Continuing work begun under the Aviation Partnership
Agreement to advance aviation cooperation and use the Aviation Partnership as a model for other sectors.¶ In Rio de
Janeiro, Deputy Secretary Blank met with more business leaders and also delivered remarks at a Columbia University
event focused on innovation and economic development which was part of the launch of the university’s new Global
Center in that city. She emphasized the importance of U.S.-Brazil collaboration in areas such as infrastructure
development, clean energy, student exchanges, and more. Finally, she announced that U.S.-Brazil partnerships would
continue to grow in the near future due to a high-level, infrastructure-focused trade mission to Brazil – as well as
Colombia and Panama – that will take place in mid-May.
Biden’s visit to Brazil has set the stage for US Brazil interaction.
CFR 13 (Julia E. Sweig, Nelson and David Rockefeller, Senior Fellow for Latin America Studies and Director for Latin America
Studies, The View Toward Closer U.S.-Brazil Relations, May 22, 2013, http://www.cfr.org/brazil/view-toward-closer-us-brazilrelations/p30757, DAG)
Vice President Joe Biden will visit Brazil, Colombia, and Trinidad and Tobago next week. Don't assume this American vice
president is merely ceremonial: he has a significant domestic portfolio including immigration, guns, and the budget. Nor
is his visit one of those bloated good will trips meant to dole out patronage or shore up support for some American
foreign venture. Rather, it seems the Obama administration has decided to try and seize a huge, and to date largely
missed opportunity related to jobs, energy, and prosperity in Latin America.¶ Why the sudden awakening? Immigration
reform, the President's top legislative priority this year, and a political must for both parties, has alerted the White
House to the potential foreign policy benefit in Latin America, and not just Mexico, of solving a major domestic problem.
In fact, the White House and the American public's disposition to deal with once untouchable domestic politics around
immigration, guns, energy, marijuana legalization, and maybe even Cuba, open the door for potential convergence with
Latin America. And provide a chance to get beyond the usual ideological battles that too often sap diplomatic energy
and patience.¶ Biden arrives in Brazil five months before President Rousseff's state visit to the United States and ten
years since President Bush and President Lula convened their cabinets for a joint ministerial meeting, their
recognition of the strategic potential for the two democracies and their economies. Since then, dozens, if not
hundreds, of ministerial and sub-ministerial meetings have followed. And we have stitched together dozens of intergovernmental dialogues, initiatives, defense, business, scientific, and educational exchanges. Yet there is still something
missing between the two powers—call it a lack of ambition.¶ So let me resurrect two big ideas that Vice Presidents
Biden and Temer and Presidents Obama and Rousseff might finally embrace.¶ The first idea is harder for Brasilia. Brazil
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and the United States both need middle class jobs, economic growth, and a China strategy. The benefits to both
countries of economic cooperation, beyond investment and double taxation treaties, are clear: it is time to trade
(more) freely and I don't mean waiting for Roberto Acevedo and the WTO to make that happen. Perhaps it's
politically incorrect to think this big, but Brazil has enough social protections in place to become more open. ¶ The
second idea is harder for Washington. The time has come—next week or in October—to drop the verbal caveats and
unequivocally support Brazil (as India) for a seat on a reformed UN Security Council. Brazil is peaceful, non-nuclear,
democratic, experienced in peacekeeping, and voices the rather widely held view that military answers to security
threats—see Syria, Iran, Iraq—need not become the reflexive universal default.¶ Both ideas require upending the
conventional wisdom of their respective bureaucratic and political classes, but both stand to radically unlock a
seemingly perennial,yet unrealized potential. Perhaps Biden's visit next week will set the stage.
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UQ-Terror/military cooperation
The U.S. and Brazil work on anti-terrorism efforts
Meyer, Analyst in Latin American Affairs, 2/27/13 (Peter Congressional research service: “Brazil-U.S. Relations”
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL33456.pdf Date accessed: 7/6/13)KG
The Tri-Border Area (TBA) of Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay has long been used for arms smuggling, money laundering,
and other illicit purposes. According to the State Department’s Country Reports on Terrorism, there are no known
operational cells of al Qaeda or Hezbollah related groups in the hemisphere; however, the United States remains
concerned that proceeds from legal and illegal goods flowing through the TBA could potentially be diverted to
support terrorist groups.94 In December 2010, the U.S. Treasury Department sanctioned Hezbollah’s chief
representative in South America, Bilal Mohsen Wehbe, for transferring funds collected in Brazil to Hezbollah in Lebanon.
According to the Treasury Department, Wehbe and an associate raised more than $500,000 from Lebanese businessmen
in the TBA following the 2006 conflict between Israel and Hezbollah. Wehbe also reportedly has overseen Hezbollah’s
counterintelligence activity in the TBA and has worked for the office of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali
Khamene'i.95 The U.S. government has worked with Brazil to address concerns about the TBA and strengthen the
country’s counterterrorism capabilities. The countries of the TBA and the United States created the “3+1 Group on TriBorder Area Security” in 2002, and the group built a Joint Intelligence Center to combat trans-border criminal
organizations in 2007. Within Brazil, the United States has supported efforts to implement the Container Security
Initiative (CSI) at the port of Santos, and U.S. authorities are currently training Brazilian airline employees to identify
fraudulent documents. The State Department’s Country Reports on Terrorism for 2011 commends the Brazilian
government for its continued support of counterterrorism-related activities, including investigating potential
terrorism financing, document forgery networks, and other illicit activity.96 Brazil has yet to adopt legislation,
however, to make terrorism and terrorism financing autonomous offenses. Like many other Latin American nations,
Brazil has been reluctant to adopt specific antiterrorism legislation as a result of the difficulty of defining terrorism in a
way that does not include the actions of social movements and other groups whose actions of political dissent were
condemned as terrorism by repressive military regimes in the past.97 Nevertheless, some Brazilian officials have
pushed for antiterrorism legislation, asserting that the country will face new threats as a result of hosting the 2014
World Cup and the 2016 Olympics.
Brazil and U.S. work together militarily
Meyer, Analyst in Latin American Affairs, 2/27/13 (Peter Congressional Research service: “Brazil-U.S. Relations”
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL33456.pdf Date accessed: 7/6/13)KG
According to the U.S. Department of Defense, cooperation with Brazil’s Ministry of Defense and the Brazilian military
is closer today than it has been at any point in over 30 years. The U.S. and Brazilian militaries have worked together
closely in Haiti, where Brazil commands the U.N. Stabilization Mission (MINUSTAH). Joint efforts in the aftermath of
Haiti’s January 2010 earthquake were the largest combined operations of U.S. and Brazilian military forces since World
War II. In April 2010, the United States and Brazil signed a Defense Cooperation Agreement designed to promote
cooperation in areas such as research and development, technology security, and acquisition of defense products and
services. This was followed by a General Security of Military Information Agreement, signed in November 2010, which
is designed to facilitate the sharing of classified defense and military information. In an effort to elevate bilateral
defense ties, President Rousseff joined with President Obama in April 2012 to launch a presidential-level Defense
Cooperation Dialogue. Additional areas of defense cooperation include information exchanges, combined military
training, and joint military exercises.99 Two pending defense procurement deals could impact future military ties
between the United States and Brazil. The Brazilian air force intends to purchase 36 new fighter jets, and the Boeing
F/A-18 Super Hornet is one of three finalists along with the Saab JAS-39 Gripen of Sweden and the Dassault Rafale of
France. Brazil’s National Defense Strategy places significant emphasis on building the country’s domestic defense
industry, and technology transfer is reportedly a top consideration in the fighter deal. According to U.S. officials, the
technology transfer package the United States has offered is unprecedented in the U.S.-Brazil relationship and is the
same type of package that the United States provides its closest partners in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization
(NATO).
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UQ-Offshore Drilling
U.S. and Brazil work together to make offshore drilling safe
Meyer, Analyst in Latin American Affairs, 2/27/13 (Peter Congressional research service: “Brazil-U.S. Relations”
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL33456.pdf Date accessed: 7/6/13) KG
In December 2010, the Brazilian Congress approved a new regulatory framework for developing the approximately
70% of pre-salt reserves that have not already been auctioned off.117 The new framework is designed to increase the
role of the Brazilian government and use the resources to fuel long-term economic and social development. Among
other provisions, the framework establishes state-owned Petróleo Brasileiro S.A. (Petrobras) as the sole operator for all
new offshore projects; replaces the existing concessionary model with a production sharing regime; guarantees
Petrobras a minimum 30% stake in all new joint ventures; creates a new public company—Petrosal—to manage the
development of the offshore reserves; and creates a new social fund overseen by the Brazilian Congress to direct
offshore revenues toward four key areas: education, infrastructure, science and technology, and poverty
reduction.118 The development of these reserves has been delayed, however, as there is currently considerable debate
within the Brazilian Congress regarding the distribution of oil royalties and Petrobras is unable to auction the rights to
the fields until a new royalties framework is in place.119 Brazil and the United States are working together under the
Strategic Energy Dialogue to foster the safe and efficient development of oil reserves in both countries. Through
technical workshops and other activities, government regulators and private industry have exchanged best practices
on issues such as spill response, well integrity, subsea containment, the use of dispersants, and national contingency
plans. Brazil and the United States have also cooperated on financing. In April 2009, the Export-Import Bank of the
United States offered to consider up to $2 billion in financing for Petrobras to purchase U.S. goods and services. The
Bank has approved $300 million in financing so far, and has told Petrobras that it would consider increasing its offer
above $2 billion if requested.
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BRINK:
Relations are on the brink—good now but trade disputes or geopolitical tensions could destroy them.
Aramayo and Pereira, 2011 (Carlos and Carlos, analysts for Brookings Institution, “Obama’s Visit to Latin America:
Redefining US-Brazil Relations”,http://www.brookings.edu/research/opinions/2011/03/15-brazil-us-aramayo-pereira,
DVO)
With Brazil’s new president, Dilma Rousseff, there are signs of warmer relations between the two countries. Brazil’s
foreign policy is now less ideological and more pragmatic, particularly in gaining U.S. support for Brazil to have a
permanent seat in the UN Security Council. Rousseff has made clear that Brazil will abandon its ambiguous stance on
human rights issues. Brazil has softened its rhetoric on the Iranian nuclear issue and no longer wants to be part of the
negotiations. During a recent interview, President Rousseff made it clear she wanted to improve U.S.-Brazilian ties.
Brazilian foreign diplomacy has historically advocated for creating a world order that is more welcoming to a diversity of
interests. However, Rousseff has a new approach for Brazil’s foreign policy, which continues to preserve its
commitment to multilateralism while at the same time maintain an unwavering independent voice in international
affairs. Despite recent hiccups in the U.S.-Brazil relationship, the U.S. economy is more commercially interconnected
with Brazil that ever before. The United States has acknowledged that managing its relationship with the new Brazilian
administration is a growing priority for U.S. foreign policy and economic interests. During Obama’s visit to Brazil, he
will certainly take advantage of Rousseff’s foreign policy recalibration and look for Brazil’s support on a variety of issues.
However, “currency wars,” trade disputes and other geopolitical issues will certainly test the wills of both presidents.
Relations being rebuilt now—movement towards friendship away from a tense past.
Sotero, 2012 (Paulo, Director of the Brazil Institute at the Woodrow Wilson Center, April 14, NPR, “As Brazil Grows, US
Refits Relationships”, http://www.npr.org/2012/04/14/150622182/rebuilding-u-s-brazil-relations, DVO)
PAULO SOTERO: I think we are in a phase of rebuilding a relationship, rebuilding a dialogue that suffered sort of a
collapse. I think when President Rousseff succeeded President Lula, President Obama made a very important gesture,
he re-established a dialogue with Brazil at the highest level by going to Brasilia first. This was the first time that an
American president made such an important gesture and I think the two presidents have been engaging in a rebuilding
of a relationship that is very important I believe to both.¶ WERTHEIMER: We still talk though, about Brazil as an emerging
economy, and it is the sixth largest economy in the world. Is it fair to still talk of it as emerging? Is that one of the issues
between the two countries?¶ SOTERO: Yeah. President Lula used to say that he was tired of being the president of an
emerging country. He would rather be the leader of an emergent country.¶ (SOUNDBITE OF LAUGHTER)¶ SOTERO: And I
think that's what's being built in Brazil. In many senses, Brazil is still emerging. In other senses like in agriculture, in
energy, in aviation, Brazil is a developed country.¶ WERTHEIMER: But, of course, there's always the possibility that
people in the United States will come to view Brazil as a competitor.¶ SOTERO: Well, in agricultural trade actually we
are rivals, we are competitors. In other areas we can cooperate. Now, what I think has to change in the United States is
the way Americans look to Brazil. Americans look to the continent as a bloc and they look at Brazil as a Latin American
country.¶ Yes, we are - as a cultural reference - we are part of Latin America. Operationally though, Brazil is a unique
nation, so diplomats - a diplomat friend of mine, Ambassador Luigi Rinaldi, who represented the United States at the
Organization of American States, recently wrote a piece where he says the fact that Americans see Brazil as part of a
Latin America, and all the prejudices that Americans have when they look at Latin America, make them have a difficult
time understanding Brazil.¶ WERTHEIMER: Along with a growing economy, Brazil is also looking for a much more
serious role in international organizations, for example, campaigning for a permanent seat on the United Nations
Security Council. The United States is not supporting that.¶ SOTERO: I think that the Brazil right now is not campaigning
for that. Brazil was seriously campaigning for that under President Lula. I think President Dilma Rousseff understands
this process in a pragmatic and different way. She's completely concentrated in making Brazil's economy grow because
Brazil's emergence is very much a function of that.¶ I think President Rousseff is a much more pragmatic leader. And
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the Security Council, by the way, this was not a subject very much discussed in the recent meeting between Obama and
Dilma Rousseff because, you know, they know that this is not on the table right now.
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***LINK:
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Generic:
US leadership trades off with Brazilian regional power
Espach and Tulchin 2010 (Joseph and Ralph, “Brazil’s Rising Influence and Its Implications for Other Latin American
Nations”, CAN,
http://www.cna.org/sites/default/files/CNA%20Brazils%20Rise%20and%20Implications%20for%20Neighbors.pdf)
As it has emerged on the global stage, Brazil has strived to establish mutually supportive strategies at the regional and
global levels. Most importantly, Brazil desires a stable, peaceful, and economically vibrant South America so that
Brasilia can focus its diplomatic efforts on establishing its role as a great power. However, the realization of this vision
is complicated by several factors within the hemisphere: • Significant ideological fractures within Latin America that
make active leadership potentially treacherous for Brazil, whose traditional policy has been to maintain friendly relations
with all ten of its neighbors
• Resistance to Brazilian leadership on the part of other Latin American countries, which believe that Brazil’s policies
reflect self-interest more than a commitment to collective security and development
• The weakness of international institutions in the Americas, which complicates regional coordination or leadership as
diplomatic initiatives must be pursued country by country
• The pervasive, and in many ways dominant, influence of the United States.
Brazil sees US outreach in Latin America as opportunistic-now is the key time for genuine cooperation
Padgett, 2013 (Tim, Latin American analyst for Time Magazine, “The Obama Administration Looks to Latin America
After Years of Neglect”, May 13, http://world.time.com/2013/05/13/has-washington-finally-discovered-latin-america/
DVO)
On the other hand, Latin America can also be excused if it’s a little irked — if it’s asking the U.S., Why did you wait so
long to make this outreach, if you really are making a genuine outreach? Washington feels more urgency to look south
at the moment largely because of China’s increasing incursion into the hemisphere: annual China–Latin America trade
exceeds $200 billion today compared with less than $10 billion in 2000. U.S.–Latin America trade may be robust. But
this month Sabatini’s publication, Americas Quarterly, lays out striking evidence of U.S. decline: in 1995, for example,
the U.S. sent Brazil, Latin America’s largest economy and now the world’s sixth largest, more than a fifth of that
country’s imports; by 2011 it was 15%, the same share sent from China. Ditto with regard to Brazil’s exports: in 1995 the
U.S. bought 21%, but just 10% in 2011, while for China it was 17%. China, as a result, surpassed the U.S. as Brazil’s top
trading partner in 2009. What’s more, business with the Americas as a share of total U.S. trade has actually dropped
over the past decade.
The investment tally is even more striking: in 1995, the U.S. accounted for 37% of Brazil’s foreign direct investment vs.
10% in 2011 — less than China’s. Granted, it’s good for Latin America to be less dependent on the U.S. But it’s hardly
unreasonable to conclude that Washington wouldn’t be facing this China syndrome in its own hemisphere if it had
simply taken “high-level engagement on Latin America” more seriously a decade or more ago. Or even four years ago,
when Obama took office pledging a more benign U.S. foreign policy toward the region and then used that, say critics,
as an excuse for benign neglect.
Brazil doesn’t want the US in Latin America—they see us as a strategic competitor for trade with other Latin American
countries—this tanks relations.
Wingfield and Woods, 2012 (Brian and Randall, Bloomberg News Analysts, “Romney Must Romance Brazil to Boost Latin
American Trade”, October 28, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-10-29/romney-must-romance-brazil-to-boostlatin-american-trade.html, DVO)
¶ Establishing accords with South America’s largest economies -- Brazil and Argentina -- would be difficult after leaders
of the two nations joined with Venezuala’s Hugo Chavez in 2005 to sink the U.S. proposal to create a region-wide trade
zone, according to regional experts.¶ “We have trade agreements with the governments that want to have trade
agreements with us already,” Michael Shifter, president of the Washington-based Inter-American Dialogue, said in a
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phone interview from Managua, Nicaragua. “The ones we don’t have trade agreements with are either not particularly
interested or they’re very small markets that wouldn’t make much of a difference anyway.”¶ Romney, the Republican presidential
nominee, has promoted free trade as part of his job-creation plan. President Barack Obama has stressed his administration’s enforcement of trade rules, including
cases involving China. While Obama, 51, last year signed three trade deals that had been under consideration since before his presidency, including ones with
Colombia and Panama, Romney, 65, has vowed greater focus on Latin America.¶ ‘Huge Opportunity’¶ “The opportunities for us in Latin America we have just not
taken advantage of fully,” Romney said in the Oct. 22 presidential debate. “As a matter of fact, Latin America’s economy is almost as big as the economy of China.
We’re all focused on China. Latin America is a huge opportunity.”¶ The combined gross domestic product for the Latin American and Caribbean region in 2011 was
about $5.8 trillion in current U.S. dollars, according to the World Bank. China’s GDP was about $7.3 trillion.¶ The Clinton administration in 1994 proposed the creation
of a 34-nation hemispheric trade zone known as the the Free Trade Area of the Americas, or FTAA. The effort was abandoned in 2005 after Chavez led tens of
thousands of protesters who burned an effigy of President George W. Bush while he was attending a regional summit in Argentina to discuss the proposed trade
zone. Chavez said the failed accord was an attempt by the U.S. to “annex” Latin America.¶ Romney’s plan would seek to build upon free-trade deals the U.S. already
has in place, while creating a broader accord --the Reagan Economic Zone -- open to any nation “willing to abide by the rules,” according to a document posted on the
Romney campaign’s website.¶ Free Enterprise¶ “Governor Romney is committed to expanding America’s trading relationships in the region by working to deliver on
the promise of signed agreements, by pursuing new agreements, and by building a broader Reagan Economic Zone that strengthens ties among nations committed to
the principles of free enterprise,” Amanda Henneberg, a campaign spokeswoman, said in an e-mail.¶ The reference to Ronald Reagan might face skepticism in the
region, where people often associate the former president with U.S. support for the Contras in Nicaragua and the 1983 U.S. invasion of Grenada, according to
Shifter.¶ “Romney would have to establish trust, and probably evoking Reagan doesn’t quite have the resonance in Latin America that it has in the Tea Party,” he said,
referring to the U.S. political movement that has supported Republican candidates.¶ Connect Accords¶ As president, Romney would seek to “stitch up the agreements
we have” into a regional trade zone, former Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez, an adviser to the Republican nominee’s campaign, said during an interview Aug.
21. Such an effort would require nations in the region that have trade pacts with the U.S. to reduce economic barriers among themselves, he said.¶ The U.S. has in
place free-trade agreements with 10 Latin American and Caribbean nations: Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras,
Mexico, Nicaragua and Peru. An 11th accord, with Panama, is scheduled to take effect Oct. 31. Trade preferences in place for Ecuador are set to expire in 2013, and
U.S. relations with the nation have been strained over issues including Ecuador’s ties with Iran and Chavez.¶ It would be difficult to increase the number of trade
accords in Latin America because of probable opposition from nations whose leaders can be hostile to the U.S., Rubens Barbosa, Brazil’s ambassador to the U.S. from
1999 to 2004, said in a phone interview from Sao Paulo.¶ Mercosur
Bloc¶ A deal with the so-called Mercosur trade bloc, which includes
Brazil, Argentina and Venezuela, would also be a challenge because the Latin Americans would insist the U.S. reduce
barriers on agricultural imports, said Barbosa, who participated in the failed FTAA talks.¶ The U.S. filed a complaint
against Argentina in August at the Geneva-based World Trade Organization over restrictions on imports from the U.S.
Ten days later, Argentina fired back, telling the WTO that American import restrictions on Argentine meat weren’t
justified.¶ The biggest missing element in trade policy with Latin America is an accord between the U.S. and Brazil. The
nation’s $2.5 trillion economy is bigger than the combined size of the 11 regional nations that have free-trade pacts
with the U.S.¶ “It’s just a big honkin’ economy,” Scott Miller, a senior adviser for trade policy at the Center for Strategic
and International Studies in Washington, said in a phone interview. “There’s a big commercial relationship to be had.”¶
Competitive Edge¶ A deal with Brazil could expand exports of high-tech products and services in which the U.S. has a
competitive edge over China, which is also establishing a presence in the region, Miller said.¶ China is the biggest export
market for Brazil and Chile, the world’s top copper producer, and second-largest for Peru, Costa Rica and Cuba,
according to an April report published by theUnited Nations’ Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean,
known as Eclac. China is on track to surpass the European Union as Latin America’s second-biggest trading partner,
behind the U.S., it said.¶ “China is occupying space the U.S. has left vacant because the U.S. decided to commercially
neglect the region,” according to Barbosa.¶ Brazilian Tension¶ U.S. economic relations with Brazil, its eighth-largest
trading partner last year, are at the moment tense. During the last two months, the countries have sparred over
Brazil’s proposed tariff increases on industrial goods, U.S. monetary policy and agricultural subsidies. ¶ “I hardly think
it’s possible to have a trade agreement with Brazil because the thinking here is the U.S. cannot deliver what we want:
the opening of U.S. markets and reduction of subsidies as well as other protectionist practices in the agricultural area,”
Barbosa said.
Trade is the most significant source of tension between US and Brazil.
Aramayo and Pereira, 2011 (Carlos and Carlos, analysts for Brookings Institution, “Obama’s Visit to Latin America:
Redefining US-Brazil Relations”, http://www.brookings.edu/research/opinions/2011/03/15-brazil-us-aramayo-pereira,
DVO)
One issue which has been a particular source of friction in U.S.-Brazilian relations is trade. Last year, trade tensions
grew sharply after Brazil prevailed in its WTO cotton subsidies suit against the United States. Brazil was granted
permission to retaliate with trade barriers on several U.S. goods. The United States quickly managed to buy itself a
couple of years by subsidizing Brazilian cotton growers. However, this approach is unsustainable. Both countries are
food producers and are therefore competitors. The U.S. government should allow for its subsidies to expire so that
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free market competition can take place. The same is true for ethanol. Brazil has the technical knowhow of producing
high-quality ethanol that is cheaper and cleaner than U.S. ethanol. Yet, the American ethanol market is closed for Brazil.
Brazil is expanding its sphere of Latin American influence, they want the US to get out of the way
Aguado 12 - Research Associate at Council on Hemispheric Affairs. (Mar, “BRAZIL: PLAYING CHESS IN LATIN AMERICA”, 8/6/12, http://www.coha.org/brazilplaying-chess-in-latin-america/, HW)
Half a century ago, a spirit of “what is good for the USA is also good for Brazil” defined the Brazilian government’s
approach to foreign policy. Yet now Brazil is more aware of its power. As it seeks to expand its influence throughout and
beyond Latin America, its foreign policy increasingly collides with the historically U.S.-dominated role in guiding issues
such as trade and security matters. Since the 1990s, Brazil has risen as a regional power in Latin America by crafting
political and economic alliances with its neighbors. Its attempts to influence the outcome of elections and develop
economic exchanges in the region demonstrate its pursuit of a leadership role in Latin America—replacing the U.S. with a more
likeable partner and perhaps a more agreeable mix. Pointedly excluding the U.S., this conflict is likely to show one of Brazil’s
powerful introductory foreign policy moves as the country steps up its influence over policy thinking regarding
underlying tensions. However, the degree of Brazil’s international political power is confined by its adherence to several non-radical positions, such as its
peacekeeping efforts. Regionally, several organizations have grown as Latin American trade blocs, such as UNASUR, strengthen Brasilia’s position while excluding the
United States and Canada.(13) However,
the building up of Brazil’s hegemonic rivalry with the U.S. in Latin American policymaking amounts to a failure to seek a partnership and to open a dialogue between both countries. Though this “good
neighbor policy” has not yet encountered the many potential obstacles that await it, U.S.-Brazil relations could heat
up to the discomfiture of both. Consequently, Brazilian foreign policy is being altered dramatically in the 21st century as the country develops. To
assert and display its legitimacy as a regional power, Brazil is strategically increasing its presence through most of
Latin America. The region has in many ways become a Brazilian chessboard, in which the country is using political developments to
advance its interests as well as place its strategic economic and political pieces throughout the region. Now, a more serious Brazil challenges the
U.S. bickering game in Latin America, and aspires to become one of the pillars supporting the region through diverse
and more integrated engagements with its neighbors.
Brazil wants the US to stay out of Latin America
Meyer 13 – Analyst in Latin American affairs for the Congressional Research Service. (Peter, “Brazil-U.S. Relations ”, 2/27/13,
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL33456.pdf, HW)
Over the past decade, Brazil has firmly established itself as a regional power. Within South America, Brazilian foreign policy
supports economic and political integration efforts in order to reinforce long-standing relationships with its neighbors.
Although integration is the primary purpose of organizations like the Common Market of the South (Mercosur) and the Union of South American Nations (Unasur),
they also serve as forums in which Brazil
can exercise its leadership and develop consensus around its positions on regional and
global issues. Brazil’s emphasis on forging new ties has led to increased engagement with countries in Central America and the Caribbean, areas where
Brazil has not traditionally had much influence. Brazil engages in multilateral regional diplomacy through the
Organization of American States (OAS);48 however, it has demonstrated a preference for resolving issues through
regional forums that do not include the United States.
Brazil and the US are at odds over trade liberalization in Latin America—they have two completely
divergent perspectives.
Hornbeck, 06 (David, Congressional Research Service Specialist in International Trade and Finance, February 3, “Brazilian
Trade Policy and the US”, http://new.nationalaglawcenter.org/wp-content/uploads/assets/crs/RL33258.pdf, pages 3-4,
DVO)
The “trade preference” framework helps explain Brazil’s trade strategy. It pegs Brazil as a “regional leader” based on its
leadership in pressing for South American economic integration, its conditional support of multilateral negotiations, and
its reticence to consummate separate trade deals with developed countries.3 Brazil’s trade preferences in order of
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priority are: 1) expand and strengthen Mercosul, where Brazil is the undisputed industrial hub and political leader; 2)
advocate developing country interests in the Doha Round, especially on agricultural issues, and; 3) resist what it views
as a welfare reducing, U.S.-designed FTAA, and to a lesser extent, also a preferential trade arrangement with the
European Union unless it serves as a counter influence to the FTAA.4
Brazil and the United States approach trade liberalization from different perspectives. U.S. trade strategy has been
characterized as “competitive liberalization,”5 where simultaneously negotiating comprehensive multilateral,
regional, and bilateral pacts allows gains to be achieved where parties can agree. It is competitive in that gains at
one level of negotiation (e.g. bilateral or regional) can create new incentives or pressures to make breakthroughs
at other levels (e.g. regional or multilateral). It is comprehensive by its inclusion of issues that go beyond market
access such as services trade, intellectual property rights, government procurement, and investment.
Brazil has a narrower and more cautious tack, restricted largely to market access and dominance in regional trade,
where it feels most ready to compete. The perceived benefits of Brazil’s strategy include attaining greater
bargaining power through the Mercosul coalition, slowing the multilateral trade liberalization process to allow more
time for economic adjustment, and enhancing its national influence in the world by protecting domestic economic
(industrial) capacity. These “trade preferences” are not randomly determined, but are deeply embedded in the
country’s industrial, foreign, and macroeconomic policies, discussed below.
Brazil sees the US as a competitor within Latin America and seeks to deter its influence.
Hornbeck, 06 (David, Congressional Research Service Specialist in International Trade and Finance, February 3, “Brazilian
Trade Policy and the US”, http://new.nationalaglawcenter.org/wp-content/uploads/assets/crs/RL33258.pdf, pages 5-6,
DVO)
As with all countries, Brazil’s foreign policy shapes its trade preferences, but compared to the United States it plays a
more prominent role. Unlike the United States where trade policy is constitutionally defined as the responsibility of
Congress and carried out in a separate cabinet-level agency (the United States Trade Representative — USTR), in Brazil
it is undertaken by the executive branch under the purview of the Ministry of Foreign Relations. The most important
aspects of trade policy, therefore, are driven less by commercial interests and often are subordinated to a larger
foreign policy imperative, primarily, enhancing Brazil’s influence in Latin America and the world. In the Western
Hemisphere, this implies taking on the United States. In the words of one Brazilian expert, “Brazil’s foreign policy over
the past four decades is characterized by competition with the United States, and the objective of developing the
nation’s industrial capacity as a key condition for independent activities within the international system.”11
Economically, there are two sides to this policy: offensively, it seeks to integrate South America; defensively, it seeks to
deter encroaching U.S. economic influence in the region. Brazil’s government has taken steps recently to realize this
agenda, by establishing in 2004 the South America Community of Nations as a loosely interwoven example of political
and economic integration and by limiting progress on the U.S. version of the FTAA. Although intentions may not be
overtly adversarial, these two policies do present a challenge to the U.S. trade agenda. By extension, Brazil’s
leadership in the region is played out at the WTO where it is an unyielding force in pushing for reductions in agricultural
barriers in the Doha Round.
Brazil’s official trade stance is opposition to US encroachment in Latin America.
Hanson, 2012 (Stephanie, Associate Director of the Council on Foreign Relations, focusing on Latin America, July 2,
“Brazil on the International Stage”, http://www.cfr.org/brazil/brazil-international-stage/p19883, DVO)
On trade, Brazil has often taken a stance that aligns it with other developing nations and places it in opposition to
developed countries, including the United States. Brazil's trade policy is "not merely about making the nation
wealthier, but making the nation more powerful," says Matias Spektor, senior research fellow at CPDOC, a Brazilian
research center. In Latin America, it stauchly opposed the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas and announced its
intention to increase trade within the Mercosur bloc of countries. An April 2008 report (PDF) from the Wilson Center's
Brazil Institute said that Brazil is reluctant to expand its trade relations with the United States and the European Union
because "it fears that this would conflict with its south-south foreign policy strategy and potentially alienate its
developing world allies."
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Brazil views Latin America as its sphere of influence.
Shanmugasundaram 12 (Sasikumar Shanmugasundaram, Sasikumar completed his Master’s degree in International Relations and
European Studies at Central European University, August 4th 2012, Regional Hegemony and Emerging Powers: Theorizing India's Neighborhood
Policy,
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=4&ved=0CFMQFjAD&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.etd.ceu.hu%2F2012%2Fsha
nmugasundaram_sasikumar.pdf&ei=JmrbUd6sBOGgiQK_vIHgDw&usg=AFQjCNGo2dG4xf8s3m6gQarx-3lmciPEGQ&sig2=ALFAYpSuzbUxs5-uXVJzTQ,
7-8-13, DAG)
Brazil, on the other hand, attempts to exercise regional hegemony in South America 'to extend its long-standing focus
on sovereignty and autonomy to the continental level, wrapping it around core regional concerns."13 Its powerful
foreign ministry, Itamaraty. is keen on pursing "autonomy through diversification" of relations - combined with seeking
autonomy from the United States.14 In 2008 Brazil proposed the creation of a South American Defense Council (CSS)
aiming at NATO like defense alliance and regional armament industry following the Colombian military incursion into
Ecuadorian territory. The CSS is seen as a Brazilian strategy to exercise hegemonic power in South America. Burges
calls it "consensual hegemony' because "[t]he imperative was not to subsume other regional states to Brazilian will, but
instead to cycle the region-forming process through Brazil and position the country's propositions and prerogatives as
the central unifying factor of a potential South American region." Brazil's role in mediating territorial disputes between
Ecuador and Peru from 1995 to 199S. Its interest in solving the Colombian conflict, its leading role in troop commitment
and funding when the UN Security Council mandated action in Haiti, and its role in preventing coup attempts against
Paraguay and Venezuela shows Brazil's interest in exercising its hegemonic influence in the South American region.
Brazil hates Western hegemony and is uniting Southern countries against imperialist regimes
Gratius, Gomez ’13 (Susanne Gratius, PhD in Political Science from the University of Hamburg and the University Complutense
of Madrid, Her research focuses on EU-Latin American relations, Cuba, Venezuela, Brazil, and emerging powers; Miriam Gomez
Saraiva, Graduate Program in International Relations, State University of Rio de Janeiro, “Continental Regionalism: Brazil’s Prominent
Role in the Americas”, International Relations and Security Network, 4-06-2013,
http://www.fride.org/descarga/04_06_2013_ISNZURICH_SG.pdf)
In these times of change in the shaping of a new world order, Brazil
has begun to stand out for its assertive participation in
international politics, where it has favoured anti- hegemonic, multi-polar positions and its increasingly strong
leadership in its own region. During the Lula administration from 2003 to 2010, Brazil gradually started step- by-step to shoulder the costs inherent in
cooperation, governance and integration in the region. At that time, the Brazilian Development Bank BNDES – with a total budget that exceeds that of the InterAmerican Development Bank – began to finance infrastructure projects in South American. The election of Lula da Silva at the end of 2002 and the ensuing rise of an
autonomy- oriented group in Brazil’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs cast the country’s foreign policy in a new light. Diplomatic
support for existing
international regimes in the 1990s gave way to a proactive push towards modifying these regimes in favour of southern
countries or Brazil’s particular interests, which was defined by Lima as soft revisionism. The idea of bringing other emerging or poorer
southern countries on board to counterbalance the might of traditional Western powers served as the basis for the
country’s international actions. While coalitions with emerging partners helped boost Brazil’s global pretensions, its diplomatic efforts were geared
towards bolstering its international standing independently of any other nation, with its role as a global player being firmly grounded in the ideas of autonomy and
universalism that were the predominant diplomatic thinking at the time. Alongside
Brazil’s international rise, its leadership in South
America also started to be seen as a priority. Indeed, the moves to boost its global and regional projection came simultaneously and were seen by
Brazil as mutually beneficial. The cooperation with its regional neighbours was perceived by policy-makers as the best way for Brazil to realise its potential, support
economic development and form a bloc with stronger international influence. The creation of the South American Defence Council and the Brazilian command of the
UN peacekeeping force in Haiti, whose troops are drawn from different countries in the region, were seen as helping Brazil towards a permanent seat on the UN
Security Council. According to Flemes, in
its upward progress in a new, more multi-polar world order, Brazil would need regional
clout in global negotiations, but would not be tied down to any form of institutionalisation that might restrict its
autonomy.
Brazil’s foreign policy has expanded to Latin America: Brazil wants to keep the US out
Gratius, Gomez ’13 (Susanne Gratius, PhD in Political Science from the University of Hamburg and the University
Complutense of Madrid, Her research focuses on EU-Latin American relations, Cuba, Venezuela, Brazil, and emerging
powers; Miriam Gomez Saraiva, Graduate Program in International Relations, State University of Rio de Janeiro,
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“Continental Regionalism: Brazil’s Prominent Role in the Americas”, International Relations and Security Network, 4-062013, http://www.fride.org/descarga/04_06_2013_ISNZURICH_SG.pdf)
Under the Lula Presidency, closer relations with Cuba, Brazil’s military command of the UN stabilisation mission in
Haiti and its diplomatic influence in the political crisis in Honduras contributed to give the country a higher regional
profile and status. It was also Brazil, together with Venezuela that pushed for the transformation of the dialogue forum
Rio Group into the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (Celac), which held its first meeting in Brazil and
was officially created in 2011 in Caracas. Today, Brasilia’s regional policy is no longer limited to its own sphere of
influence but increasingly includes Central America and the Caribbean, the traditional backyard of the United States.
There was no agreement with the United States over how regional issues should be dealt with, but the absence of a
US policy for the region prevented any stand-off between the two countries. The Brazilian government has operated
autonomously whenever issues relating to the continent have arisen. Washington’s low-profile in Latin America and
the concentration of a few countries of strategic interest (Colombia, Central America and Mexico) facilitated Brazil’s
proactive Latin American policy. The Free Trade Agreement of the Americas (FTAA) project was the last attempt to
design a
hemispheric project. Its failure at the Summit in Mar del Plata in 2005 proved the limits of Washington’s traditional
hegemony in the Americas and contributed to a stronger regional profile of its rival in the South. Without a
hemispheric project, the Organization of American States (OAS) “lacks a guiding vision” [23] and lost appeal in Latin
America. Although the OAS is still the most consolidated collective institution in the Americas, it lacks both leadership
and followers. Moreover, a serious financial crisis is further weakening the traditional organisation. Brazil is promoting
regional concertation outside the traditional framework instead of increasing its weight in the inter-American
environment, which reflects a US hegemony. Against that background, Brazil perceives regional integration not only as
a goal in itself but also as an instrument for autonomy and ‘soft-balancing’ the United States.[24] Thus, its attitude
towards integration is not free of self-interest. Apart from common regional goals, the country also seeks to implement
a neighbourhood policy that serves Brazil’s power aspirations25 [25] in South America and the Americas.
Brazil’s establishment of Latin American organizations are designed to keep the US out; Celac shifts
Mexico’s focus towards Latin America
Gratius, Gomez ’13 (Susanne Gratius, PhD in Political Science from the University of Hamburg and the University
Complutense of Madrid, Her research focuses on EU-Latin American relations, Cuba, Venezuela, Brazil, and emerging
powers; Miriam Gomez Saraiva, Graduate Program in International Relations, State University of Rio de Janeiro,
“Continental Regionalism: Brazil’s Prominent Role in the Americas”, International Relations and Security Network, 4-062013, http://www.fride.org/descarga/04_06_2013_ISNZURICH_SG.pdf)
It is probably too early to predict that the Celac, launched in 2011, will become the third (and in any case less relevant)
circle in Brazil’s regional policy. The future of Celac heavily depends on the relationship between the two regional
players, Brazil and Mexico. The rivalry between the countries and their diverging strategies of global assertion
(Mexico by North-South and Brazil by South-South cooperation) still represent a major obstacle to regional cooperation
and a result-oriented political dialogue. Nonetheless, the election of Enrique Peña Nieto as President of Mexico, who
assumed the Presidency in December 2012, could represent a shift in Mexico’s US- oriented foreign policy towards a
more prominent role of Latin America and closer relations with Brazil.[27] The latter would be an important step to
consolidate Celac beyond Brazil and Venezuela’s power ambitions and ‘softbalancing’ strategies. The three platforms –
Mercosur, Unasur and Celac – are part of a complex regional and continental puzzle heavily influenced by Brazil. While
Mercosur serves to consolidate the alliance with Argentina and (more recently) Venezuela, South America is a label for
political stabilisation and cohesion and Celac is designed as a forum (or future organisation) for regional influence and
autonomy from the United States and, in political terms, a declining inter-American system based on the OAS. In this
sense, and although it is not and will probably never become a Latin American OAS, the Celac is seen as a counterweight to a declining inter-American system and a less hegemonic United States. Given its own power aspirations,
Brazil’s interests in the inter-American system led by the OAS and dominated by the US are rather limited. But even so,
up to now Brasilia has not been able to create a regional organisation that could, even in the long run, replace the OAS’
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sophisticated institutional structure, including its human rights system. [28] Brazil’s regionalism is clearly limited to Latin
America.
Brazil is taking the US role as regional hegemon in South America
Brand et al ’12 (Alexander Brand, Lecturer and Post-Doc Researcher at the Department of Political Science at the University of Mainz, M.A. in Political Science,
Philosophy and Media & Communication Sciences; Susan McEwen-Fial, Lecturer at the Department of Political Science at the University of Mainz; Wolfgang Muno,
Professor of Political Science; Andrea Ribeiro Hoffmann, Lecturer at the Willy Brandt School of Public Policy; “BRICs and U.S. Hegemony: Theoretical Reflections on
Shifting Power Patterns and Empirical Evidence from Latin America”; Mainz Papers on International and European Politics, Mainz: Chair of International Relations,
Johannes Gutenberg University; April 2012; https://international.politics.uni-mainz.de/files/2012/10/mpiep04.pdf”
Flemes and Radseck argue that, consequently, today “Brazil not only plays the leading part in defense and security
cooperation in South America, but has recently been increasing its military spending in order to secure its status as the
regional military dominant power” (Flemes/Radseck 2009: 15). The authors call attention to the fact that Brazil is the
only Latin America country which controls the technology to enrich uranium, and that “in search for state of the art
military technology, Brazil entered into a strategic partnership with France in December 2008, signing armaments
contracts of $ 8.5 billion. The acquisitions include four conventional Scorpene submarines, 50 trans- port helicopters,
and assistance in the construction of a hull for a future Brazilian nuclear submarine. Despite Brazil ś investments in its
neglected defense sector, these expenditures relative to its GDP remain low when compared to the cases of Chile and
Colombia. .. However, with respect to the relative military potential, Brazil ranks far ahead of its South American
neighbors” (ibid.). The investment in military capabilities is not directed at threatening its Latin American neighbors,
but rather to reaffirm its role as holder of the monopoly of violence inside national territory (especially in light of the
organized drugs problem), contribute to the peace and sta- bility in South America (balancing the U.S. by overtaking
the hegemon’s historical role) and indicate an aspiration for global affirmation as a power worth of respect (Bertonha
2010: 114- 115). As for the latter the Brazilian bid for a Permanent Seat the UN Security Council is a specific aspect as
well. In this sense, another investment has been on the training and joint exercises of troops to participate in
peacekeeping operations, the case of Haiti being the main example so far. As Kenkel states “since 2004 the states of
South America have become key contributors to the UN peace operations (PKOs), and one of the largest such missions the UN stabilizations mission in Haiti (Minustah) – has become a testing ground for a joint peacebuilding model being
developed by these countries. . . for South American troop contributors this is a natural vocation that , with Brazil at the
fore, they have begun to exercise with growing self-confidence as their global influence has grown (Kenkel 2010: 584).
Brazil hates U.S. interference in Latin America
Brand et al ’12 (Alexander Brand, Lecturer and Post-Doc Researcher at the Department of Political Science at the University of Mainz, M.A. in
Political Science, Philosophy and Media & Communication Sciences; Susan McEwen-Fial, Lecturer at the Department of Political Science at the
University of Mainz; Wolfgang Muno, Professor of Political Science; Andrea Ribeiro Hoffmann, Lecturer at the Willy Brandt School of Public Policy;
“BRICs and U.S. Hegemony: Theoretical Reflections on Shifting Power Patterns and Empirical Evidence from Latin America”; Mainz Papers on
International and European Politics, Mainz: Chair of International Relations, Johannes Gutenberg University; April 2012;
https://international.politics.uni-mainz.de/files/2012/10/mpiep04.pdf”
UNASUR is therefore another example in which balancing the U.S. was a main driving force in the Brazilian foreign
policy. Despite a range of disagreements between Brazil and Venezuela, and their own dispute for sub-regional
hegemony in South America, both countries share the discontentment with U.S.’s historical influence in Latin America,
and also, in particular, with its militarized approach to the narcotraffic conflicts in Colombia. The inclusion of security in
UNASUR’s objectives, and the creation of the South American Defence Council (SDC) under its auspices, has been a
novelty to South American practices of multilateral cooperation. These developments have not only affected the
bilateral relations between the U.S. and South American countries, but also the role of the OAS in the region. Its
collective defense component, the Inter american Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance (TIAR) was discredited after the U.S.
chose to support Great Britain and NATO over Argentina during the Falklands War in 1982, and practically dead after
Mexico renounced it in 2002 (Ribeiro-Hoffmann/Herz 2010).
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Latin America must resolve their own challenges- UNASUR proves
Pothuraju ’12 (Babjee Pothuraju, Research Assistant at the Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses, “UNASUR and
Security in South America”, Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses, 10-30-2012,
http://idsa.in/system/files/Backgrounder_UNASURandSecurityinSouthAmerica_Babjee.pdf)
One of the major challenges that has tested the credibility of UNASUR is the conflicting strategic interests pursued by
the region’s major countries – Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Argentina and Venezuela. These clashes of interests have
undermined the level of cooperation and integration in the region. Therefore, the Union needs to devise methods for
accommodating these conflicting interests in a mutually beneficial manner in order to prevent tensions. This can be
achieved by emphasizing upon shared values, cultural ties and security linkages. The influence of extra-regional
powers, chiefly the United States, on regional developments is another challenge. The United States has been
interfering in regional affairs over years through both bilateral agreements as well as through regional organisations
like the Organization of American States (OAS). This has resulted in the externalisation of domestic issues and delayed
their peaceful resolution. It is therefore imperative that these extra- regional influences be kept in check. Though the
role of the United States cannot be ignored in South American politics because of its geo-political location and historical
factors, it has to be reduced to the minimum extent possible by finding regional solutions for regional problems and
encouraging regional players to take a proactive role in regional issues.
Brazil is the unquestioned hegemon of South America but wants to expand its hegemonic role to
Latin America to counteract US influence—plan interferes.
Kovac, 2011 (Ivan, Professor of Political Science at Maja Bel University, Slovakia, April, “Mexico and Brazil: Forming the
Regional Player’s Role”, http://www.culturaldiplomacy.org/academy/content/pdf/participant-papers/2011/april/biecroa-nua/ivan_kovac_participant_paper_-_mexico_and_brazil-forging_the_regional_players_role.pdf, DVO)
Recent position of Brazil in the Latin American region is closely tied with its role of the leader in South American area.
This leadership, exercised in both political and economic means, manifests itself also in integration impulses the
country has offered. Core of its strong position in the mentioned sub-region is the existence of a strategic concept and
framework of action that has been present in its foreign policy doctrine over the long run. Since the creation of
Mercosur, Brazil has continuously strived for a strong position by offering compromise and dialogue with all states of
the region. The phenomena of active political and military engagement, introduced at the onset of Lula’s era, together
with regional economic dominance helped the country to build a counter-pole of US influence in the region. ¶ Nowadays,
Brazil is the main engine of South American integration at all its fronts –from Mecrosur through UNASUR as far as
energetic and military issues are concerned. Thanks to Lula’s ability to find the modus vivendi with Venezuela, the
country succeeded in hiring a player that represents the third power center in Latin America. Venezuela, unlike Brazil,
is making use of petrodollar diplomacy and offers a political and ideological alternative in the fight with the US. Chávez’s
influence on some countries in the region and his active engagement in integration policy make him a valuable ally for
Lula who knows that a good relationship with Venezuela is a basic precondition for the realization of Brazil’s policy. ¶
Country’s added value is the good level of relations with all members of the Latin American community, mainly thanks
to the conciliatory approach to political disputes and a tendency to opt for a compromise solution in the sense of a
community spirit. Wide dimension of its policy and global ambitions of the country, that has better political and
economic position in the international arena than any other country from the region, are another important factor
legitimizing Brazil’s ambition to lead the whole community. At the global level, Brazil has firmly assumed the leadership
of the entire region by defending its interests in the international economic arena and is ready to continue doing so in
the UN SC as well. ¶ Widening the focus scope from primarily South-American oriented to make it more Latin-American
still remains a challenge for the future. Undoubtedly, Brazil has succeeded to build a leading position in South America
but in order to attain its ultimate goal, it seems inevitable to enlarge the area of action by Central America as well as
The Caribbean, where still a strong US and Mexican influence persists.
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Brazil’s foreign policy goal is to establish a united Latin America in opposition to US hegemony—
plan interferes.
Kovac, 2011 (Ivan, Professor of Political Science at Maja Bel University, Slovakia, April, “Mexico and Brazil: Forming the
Regional Player’s Role”, http://www.culturaldiplomacy.org/academy/content/pdf/participant-papers/2011/april/biecroa-nua/ivan_kovac_participant_paper_-_mexico_and_brazil-forging_the_regional_players_role.pdf, DVO)
The concept of a united South America represents “a contra-project to North America (including Mexico and Central
America) dominated by the US.“11 Brazil as the leader of this sub-region advocates the principles of a consensual
leadership based on co-operation which contrasts with US often used unilateralism. To reach the goal, which is the
formation of a hemispheric counterbalance to the US, Brazil wants to use the instruments of economic co-operation
amplified by a political consensus in bilateral relations. Since Lula’s takeover, Brazil made huge efforts for the benefit
of regional integration and engaged itself in the conflict resolution within some countries of the region. Its diplomatic
intervention in Venezuela, Bolivia as well as an offer to mediate with ELN in Colombia support the idea that the factor
of political leadership has been fully accepted as a modus operandi of Brazil’s diplomacy.
Brazil is the unquestioned hegemon of Latin America—economic and military strength.
Kovac, 2011 (Ivan, Professor of Political Science at Maja Bel University, Slovakia, April, “Mexico and Brazil: Forming the
Regional Player’s Role”, http://www.culturaldiplomacy.org/academy/content/pdf/participant-papers/2011/april/biecroa-nua/ivan_kovac_participant_paper_-_mexico_and_brazil-forging_the_regional_players_role.pdf, DVO)
Brazil is the most populous and the largest country of Latin America. As a giant, it has common borders with all South
American countries except for Chile and Ecuador. These constant factors are a kind of predestination for Brazil to play
a leading role in the Latin American region. The influence that the country has been continuously gaining makes it
nowadays the most influential country in the region. Recent development inside the country characterized by relative
stability of political scene and an explosive economic growth make it a potential big power. An important recognition is
the fact that „in Brazil, unlike in many other countries in the region and particularly Mexico, the enormous differences
in development …did not result in political polarization.“8 Pro-active policy of Lula da Silva’s administration (20032010) put the country inside the game on the world’s principal forums without having omitted or underestimated the
region of South America as well as Latin America in general. Brazil is the player number one in military affairs in the
entire Latin American region and its military capacities are incomparably better than those of any other state of the
region.
The mandate that Brazil derives from its military superiority enables the country to lead the effort toward deepening of
regional integration in military and security affairs using a bold pattern comparable to the one of the NATO in the
Northern hemisphere. Economic relations of the country give an example of a highly diversified economic policy
stretching from the US, through the EU as far as the Asian-Pacific region.9
This balanced economic orientation, which contrasts with Mexico’s dependence on the US economy, makes it possible
for Brazil to act effectively on international fore and thus easily gain the trust of other states. Mercosur’s strong
economic structure and Brazil’s dominance therein enables it to play an uncontested leading role in the integration
effort of South America. A prudent foreign policy with a high level of autonomy in decision-making process as well as
non-conflicting actions make it possible for Brazil to pursue a proper strategy of relations with other countries of the
region, which is furthermore fomented by strong economic linkages.
When the US treats Brazil as a regional junior partner, relations break—plan is an instance.
Burnett, 2013 (Alistair, Editor of the BBC World News Tonight, June 13, The Nation Magazine, “Brazil Balks at Serving as
Junior Partner to the US”, http://www.nationmultimedia.com/opinion/Brazil-balks-at-serving-as-junior-partner-to-theU-30208163.html, DVO)
Washington cuts Brasilia far less slack. One reason may be a surprising lack of knowledge and understanding of each
other's policies and priorities. Americans seem in no hurry to make up for this deficit in knowledge. While tourism has
increased in both directions in recent years, there are still no direct flights between Brasilia and Washington. South
America is not high on Washington's list of priorities, given the challenges from China, turmoil in the Middle East, war
in Afghanistan and nuclear threats from North Korea. Historically, the US has regarded the rest of the Americas as its
backyard, taking for granted it will remain that way. Despite a direct challenge to US policies in the region from the late
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Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez, this US outlook on southern neighbours has not changed much. President Barack
Obama, unlike his predecessor, has stressed that Washington needs to work with allies and friends to achieve foreignpolicy goals, rather than go it alone. But old habits die hard. Part of the reaction to Brazil's Iran initiative lies in a
Washington mindset that the US is predominant; it welcomes the policies of emerging powers if they accord with
Washington's.¶ Brazil, too, has blinders. Like the US, it's a huge, complex country more concerned with matters at
home than abroad. Like the US, it supports the interests of domestic constituencies, such as the huge agribusinesses
producing soya; this brings it into direct competition with the US, also a major agricultural producer. With its emerging
economy and burgeoning economic links with Asia and Africa, Brasilia has begun to project influence on the world stage,
with an expanded diplomatic service and new embassies across the global South. This, added to its distinct policy
agenda, means it rubs against American interests more often. Brazil sees itself as a consensus-seeker in global affairs
and emphasises soft power, eschewing use of military force in international affairs. In many ways, Brazil represents
an implicit challenge to the US's sense of its role in the world. A strong thread through US foreign policy has been the
idea of US exceptionalism - that the US serves as an example to the world. In recent years, this ideology has tempted US
theorists like Samuel Huntington or Ivo Daalder to think that if only the whole world were democratic and shared "its
values" there could be a true Pax Americana. Yet Brazil is a democracy that does not always agree with the US,
especially when it comes to use of force. Crucially, unlike India, which is culturally and geographically distant from the
US, Brazil is a New World society and political system, and as such represents a potentially attractive alternative model
to the US for emerging economies. ¶ This challenge, added to different approaches in how international affairs should
be conducted, and the reluctance of Washington to accept the changing global balance of power, produce
fundamental tensions between Brasilia and Washington, not easily resolved even if there was a will in either capital
to do so.
Brazil’s foreign policy strategy aggressively seeks to check US retrenchment in Latin America in a variety of ways, they
would react negatively to the plan.
Center for Hemispheric Defense Studies, 2010 (“Grand Strategy for Assertiveness: International Security and US-Brazil Relations”,
National Defense University, March 24, https://www6.miami.edu/hemispheric-policy/Task_Force_Papers/CostaGrand_Strategy_for_Assertiveness.pdf, page 6-7, DVO)
Brazil’s strategy also involves redesigning and expanding relations with the Latin American and the Caribbean region.
Important here may be the perception that the United States, either by design or as a result of the course of events, is
retrenching as the dominant actor in the region. This is illustrated by the fact that Hugo Chávez is able to expand his
influence and forge an anti-U.S. movement with sympathetic partners, influencing internal politics in many countries
with aid and electoral contributions, promoting constitutional changes and bullying Colombia. Such U.S. retrenchment
could also partially explain China’s expanding trade and investment presence in the hemisphere, the diplomatic
overtures of Iran and Russia to explore relations and gain a foothold on the continent, and their efforts to gather
votes from countries in the region on issues to be decided in international organizations. ¶ In this environment, Brazil is
pursuing two regional campaigns. In Central America, it expanded its diplomatic presence by opening new
representative offices and with Lula making regular visits to Central America and the Caribbean. Brazil has also
gradually strengthened its relations with Cuba, including investments and defense dialogues. In coordination with the
United States, Brazil has introduced new ideas and processes to assist small, tropical countries to expand their use of
bio-fuels to increase available energy sources and diversify their economies. Most importantly, Brazil has been a
faithful supporter, since 2004, of UN operations in Haiti. And with the tragic consequences of the January 2010
earthquake, Brazil’s leadership promises that it will be a leader in continuing the UN’s MINUSTAH mission and in
coordinating relief and reconstruction efforts. With the largest troop contingent and credibility in coordinating with local
political forces and contributing countries, Brazil’s willingness to retain forces in Haiti can be considered a leading
indicator of its commitment. Of course, the collateral gains Brazil may achieve with its diplomacy and global presence
will depend on how well it will compare with the overwhelming commitment of the United States in helping Haiti.¶ In
South America, Brazil has designed a diplomatic campaign around the Union of the South American Nations (UNASUL)
and the South American Defense Council (CDS). In practical terms, both institutions function basically for diplomatic talk
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and discreet consultation on disputes among its members - that is, they are fora where ideas are conveyed, tested and
promoted, and where disputes and controversies can be aired publicly. Internal controversies over sovereignty issues
(Peru-Chile, Bolivia-Chile and Ecuador-Colombia) and ideological differences (led by Chávez) have undermined the
progress of both institutions. As a result, Brazil’s pursuit of its interests and projects continues to take place largely at
the bilateral level. Thus, Brazil has woven a pattern of radial bilateral relations, characterized by dialogue and projects
of bilateral interest, with all its neighbors.13¶ Since 1999, a dominant goal of the CDS has been to promote military and
defense collaboration among member states in South America, without foreign interference. So far, however, it is not
clear what form the CDS will eventually take. At this point, it has not projected itself as a political-military alliance, in the
style of NATO, nor is it a substitute for diplomatic mobilization as countries face the diminished importance and
effectiveness of the Organization of American States (OAS). Despite the declared support of Council members, little
progress has been made. Colombia has preferred to have the United States as its ally rather than rely on the CDS for its
security. Bilateral disputes, such as those between Chile and Peru, are negotiated through other channels. Projects for
joint defense industries or joint strategic studies face a lack of practical proposals and shared funding. Finally, the 2009
agreement between Colombia and the United States, involving the United States’ use of Colombian bases for anti-drug
efforts, while generating concern in Brazil and other countries, bolstered the resolve and the regional autonomy of
the Colombian government and showed the limits of South American efforts to work together.
Brazil views US attempts to intervene in Latin America as attempts to sideline Brazil in the
international community.
Center for Hemispheric Defense Studies, 2010 (“Grand Strategy for Assertiveness: International Security and US-Brazil
Relations”, National Defense University, March 24, https://www6.miami.edu/hemisphericpolicy/Task_Force_Papers/Costa-Grand_Strategy_for_Assertiveness.pdf, page 10-11, DVO)
A mutually-acceptable approach that could improve Brazil-U.S. collaboration in helping other countries and improving
international relations in the Americas has so far been elusive. While Washington focused on the struggle in the
Middle East, on the global terrorist challenge and on its own financial crisis, most of the rest of the Americas, including
Brazil, received little attention from the United States on the political agenda. Washington’s attention to security
developments in Colombia and Mexico continues; however, many Brazilians feel that the political presence, interest
and influence of the United States in the region reached its lowest point at the close of the Bush administration.
Developments under President Barack Obama have either been on issues where Brazil is a player (Honduras and biofuel exports to the United States) or have been reactions to external events, such as the earthquake in Haiti.
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Mexico
US involvement in Mexico is unpopular in Latin America.
Kovac, 2011 (Ivan, Professor of Political Science at Maja Bel University, Slovakia, April, “Mexico and Brazil: Forming the
Regional Player’s Role”, http://www.culturaldiplomacy.org/academy/content/pdf/participant-papers/2011/april/biecroa-nua/ivan_kovac_participant_paper_-_mexico_and_brazil-forging_the_regional_players_role.pdf, DVO)
The position of Mexico within Latin America is determined by its geographical and geopolitical surroundings and the
government’s foreign policy. From the historical point of view, it is worth mentioning that “Mexico’s dual geopolitical
position as both the North of Latin America and the South of North America implicates troubles to find a place in the
Latin American game and to integrate the vision of connector of both sides of the triangle.“7 After the tenure of Fox,
when the country witnessed weakening of its position in the region, the new times have come with Calderón in
December 2006 which allow to hope for a formulation of Mexico’s new strategy towards Latin America. In order to
implement this new policy, it is inevitable to gain the trust of all relevant community members, something that
Calderón partially succeeded in after having rebuilt the relationship with both Venezuela and Cuba. Clear definition of
country’s stance towards the US policy in the region remains another important aspect of success. The reason to do
that is that the US has continuously been acting as a divisive actor in the region and the alleged nexus of Mexico to
Washington is misused by anti-American regimes of Latin America as an argument to avoid the acceptation of Mexico’s
influence in the region. Thus the major failure of Fox’s administration was the pursuing, if not copying, of the US policy
towards the region, which would later cause not only a loss of autonomy in foreign-policy building but lead also to
grave misunderstandings in relations with some states.
Mexico aff link—plan props up Mexico which makes them a strategic competitor against Brazil for regional
hegemony, angering Brazil.
Kovac, 2011 (Ivan, Professor of Political Science at Maja Bel University, Slovakia, April, “Mexico and Brazil: Forming the
Regional Player’s Role”, http://www.culturaldiplomacy.org/academy/content/pdf/participant-papers/2011/april/biecroa-nua/ivan_kovac_participant_paper_-_mexico_and_brazil-forging_the_regional_players_role.pdf, DVO)
The prospects of an eventual Mexico’s or Brazil’s leadership in Latin American region stem from at least two kinds of
aspects – constant and variable ones. Constant factors such as the geographic allocation or the area make it easier for
Brazil to achieve the leading position in South America, whereas Mexico has to cope with the role of a country stuck in
between two blocks with conflicting interests. Its NAFTA membership had become a watershed event and made the
country play two games at once, which partially led to abandonment of a purely Latin American dimension of Mexico’s
foreign policy. Besides this fact, Mexico’s reputation in Latin America had been seriously harmed by a series of
disputes with regional partners during the tenure of previous president Vicente Fox (2000-2006). Thus, Mexico has
lost the prospect to become the uncontested leader of the region, but still has a way to take. Its future depends on the
ability to position itself into the role of a connector being able to understand the interests of its own community vis-à-vis
the US and to act as a facilitator in the mutual interaction of the North and the South of the hemisphere.
On the other hand, Brazil is an uncontested leader of South America and was able to find an effective modus vivendi
with the most complicated regimes of the region. If it retains a high level of co-operation with Chávez’s regime, there
will be no obstacles to achieve its vision of a more stable and secure South America. Brazil’s desire to unite South
America by means of various forms of integration and co-operation demonstrates its bold ambitions and helps gain
prestige in the global context as well. However, taking into account that Brazil’s activities are almost exclusively
concentrated in South America, an impediment comes up on the way to achieve the desired position of the leader of
the entire region.
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***LINK MAGNIFIERS:
Status quo solves US-Brazil cooperation and Brazilian regional influence but – Brazil is suspicious of
US policy – only a risk of a link
Espach and Tulchin 2010 (Joseph and Ralph, “Brazil’s Rising Influence and Its Implications for Other Latin American
Nations”, CAN,
http://www.cna.org/sites/default/files/CNA%20Brazils%20Rise%20and%20Implications%20for%20Neighbors.pdf)
Perhaps the central question for U.S. strategists regarding Latin America is: Does the United States prefer a region under
Brazilian leadership, especially on security issues, or a region with a less coherent power structure in which security
threats are managed in an ad hoc fashion? The posture of the U.S. government recently has been supportive of
Brazilian leadership. However, Brazilian suspicions about the United States and its true interests in the region run
deep . Until Brazil’s internal debates regarding overall strategy are resolved, Brazil likely will maintain positive,
cooperative relations with the United States, but not at the cost of limiting its broader global strategic options .
Low Threshold for a link – Brazil perceives itself as a regional power
Espach and Tulchin 2010 (Joseph and Ralph, “Brazil’s Rising Influence and Its Implications for Other Latin American
Nations”, CAN,
http://www.cna.org/sites/default/files/CNA%20Brazils%20Rise%20and%20Implications%20for%20Neighbors.pdf)
International pundits and analysts have only recently decided that Brazil qualifies as a rising global power,1 but
generations of Brazilians have assumed that it was destined to become o ne. Since its independence in 1889,
Brazilians have shared with the United States a bedrock self-perception of uniqueness and destiny. Like the United
States’ notion of Manifest Destiny, Brazilians have imagined themselves distinct from their smaller neighbors and
blessed with an abundance of land and resources to support a prosperous, industrial, and independent nation capable of
global leadership and worthy of emulation. Brazil has only needed to develop its internal resources, and industrialize
its economy; regional leadership and global influence would naturally follow.
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***IMPACT MODULES:
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Stability Internals:
Brazil-US relations key to maintaining global stability
Lobe 12-Journalist for the Inter Press Service (Jim, “Brazil, Turkey, India, Indonesia Key to U.S.-Backed Global Order”,
11/8/12, http://www.ipsnews.net/2012/11/brazil-turkey-india-indonesia-key-to-u-s-backed-global-order/, MB)
WASHINGTON, Nov 28 2012 (IPS) - The United States should focus increasingly on courting Brazil, India, Indonesia and Turkey, four
“global swing states” critical to the preservation of the Western-dominated international order, according to a new report
released here Tuesday by two major U.S. think tanks.¶ With the post-World War II global order facing challenges such as the rise of China, the
fiscal difficulties of Western governments, and unresolved crises over North Korea’s and Iran’s nuclear programmes,
these four nations, if given incentives, can play a crucial role maintaining and renewing the strength of existing international
institutions, it says.¶ “The United should …seize the opportunity to enlarge the international order’s base of supporters to include Brazil, India, Indonesia, and
Turkey,” according to the two main authors, Daniel Kliman of the German Marshall Fund (GMF) and Richard Fontaine, president of the Center for a New American
Security (CNAS), a think tank that has enjoyed significant influence with the administration of President Barack Obama. ¶ “ These
four nations each
possess a large and growing economy, a strategic location in their region and a commitment to democratic
institutions. And critically, each nation’s precise international role is now in flux,” they noted.¶ As with “swing states” in the U.S.
electoral system, focusing on the four countries “can deliver a geopolitical payoff, because their approach to the international
order is more fluid and open than those of China or Russia,” according to the report.¶ “In addition, the choices that (they) make –
about whether to take on new global responsibilities, free ride on the efforts of established powers or complicate the solving of key challenges –
may, together, decisively influence the trajectory of the current international order.Ӧ The new report comes amidst a lengthy
debate sparked in major part by the 2008 financial crisis and the subsequent Euro crisis and the widespread perception – or reality – that the West, including the U.S.,
is in decline relative to “the Rest”, notably China and other emerging powers.¶ How Washington should react to this perception or reality – particularly with respect
to preserving an international structure of institutions that have served the West well – has been the subject of a flood of books and reports, not to mention an
endless number of think tank discussions.¶ America’s engagement with these four countries is critical and can influence their choices and enlarge their capacity to
take on new responsibilities – but it remains a work in progress.”¶ The report divides the current order into five components – trade, finance, maritime, nonproliferation, and human rights – and notes each country’s record – and areas of agreement and disagreement with the U.S. – with regard to each component.
US-Brazil Cooperation is key to resolving Cuba and FARC
ITF 11, Independent Task Force Report No. 66 (Council on Foreign Relations, “Global Brazil and? U.S.-Brazil
Relations”, 2011, i.cfr.org/content/publications/attachments/Brazil_TFR_66.pdf)
In the Americas, the Task Force likewise encourages USAID and? ABC to advance cooperation in Haiti and applauds
existing bilateral? and multilateral collaboration under Brazil’s leadership of Minus -? tah . Also in the Caribbean, the Task
Force considers that the United? States can learn from Brazil’s presence in Cuba. The Brazilian government? and
private sector engages Cubans across a number of issues and? industries, including energy and agriculture, and can
share instructive? experience with respect to the many dimensions of Cuba’s transition.? Colombia is fruitful ground
for U.S.-Brazil collaboration on? gender, health, security, and social issues. More than three million? Colombians
(largely women and children of indigenous or African? descent) have been displaced from their land, making them,
according? to the UN High Commission for Refugees, the world’s largest? population of internally displaced persons
(IDPs). Arguably, a critical? dimension of resolving Colombia’s conflict resides in a sound rural? strategy that includes
the redistribution of ill-gotten land, among? other measures.53 To advance peace and security in Colombia, Brazil?
and the United States each have significant resources and expertise? that together could help Colombia protect and
assist its IDPs and? develop its rural regions in a socially, economically, and environmentally? sustainable way.
Key to regional stability
FP 12, Foreign Policy (Ian Bremmer, “Brazil wants some Security Council love. But it won't get it (yet)”, April 3, 2012,
http://eurasia.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2012/04/03/brazil_wants_some_security_council_love_but_won_t_get_it_yet)
When Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff travels to Washington next week, she won't be looking for a free trade deal or
military assistance. Her country, the "B" that begins the "BRICS," primarily wants recognition -- specifically U.S. support
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for a permanent seat on a revamped U.N. Security Council. But this time around, Rousseff won't even be getting a state
dinner.? Washington, due mainly to bureaucratic inertia, isn't ready to give Brazil the recognition it wants. Its reluctance
may actually encourage other nations to behave in ways contrary to U.S. interests.? Years of macroeconomic stability,
sustainable economic growth, and a cluster of successful social policies gave rise not only to a new and thriving
Brazilian middle class, but also to Brazilian multinational companies, the so-called national champions. Externally,
these changes translated into greater confidence -- inside and outside official circles -- and a wider scope of
international ambitions .? Brazil is beginning to display the characteristics of a regional hegemon -- it has attracted
more illegal immigrants from surrounding countries, and helped Colombia's government conduct rescue missions for
hostages held by the FARC. And since 2004, Brazil has been leading the U.N. stabilization mission in Haiti . But Brazil's
"holy grail" remains a seat at the Security Council table. And it won't get recognition (yet) from the most important
member of the Permanent Five, whose support it very much covets.? According to many foreign policy specialists in
Washington, Brazil does not deserve a place in the top echelons of the U.N. because it is not a nuclear power and is
unwilling to share the burden of leadership. Another line of reasoning highlights the fact that the U.S. does not endorse
Brazil's bid -- as it did with India -- because South America is not a very relevant region in the U.S. strategic chessboard.
The remaining argument point to the fact that a potential endorsement could hurt U.S. interests with other key allies in
the region, specifically Mexico and Colombia.? Even if some of these considerations may hold elements of truth, at the
end of the day they hamper the deepening of relations between the two largest democracies and economies in the
Western hemisphere. Brazil could do a better job explaining to the U.S. -- and the world -- how it would behave as a
permanent member of the Security Council; but the U.S. could also rethink some of its arguments against Brazil.? The
fact that Brazil is not a nuclear power and that South America is not a relevant strategic hotspot should count in favor
of Brazil's aspirations, not against. If the region is relatively calm, it is because of the collective effort of Brazil and
Argentina to end their economic and military rivalry in the 1980s. As a matter of fact, the rapprochement also defused
the nuclear component of the rivalry, something that India and Pakistan were not able to do. The U.S. decision to
endorse India's bid and ignore Brazil's sends a perverse message. It awards a country that snubbed every major
nonproliferation regime while punishing a country that willingly adhered to these very same regimes.? Although the
repercussion of the endorsement of Brazil's bid over U.S. interests with key allies in the region is likely to be negative, its
importance is widely overplayed. Even nuclear Pakistan's outright resistance did not factor in U.S. geopolitical calculus
when it endorsed India's bid. In addition, for some time now, the U.S.-Latin American agenda is in fact a collage of
increasingly specific bilateral relations. Any dissatisfaction, therefore, could be dealt with bilaterally without any
relevant repercussion on the regional agenda.? Next week's visit by Rousseff is likely to pass without the words that
Brazil wants to hear from President Barack Obama. Those words will eventually come from Obama or a future U.S.
president, but their absence in the short term will keep relations between the Western Hemisphere's two most
important democracies from reaching their productive potential.
US-Brazil Cooperation key to international relations
INSS 12, Institute for National Strategic Studies (E. Richard Downes, “Trust, Engagement, and ? Technology
Transfer: ? Underpinnings for U.S.-Brazil ? Defense Cooperation”, August 2012,
http://www.ndu.edu/press/lib/pdf/StrForum/SF-279.pdf)
Decisions by the United States and Brazil either ? to continue the current level of dialogue and engagement on
defense and security issues or enhance the ? relationship will define future bilateral security cooperation both globally
and within the Americas. Only ? a conviction by political leaders and senior defense ? officials in both countries that
major benefits will accrue to each nation’s posture can move the reinvigorated relationship to higher levels. President
Obama ? and President Rousseff took such a step during their ? April 2012 Washington meeting by establishing a ? U.S.Brazil Defense Cooperation Dialogue. The presidents noted the importance of enhanced dialogue in ? enabling closer
bilateral cooperation, based on mutual ? respect and trust, and providing a forum for exchanging views and identifying
opportunities for collaboration on defense issues around the world. The first ? meeting of the Defense Cooperation
Dialogue took ? place in Brasilia 2 weeks later. Consistent with the ? 2010 Defense Cooperation Agreement, Defense
Secretary Leon Panetta and Defense Minister Amorim ? stated that they intend for defense cooperation to focus on six
priority categories of activity during 2012: ? science, innovation, and technology transfer; logistics; ? communications;
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humanitarian assistance and disaster ? response; cooperation in support of African nations; ? and cybersecurity.35? If
Brazil gains confidence that a powerful northern ? neighbor is its partner in defense, instead of an indifferent bystander
or worse, the South American state can ? focus on advancing its national security and development without
unnecessary defense burdens. The United ? States benefits from having the trust and confidence ? of a new
international and regional power, although ? there may not be full agreement on every matter of ? policy. The United
States can focus on ways to achieve ? “real progress on bilateral, hemispheric, and global issues” through a more
constructive relationship with an ? emerging regional player. A more fluid transfer of U.S. ? defense technology, by
understanding Brazilian terms, ? can be a catalyst and a test case for interactive cooperation. Given appropriate levels of
political will on both ? sides, increasing the intensity of defense engagement ? and cooperation between “friends at
the same level,” in ? the words of former Minister Jobim,36 could result in a ? major transformation in Brazil-U.S.
security relations ? and bring important benefits to both countries.? The United States should welcome Brazil as a
true ? and equal partner in international affairs. Each shares a ? vital interest in hemispheric prosperity and peace and
? in a strong normative antiproliferation regime. With no ? territorial or imperial ambitions, the two powers ought ?
to see each other as equally interested in bolstering international peace and security as the best way to buttress the
world against terrorism, crime, and the threat ? of nuclear war. It is long past time for the two giants ? of the Western
Hemisphere to increase their defense ? cooperation, whatever may be the titles given to agreements between them.
US-Brazil relations key to defense
Meyer 13 (Peter, 2/27, Analyst in Latin American Affairs, “Brazil-U.S. Relations”, Date accessed: 7/6/13,
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL33456.pdf, LE)
According to the U.S. Department of Defense, cooperation with Brazil’s Ministry of Defense and ¶ the Brazilian
military is closer today than it has been at any point in over 30 years. The U.S. and ¶ Brazilian militaries have worked
together closely in Haiti, where Brazil commands the U.N. ¶ Stabilization Mission (MINUSTAH). Joint efforts in the
aftermath of Haiti’s January 2010 ¶ earthquake were the largest combined operations of U.S. and Brazilian military
forces since ¶ World War II. In April 2010, the United States and Brazil signed a Defense Cooperation ¶ Agreement
designed to promote cooperation in areas such as research and development, ¶ technology security, and acquisition
of defense products and services. This was followed by a ¶ General Security of Military Information Agreement, signed in
November 2010, which is ¶ designed to facilitate the sharing of classified defense and military information. In an effort to
¶ elevate bilateral defense ties, President Rousseff¶ joined with President Obama in April 2012 to ¶ launch a
presidential-level Defense Cooperation Dialogue. Additional areas of defense ¶ cooperation include information
exchanges, combined military training, and joint military ¶ exercises.¶ 99¶ Two pending defense procurement deals
could impact future military ties between the United ¶ States and Brazil. The Brazilian air force intends to purchase 36
new fighter jets, and the Boeing ¶ F/A-18 Super Hornet is one of three finalists al¶ ong with the Saab JAS-39 Gripen of
Sweden and ¶ the Dassault Rafale of France. Brazil’s National Defense Strategy places significant emphasis on ¶
building the country’s domestic defense industry, and technology transfer is reportedly a top ¶ consideration in the
fighter deal. According to U.¶ S. officials, the technology transfer package the ¶ United States has offered is
unprecedented in the U.S.-Brazil relationship and is the same type of ¶ package that the United States provides its
closest partners in the North Atlantic Treaty ¶ Organization (NATO).¶ 100¶ Nevertheless, Brazilian officials remain
wary of relying on U.S. ¶ hardware as a result of past experiences¶ 101¶ in which the U.S. government blocked sales
of ¶ Brazilian arms containing U.S. technology.¶ 102¶ A final decision has been delayed for several years ¶ and is
reportedly now scheduled for mid-2013.¶ 10
US-Brazil cooperation is key to regional stability
Council on Foreign Relations ’12 (Council on Foreign Relations, Joint Statement from the Fourth US-Brazil Global
Partnership Dialogue, “Joint Statement from the Fourth US-Brazil Global Partnership Dialogue, October 2012”; 10-242012, http://www.cfr.org/brazil/joint-statement-fourth-us-brazil-global-partnership-dialogue-october-2012/p29340)
On October 24, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Minister of External Relations Antonio de Aguiar
Patriota conducted the fourth meeting of the United States - Brazil Global Partnership Dialogue (GPD) in Washington,
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D.C. The GPD was first established in 2010 and elevated to the presidential level by President Barack Obama and
President Dilma Rousseff in March 2011. This meeting was preceded by senior-level regional consultations on Africa,
Asia and Pacific, South Asia, and the Middle East. Secretary Clinton and Minister Patriota stressed the important role
the GPD has played in strengthening cooperation between our two countries, and reaffirmed the joint commitment to
form a U.S.-Brazil Partnership for the 21st Century between the governments and peoples of the two nations. The GPD
provides a forum through which our countries work together to promote cooperation and dialogue on a broad range
of bilateral, regional, and multilateral issues. The participants expressed satisfaction with the progress under the GPD
since the last ministerial on April 16, 2012 in Brasilia. Consultations have been held on the Middle East and Asia that
complement dialogues on Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean; economic and commercial issues; science,
technology, innovation, and the environment; internet communication and cyber-related issues; and education, culture,
and social inclusion. These consultations will continue to facilitate understanding and cooperation between our two
countries. Noting the interdependence among peace, security, and development, Secretary Clinton and Minister
Patriota reaffirmed their desire to build a just and inclusive world order that promotes democracy, open government,
human rights, and social justice. The two participants concurred that just as other international organizations have had
to change to be more responsive to the challenges of the 21st century, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) also
needs to be reformed, and expressed their support for a modest expansion of the Security Council that improves its
effectiveness and efficiency, as well as its representativeness. Secretary Clinton reaffirmed the United States'
appreciation for Brazil's aspiration to become a permanent member of the Security Council and acknowledged its
assumption of global responsibilities. The participants agreed they would continue discussions on United Nations
Security Council reform. The participants underlined the political, institutional, humanitarian, and security-related
achievements of Haiti and expressed their appreciation for the critical contribution of the UN Stabilization Mission in
Haiti (MINUSTAH). They stressed the integrated nature of MINUSTAH's mandate. Brazil and the United States
encouraged the Government of Haiti to work toward strengthening governance and the rule of law and, in this context,
further encouraged Haiti to continue to pursue the development of the Haitian National Police. Minister Patriota and
Secretary Clinton underscored the importance of strengthening bilateral trade and investment and their positive
contribution to their respective economies and to create job opportunities. They praised the successful completion of
the first meeting of the U.S.-Brazil Investment Dialogue and the VII U.S.-Brazil Economic Partnership Dialogue (EPD) and
welcomed the arrival of a Transportation Security Administration Representative to Brazil to promote cooperation on
civil aviation issues. Participants reviewed progress in implementing the Memorandum of Understanding on the Aviation
Partnership and the first meeting of its Coordinating Committee in Brasilia on October 10, 2012. Public and private
sector participants in the meeting identified thirteen activities to be carried out over the next year, such as workshops
on airport service quality and safety practices during construction; specialized training for aviation safety inspectors and
air traffic controllers; capacity building; support for the creation of internships in fields such as aviation engineering;
strengthening of industry supply chains; and certification for aircraft parts and components. Both governments
underscored their commitment to work together as partners to promote development, food security and nutrition, and
agreed to further strengthen the partnership between the U.S. Agency for International Development and the Brazilian
Cooperation Agency, as formalized in the 2010 Memorandum of Understanding for the Implementation of Technical
Cooperation Activities in Third Countries and the 2012 Memorandum of Understanding for the Implementation of
Technical Cooperation Activities in Third Countries to Improve Food Security. The U.S. and Brazil are currently working
together to improve agricultural productivity and agriculture research in Mozambique, and are now planning joint
projects to increase agriculture production, decrease malnutrition, and promote renewable energy in Haiti and
Honduras. Both governments will seek to finalize a separate Memorandum of Understanding that will promote trilateral
cooperation in agriculture technology and will continue to explore opportunities for bilateral and regional cooperation in
disaster risk management and response. Minister Patriota and Secretary Clinton praised the Domestic Finance for
Development (DF4D) Workshop that was held in Brasilia and co-hosted by the United States and Brazil on October 9-10,
which set the stage for follow-on collaboration with participating countries to encourage fiscal transparency and
discourage corruption while making tax administration and budget execution more efficient and effective. The
participants noted the continued increase in travel between our two countries and expressed satisfaction at the
significant progress by the Department of State to reduce U.S. visa appointment wait times in Brazil. Secretary Clinton
and Minister Patriota appreciated the many actions taken to facilitate the travel of U.S. and Brazilian citizens, including
the extension of visas from five to 10 years, the opening of a 10th Brazilian Consulate in the United States, in Hartford,
Connecticut, the planned opening of new U.S. consulates in Belo Horizonte and Porto Alegre, the latest U.S.-Brazil
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Consular Dialogue on October 4 in Brasilia, and the first meeting of the Working Group on Visa Issues in Washington,
D.C. on October 22. They agreed to continue to strengthen the dialogue in this area. Recognizing the growing
opportunities, threats, and challenges in cyberspace, participants welcomed the first meeting in July 2012 of the
Internet and Information Communication Technology (ICT) Working Group, during which interagency representatives
from both governments exchanged views and best practices on a broad range of cyber issues. Both sides affirmed the
value of open discussion of Internet and ICT issues and pledged to continue these efforts, including consultations on
positions in multilateral fora. The participants reaffirmed the shared commitment to remove barriers to access
economic opportunity, education, health, and justice for historically marginalized groups, including people of African
descent through the ongoing implementation of the U.S.–Brazil Joint Action Plan to Eliminate Racial and Ethnic
Discrimination and Promote Equality, and lauded the successful Joint Action Plan technical meeting and seminar on
Equity in Education, both held in Brasilia in August 2012. The participants further agreed that empowering and
protecting women and girls requires strong, coordinated action by the international community. As examples of our
shared commitment, our two countries are collaborating with Haiti on efforts to combat gender-based violence. The
U.S.-Brazil Steering Group to Advance Women in Science was established in August as a direct result of the U.S.-Brazil
Joint Commission Meeting on Science and Technology Cooperation hosted in Brasilia in March 2012. The Steering Group
will provide recommendations to enhance international cooperation among women and establish a network of U.S. and
Brazilian female scientists. Participants welcomed continued implementation of the Action Plan on Education, and our
joint efforts to support the U.S. "100,000 Strong in the Americas" initiative and Brazil's "Scientific Mobility Program"
(also known as "Science Without Borders"). They lauded the Department of Commerce-led Education Trade Mission that
visited Brazil in September 2012. The mission comprised representatives from 66 U.S. institutions of higher education,
making this the largest ever such mission. Participants emphasized the importance of the private sector and research
centers in promoting academic mobility between Brazil and the United States, in particular by means of internship
offers. Participants welcomed the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) Concerning Labor Cooperation signed on May
17 by the U.S. Department of Labor and the Brazilian Ministry of Labor and Employment, and the first meeting of the
U.S.-Brazil Labor and Employment Dialogue on October 23 in Brasilia. This initiative will further strengthen efforts under
the 2011 MOU for the Implementation of Technical Cooperation Activities in Third Countries in the Field of Decent
Work, through which the United States and Brazil have jointly supported a $1.29 million dollar trilateral program to
combat and prevent child labor in Haiti, and provided complementary funding of close to $10 million dollars to combat
child labor in South American countries and Lusophone Africa. The participants stressed the need to mobilize innovation
and investment around critical global challenges and to introduce businesses, investors, entrepreneurs, and universities
to new market opportunities that accelerate economic development and promote sustainable economies. Both parties
noted the new "Accelerating Market-Driven Partnerships" (AMP) initiative as an important mechanism for cross-sectoral
collaboration to catalyze innovative solutions. Participants also observed with pleasure the successful visit of an
Innovation Delegation comprised of entrepreneurs, educators, and technology leaders to Brazil in August 2012, as
Secretary Clinton announced in the April 2012 GPD. They also welcomed the ongoing preparations for the first meeting
of the Brazil-U.S. Working Group on Innovation, due to take place in the next few months, in fulfillment of the
commitments made at the third meeting of the Joint Commission on Science and Technological Cooperation held last
March. Participants also agreed on the importance of identifying areas of cooperation on sports, including through
initiatives encouraging the promotion of social inclusion, investment, innovation, education, and women's advancement
related to sports programs. Secretary Clinton and Minister Patriota reinforced their commitment to Rio+20 outcomes
and highlighted the success of the conference in advancing the common vision of the global community on sustainable
development. They emphasized the importance of continuing to advance key global priorities, in particular the
elaboration of Sustainable Development Goals, strengthening of the institutional framework for sustainable
development, and the promotion of sensible approaches to improve the management of our vital natural resources. It is
also crucial to integrate the expertise, energy, and commitment of civil society and the private sector in the
implementation of sustainable development. Secretary Clinton and Minister Patriota reaffirmed the importance of
both sub-regional and regional processes and noted their important contribution to promoting democracy, peace,
cooperation, security, development, and stability in the region. The participants agreed they would continue
discussions on these topics. Participants emphasized the importance of continued high-level consultations, including the
upcoming Strategic Energy Dialogue, which will highlight bilateral cooperation across a range of energy technologies,
and the Economic and Financial Dialogue, underscoring the importance of private sector engagement, as well as
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meetings of the Defense Cooperation Dialogue, Defense Bilateral Working Group, Joint Staff Talks, Space Security
Dialogue, Political-Military Dialogue, and the Disarmament and Nonproliferation Dialogue.
US-Brazil relations key to global stability and peace.
Mead, 2011 (Walter Russell, Professor of Foreign Affairs at Bard College and Editor At Large of American Interest
Magazine, April 15, “Something Real, For a Change”, The American Interest Magazine, http://blogs.the-americaninterest.com/wrm/2011/04/15/something-real-for-a-change/, DVO)
Foreigners, and perhaps especially people in the US, often think of Brazilians as emotional and hotheaded. We’ve never
gotten over the impression that Carmen Miranda made in the 1940s and 1950s when the Portuguese born ‘Brazilian’
entertainer was said to be highest paid woman in the United States. Land of the samba, land of Carnival, land of Rio.¶ It is
all true; Brazil is every bit of that and more — but there is another side to the country and the people. Brazilians have
built the largest and best performing economy south of the US border in the hemisphere; the state of Saõ Paulo alone
has a GDP larger than any Spanish-speaking South American economy. Their agribusiness in particular is world class.
Brazilians have an immense capacity for hard and focused work. The evangelical revival sweeping across Brazil is
creating a new Bible belt.¶ Politically, Brazilians have tended to be moderate almost to a fault. They achieved their
independence bloodlessly when the son of the King of Portugal declined to return to the home country after Napoleon’s
defeat allowed the exiled royals to go back to Lisbon. “I remain,” he said, and became the Emperor of Brazil. That empire
ended bloodlessly sixty years later when his son peacefully abdicated and sailed away to Europe; Brazil’s history since
then had its share of upheavals but lacks the drama and the extremism found in some other places. The military
dictatorship was less harsh than regimes in neighboring Chile and Argentina; the return to democracy was gradual and
bloodless.¶ Former president Lula was elected on his fourth try — only after he convinced voters that despite his left
wing rhetoric and trade union past he was actually a reasonable man who would stick to the successful economic
programs of his predecessor.¶ Lula’s Brazilian model of a Latin American left that is pragmatic and results-focused could
not be more different from the self-destructive radicalism of a Chavez or a Castro. “Lulaism” is the best possible antidote
to Chavezismo and the consolidation of an economically progressive and socially moderate Brazil that provides an
anchor of stability and can help the entire continent move forward. While Lula’s grandstanding on a handful of
international issues (most notably his regrettable embrace of Iranian president Ahmadinejad and his statement that the
global economic crisis was caused by people with blond hair and blue eyes) raised some eyebrows in Washington, the
steady course of the country under his leadership testified to a much more sophisticated understanding of Brazil’s
interests.¶ Lula’s successor, Dilma Rousseff, was tortured by a US backed military dictatorship as a young woman;
thankfully the experience made her more pro-human rights than anti-American. One of her early acts as president was
to put Brazil behind the push for a UN report on the state of human rights in Iran.¶ Brazil is an old nation but a young
power; it is likely to make some sudden and startling moves as it tests its new abilities and pushes the envelope. But as
far as I can see, the major strategic interests of the US and Brazil are so closely aligned that cooperation between the
two countries will be one of the building blocks of the new century. Brazil’s growing influence will tend to make its
neighborhood and the world richer, more free, and more stable. It brings the experiences, sometimes painful, of a
developing country to the high table of world powers; its instinct for “order and progress” (the slogan appears on its
flag) dovetails very closely with what the United States wants to see in the world.¶ A post-racial United States and a
post-Third World Brazil can get a lot done together as long as both countries think the relationship true and work to
keep it on track. Things are by no means perfect — in Brazil itself and in the US-Brazil relationship; I’ll be posting about
some the pitfalls as well.¶ But if you want reasons to be optimistic about where the human race, the western hemisphere
and American foreign policy are going — watch Brazil.
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Stability Impacts:
State failure causes global disease and WMD conflict
Emmott ‘3,
Bill, Editor-in-Chief of The Economist, 2003, 20:21 Vision, pp. 265-266, 277-278
There are other self-serving reasons to be worried about inequality and its handmaiden, poverty. One is that a poorer country is more likely to have weak
political and social institutions, which are then more likely to collapse into chaos or civil war. That is especially likely when the country is
poor in terms of the direct economic activity of its citizenry but is nevertheless home to some valuable natural resources, such as the diamonds of Sierra Leone.
Forces within, and forces from outside, are liable to fight to get their hands on those resources. Chaos and civil war are essentially local troubles that need not affect
the rest of the world, but they are liable
to draw in neighbors, risking a wider regional conflict as countries or factions vie to exploit the
countries are also likely to harbor and to foster two other ills: disease and terrorism. Disease
may well contribute to poverty rather than being a consequence of it, but it is also the case that a poor country [are] likely to lack the infrastructure as
well as money to be able to deal with epidemic diseases such as the human irumunodeficiency virus that causes AIDS, or Ebola, and those
diseases might then be able to spread(.) across other borders. The danger of terrorism is more obvious: discontented, otherwise hopeless people may
vacuum left in the collapsing state. Poorer, unstable
wish to take out their sense of grievance on the luckier rich, and will be likely to find plenty of willing recruits for dangerous or even suicidal terrorist missions. The
terrorist attacks on 11 September 2001 confirm this only indirectly, since the terrorists concerned were neither poor nor hopeless. But they and their followers did, it
seems, feel that Islamic countries in general were poor and lacking in hope, following centuries of humiliation at the hands of the West. And the argument applies
directly to Afghanistan: if that country had not been dirt-poor, it would have been unlikely to have acted as a host to the al-Qaeda terrorists. Rich countries can give
rise to terrorism too, even without the separatist movements found in the Basque Country and Northern Ireland; Germany had its Baader-Meinhof gang in the 1970s,
Italy its Red Brigades, and even America had the Symbionese Liberation Front. But they have not been numerous enough to pose a danger to their governments or to
any other country. Poverty and despair act as a more powerful recruiting sergeant for terrorists than do mere alienation or beliefs in anarchism. Other people worry
about inequality because of a fear of war: the fear that
countries which feel that they are unable to advance their living standards and
sense of power by conventional economic means may be tempted to use military methods as a shortcut . As a general proposition,
this argument is unconvincing, for a poorer country is also often militarily weak, though that still made the Soviet-led Warsaw Pact countries a formidable enemy to
NATO during the cold war. By and large, however, the rich will always be able to defeat poor countries in anything other than a guerrilla war—and such fighting
methods may be common in civil wars or m wars of liberation, but they do not put other countries themselves in physical danger, except from terrorism. But in some
circumstances this argument may hold good. North Korea, for example, has long used the threat of military attack either on its southern compatriot, or on Japan or
the United States, as a means by which to blackmail the rich. Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990 in order to grab its oil as well as merely to make a territorial point.
Inequality, in other words, may lead to an increase in the number of unpredictable dictators— slightly euphemistically known as rogue states (even
more euphemistically known, by America's State Department, as "states of concern"). These rogues have become more dangerous as technology has advanced
sufficiently to make long-range missiles cheap enough to buy and develop, and to use as a threat. They could become extremely
means to develop and deploy nuclear, chemical or
deadly if any obtain the
biological weapons.
Latin American instability causes state failure - extinction
Manwaring 5
Max G., Retired U.S. Army colonel and an Adjunct Professor of International Politics at Dickinson College, venezuela’s
hugo chávez, bolivarian socialism, and asymmetric warfare, October 2005, pg. PUB628.pdf
President Chávez also understands that the process leading to state failure is the most dangerous long-term security challenge facing
the global community today. The argument in general is that failing and failed state status is the breeding ground for
instability, criminality, insurgency, regional conflict, and terrorism. These conditions breed massive humanitarian disasters and major
refugee flows. They can host “evil” networks of all kinds, whether they involve criminal business enterprise, narco-trafficking, or some form of ideological
crusade such as Bolivarianismo. More specifically, these conditions spawn all kinds of things people in general do not like such as murder, kidnapping,
corruption, intimidation, and destruction of infrastructure. These means of coercion and persuasion can
spawn further human rights
violations, torture, poverty, starvation, disease, the recruitment and use of child soldiers, trafficking in women and body parts, trafficking
and proliferation of conventional weapons systems and WMD, genocide, ethnic cleansing, warlordism, and criminal
anarchy. At the same time, these actions are usually unconfined and spill over into regional syndromes of poverty,
destabilization, and conflict.62 Peru’s Sendero Luminoso calls violent and destructive activities that facilitate the processes of state failure “armed
propaganda.” Drug cartels operating throughout the Andean Ridge of South America and elsewhere call these activities “business incentives.” Chávez
considers these actions to be steps that must be taken to bring about the political conditions necessary to establish Latin American socialism for the 21st
century.63 Thus, in addition to helping to provide wider latitude to further their tactical and operational objectives, state and nonstate actors’ strategic
efforts are aimed at progressively lessening a targeted regime’s credibility and capability in terms of its ability and willingness to govern and develop its
national territory and society. Chávez’s
intent is to focus his primary attack politically and psychologically on selected Latin
American governments’ ability and right to govern. In that context, he understands that popular perceptions of corruption,
disenfranchisement, poverty, and lack of upward mobility limit the right and the ability of a given regime to conduct the business of the state. Until a given
populace generally perceives that its government is dealing with these and other basic issues of political, economic, and social injustice fairly and effectively,
instability and the threat of subverting or destroying such a government are real.64 But failing and failed states simply do not go away.
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Virtually anyone can take advantage of such an unstable situation. The tendency is that the best motivated and best armed organization on the scene will
control that instability. As a consequence, failing and failed states become dysfunctional states, rogue states, criminal states, narco-states, or new people’s
democracies. In connection with the creation of new people’s democracies, one can rest assured that Chávez and his Bolivarian populist allies will be
available to provide money, arms, and leadership at any given opportunity. And, of course, the
longer dysfunctional, rogue, criminal, and narcostates and people’s democracies persist, the more they and their associated problems endanger global security, peace,
and prosperity.65
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Energy Impacts:
Biomass key to solve warming.
Caribbean News Now, 2013 (March 7, “Renewable Energy: The Trending Dominant Climate Change Solution”,
http://www.caribbeannewsnow.com/topstory-Commentary%3A-Renewable-energy%3A-The-trending-dominantclimate-change-solution-14443.html)
Scientifically, renewable energy (RE) flows include natural phenomena, namely, wind, tides, geothermal heat and
sunlight. More so, renewable energy is derived from natural processes that are continually restored.
According to the Union of Concerned Scientists, trends indicate renewable energy is likely to become dominant climate
change solution around the globe by 2050, referring to a new United Nations (UN) Intergovernmental Panel study on
Climate Change (IPPCC). The study indicates that renewable energy has the potential to be more competitive than
nuclear power, fossil fuels with carbon capture and various low carbon energy options athwart a mass of the
scenarios analyzed by the report.
In William Moomaw’s, et al, report, “Renewable Energy and Climate Change”, he submitted his research on “Renewable
as an Option to Mitigate Climate Change”. Williams confronted the issue on a global basis, stating that is estimated that
RE accounted for 12.9 percent of the total 492 electric power (EJ) of primary energy supply in 2008.
Additionally, he reiterated that the largest RE contributor was biomass (10.2%), having the majority – about 60 percent
-- of the biomass fuel used in conventional cooking and heating applications in developing countries considering the
rapid increase use of modern biomass. Coupled with this, hydropower represented 2.3 percent, whereas other RE
sources accounted for 0.4 percent.
Unchecked warming causes extinction – positive feedbacks leads to disease, heat waves, drought,
starvation, and the death of billions
Associated Press 2007 (Climate Report Maps Out ‘Highway to Extinction’) April 1, http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17889856/
WASHINGTON - A key element of the second major report on climate change being released Friday in Belgium is a chart that maps out the effects of global warming
with every degree of temperature rise, most of them bad. There’s one bright spot: A minimal heat rise means more food production in northern regions of the world.
However, the
number of species going extinct rises with the heat, as does the number of people who may starve, or face
water shortages, or floods, according to the projections in the draft report obtained by The Associated Press. Some scientists are calling this degree-bydegree projection a “highway to extinction.” It’s likely to be the source of sharp closed-door debate, some scientists say, along with a multitude of other issues in the
20-chapter draft report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. While the wording in the draft is almost guaranteed to change at this week’s meeting
in Brussels, several scientists say the focus won’t. The final document will be the product of a United Nations network of 2,000 scientists as authors and reviewers,
along with representatives of more than 120 governments as last-minute editors. It will be the second of a four-volume authoritative assessment of Earth’s climate
released this year. The last such effort was in 2001.University of Victoria climate scientist Andrew Weaver said the
chart of results from various
temperature levels is “a highway to extinction, but on this highway there are many turnoffs. This is showing you where the road is heading. The
road is heading toward extinction.”Weaver is one of the lead authors of the first report, issued in February. While humanity will survive, hundreds of
millions, maybe billions of people may not, according to the chart—if the worst scenarios happens. The report says global warming has
already degraded conditions for many species, coastal areas and poor people. With a more than 90 percent level of
confidence, the scientists in the draft report say man-made global warming “over the last three decades has had a discernible
influence on many physical and biological systems.” But as the world’s average temperature warms from 1990 levels, the projections get more
dire. Add 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit -- 1 degree Celsius is the calculation scientists use—and between 400 million and 1.7 billion extra people can’t
get enough water, some infectious diseases and allergenic pollens rise, and some amphibians go extinct . But the world’s
food supply, especially in northern areas, could increase. That’s the likely outcome around 2020, according to the draft. Add another 1.8 degrees and as
many as 2 billion people could be without water and about 20 percent to 30 percent of the world’s species near
extinction. Also, more people start dying because of malnutrition, disease, heat waves, floods and droughts—all
caused by global warming. That would happen around 2050, depending on the level of greenhouse gases from the burning of fossil fuels.At the extreme
end of the projections, a 7- to 9-degree average temperature increase, the chart predicts: “Up to one-fifth of the world population affected by increased flood events
... “1.1 to 3.2 billion people with increased water scarcity” ...”major extinctions around the globe.” Despite
that dire outlook, several scientists
involved in the process say they are optimistic that such a drastic temperature rise won’t happen because people will
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reduce carbon dioxide emissions that cause global warming. “The worst stuff is not going to happen because we can’t be that stupid,” said
Harvard University oceanographer James McCarthy, who was a top author of the 2001 version of this report. “Not that I think the projections aren’t that good, but
because we can’t be that stupid.”
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Energy Internals:
US Brazil relations key to clean energy.
Blank 13 (Rebecca Blank, Deputy Secretary of Commerce, Remarks on Strengthening U.S.-Brazil Relations at Columbia University
Event in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, http://www.commerce.gov/news/deputy-secretary-speeches/2013/03/20/remarks-strengthening-usbrazil-relations-columbia-univers, 3-20-12,DAG)
Boa tarde. Thank you, President Bollinger. Lee hired me in 1999 to work for him as the dean of the public policy school
at the University of Michigan. I have watched him over the last decade become a major leader in higher education in the
United States. It’s a pleasure to be with you today, Lee, to celebrate a new beginning–the Global Center of Columbia
University in Rio de Janeiro.¶ Of course, I also want to thank Governor Cabral for hosting us here in the beautiful Palace.
Obrigada. Thank you.¶ Columbia is just one of many leading U.S. institutions that are recognizing Brazil’s dramatic
transformation in the 21st century. ¶ Over the last decade, the fruits of democracy have spread quickly in Brazil.
Millions of Brazilians have been lifted out of poverty and into a vibrant and powerful middle class.¶ As a result of this
progress, in recent years, the United States and Brazil have seen increased opportunities for partnership, shared
growth, and mutual prosperity. Our commercial and economic ties have blossomed. ¶ For example, our two-way trade
has more than doubled in just a decade, reaching nearly $76 billion last year. Also, every day, thousands of Brazilians
wake up and go to work at U.S. firms operating here in Brazil due to investments from companies like GE, who you will
hear from on the panel. Thousands of United States citizens, too, work in at Brazil-based firms in the United States.¶ So
the question is: Where do we go from here? What are the next steps in our journey together? ¶ We are now embarking
on the next natural stage in the U.S.-Brazil relationship. From a foundation of robust exchange in goods, services, and
investments–all of which will continue to grow–we are now moving into sharing knowledge, ideas and innovation.¶ The
new Global Center provides a great example of our maturing relations.¶ Prior to the establishment of this Center, the ties
between Columbia University’s faculty and Brazil’s scholars were already flourishing. But the faculty and alumni here–
along with President Bollinger, Governor Cabral, and others–felt the need to deepen this relationship. . . because we are
all realizing that the challenges and opportunities in the United States are very similar to the challenges and
opportunities here in Brazil. In fact, many of these challenges–from public health, to environmental sustainability, to
education itself–are shared with other countries around the world.¶ Columbia’s Global Centers recognize this. For
universities to fulfill their mission in the 21st century, they must take the deep and sometimes narrow expertise that
faculty members pride themselves on–and find ways to share that knowledge outside of their own campus. They must
show how knowledge can be both gained and applied in communities around the world, broadening the impact of
university-based research and education across the globe. ¶ Leaders in both of our nations are beginning to understand
the need for this type of outreach from our knowledge communities. ¶ And I think that this week’s celebration of this
Global Center provides a perfect backdrop to discuss the two things that are really going to matter in driving the longterm competitiveness of both the U.S. and Brazilian economies: the presence of a skilled workforce, and our ability to
stay on the cutting edge of innovation and invention. Let me talk about each of these in turn.¶ Both President Obama
and President Rousseff know that investing in education is crucial if we want to make sure that the next generation–
tomorrow’s workforce– is equipped with the skills they need to lead. It’s particularly important that our young people
learn to understand and operate in a global world. This means they need to feel comfortable in countries other than
their own. ¶ Beyond the new Global Center itself, I’ll give two examples of what each of our nations is doing to make that
happen.¶ President Obama launched an initiative two years ago called “100,000 Strong in the Americas.” It aims to
increase the number of U.S. students studying abroad in the Western Hemisphere to 100,000 while also attracting
100,000 students from throughout the Hemisphere to come to the United States.¶ Meanwhile, President Rousseff has
launched Brazil’s Science Without Borders–known in the U.S. as the Scientific Mobility program. It aims to send 101,000
students from Brazil to places like the U.S.–for one year–to study in the areas of Science, Technology, Engineering and
Mathematics–the crucial STEM fields that help drive innovation in both of our countries.¶ Not surprisingly, business
leaders in both of our countries are strongly supportive of these efforts.¶ In fact, I just came from co-chairing a meeting
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of the U.S.-Brazil CEO Forum in Brasilia. The companies in the CEO Forum have endorsed these efforts. Many of the U.S.
companies in the CEO Forum have already hosted Brazilian interns while the Brazilian companies have provided financial
support to students studying abroad.¶ They are doing this because they know that students in these programs will be
tomorrow’s leaders and innovators in the private sector. They need a pipeline of globally trained students with diverse
perspectives coming into their companies in the years ahead.¶ We, too, are promoting these exchanges at the U.S.
Department of Commerce. Last fall, our Undersecretary for International Trade led the largest-ever educational trade
mission in U.S. history. He took representatives from 66 U.S. colleges and universities to Brasilia, São Paulo, and Rio de
Janeiro–including Columbia University’s School of Continuing Education. At three fairs, these schools met with 7,500
students and parents who wanted to learn more. ¶ We must undertake these kinds of efforts because we know–like all
of you here today know–that a globally competitive economy requires a globally competitive workforce.¶ But we can’t
stop there.¶ The other key driver of 21st century competitiveness is “innovation and economic development”–which is
the title of your panel discussion in just a few moments. Innovation has driven the U.S. economy for decades. Some
studies suggest that innovation–in both products and processes – accounts for two-thirds of U.S. economic growth
since World War II. ¶ There have never been more opportunities for the United States and Brazil to work together to
encourage economic development and foster innovation–often at the same time.¶ Developing infrastructure is an
excellent and timely example of this. And we are already seeing successful collaborations. ¶ For example, in December,
the United States company CH2M Hill was selected to help develop an Economic Master Plan for a 270-square mile
region around Belo Horizonte the capital city of Minas Gerais. The company will work with local officials to create a
framework for smart growth over the next 20 years for that region – leveraging their knowledge in mixed land use,
transportation, and environmental sustainability. They will serve as a true partner in helping the region achieve its vision
of attracting more investments, more jobs, and a better quality of life for millions of people.¶ Our two governments
want to see more of these successful collaborations.¶ In fact, the Brazilian government recently hosted an
Infrastructure Road Show in New York. The conference highlighted the many infrastructure projects in Brazil related
to ports, airports, highways, railroads, oil and gas, and more. U.S. companies learned about where needs exist–and
how they can partner with Brazilian firms to get the job done.¶ So, Brazil has reached out to the United States. And I’m
pleased to announce that the United States will be reaching out to Brazil as well.¶ In mid-May of this year, the Commerce
Department will lead a Secretarial Trade Mission on infrastructure business development to Brazil. We will bring some of
our brightest minds in project management and engineering services–including construction, architecture,
transportation, energy, safety and security.¶ These companies are aware that Brazil has a set of ambitious goals–such as
a sustainable and environmentally-responsible Olympics. U.S. businesses stand ready to serve as partners in helping
achieve that. ¶ If we harness the innovative spirit of our companies, the World Cup and the Brazilian Olympics will be–as
the students at this Global Center are likely to try to say–Muito legal! Very cool!¶ Energy is another area that is ripe for
the joint innovation and development by the United States and Brazil. I have been joined by Daniel Poneman, our
Deputy Secretary of Energy, who co-leads the U.S.-Brazil Strategic Energy Dialogue, which met yesterday. ¶ Over the past
two years, this dialogue has hosted numerous events in both countries focused on everything from natural gas
development, to civil nuclear energy, to adopting renewable energy.¶ It’s clear that both nations have much to gain
from working together in this area. For example, the United States can learn from Brazil’s leadership in areas such as
hydropower, biofuels, and, increasingly, wind power.¶ Together we can jointly uncover the technologies and
innovations that will build greener economies in both of our nations and throughout the world–creating good jobs
and ensuring a cleaner and brighter future for our children.¶ Our choice is clear. ¶ Brazil and the United States can each
work separately to build and innovate within their own economies. We are both large and diverse nations and we will
both be reasonably successful on our own. But we can accomplish much more if we collaborate, building our economic
ties, sharing our knowledge, and educating each other’s youth.¶ So today, let us give the young people in both our
nations the true global education they need to succeed, through places like the Global Center. And let us continue to
foster the exchange of new ideas and innovations that will bolster economic development and competitiveness for
both nations in the 21st century.¶ President Obama has stated his commitment to this vision. Let me quote what he
himself said here in this great city exactly two years ago to this very day: “Let us stand together–not as senior and junior
partners–but as equal partners, joined in a spirit of mutual interest and mutual respect, committed to the progress that I
know we can make together.Ӧ Congratulations again to Columbia University and to Rio de Janeiro on their historic
partnership. This is only the beginning. Thank you.
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US Brazil energy promotes clean energy and cooperation.
Brazil US Business Council 11 (Brazil US Business Council, premier business advocacy ¶ organization
dedicated to strengthening the economic and commercial relationship ¶ between Brazil and the
United States, Bolstering Security Growth and Job Creation, March 19, 2011,
http://www.brazilcouncil.org/sites/default/files/Brazil_EnergyReport.pdf, DAG)
Cooperation between the United States and Brazil on energy and energy-related ¶ issues has traditionally focused on
information exchange, technical assistance, and ¶ capacity building. Much of this activity has been through regular
workshops between ¶ both countries’ government officials and private sector representatives. However, as ¶ the energy
sector moves to the forefront of public policy in both countries because ¶ of its powerful growth and job-creating
potential, additional dimensions have been ¶ incorporated into the bilateral energy agenda.¶ These new dimensions
include trilateral cooperation in Central America, the ¶ Caribbean, and Africa; multilateral cooperation on standards
development and ¶ clean energy promotion; joint research and development; diplomatic coordination in ¶
multilateral fora; regulatory cooperation; and trade and investment promotion. Public ¶ policy reform and
harmonization, as well as business development, are additional areas ¶ in which to further this partnership.
Brazil has opened its arms to US energy cooperation in the past.
Brazil US Business Council 11 (Brazil US Business Council, premier business advocacy ¶ organization dedicated to strengthening the
economic and commercial relationship ¶ between Brazil and the United States, Bolstering Security Growth and Job Creation, March 19, 2011,
http://www.brazilcouncil.org/sites/default/files/Brazil_EnergyReport.pdf, DAG)
On March 19, 2011, President Barack Obama and Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff ¶ launched a U.S.-Brazil Strategic
Energy Dialogue (SED), one of four presidential level mechanisms between both countries to deepen their political and
economic ¶ relations. The SED is the only dialogue labeled “strategic,” reflecting U.S. and Brazilian ¶ policymakers’
vision of a bold bilateral partnership with positive implications for ¶ energy security, economic growth, and job
creation.¶ The SED, co-chaired by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and the Brazilian Ministry ¶ of Mines and Energy
(MME), includes other government agencies in both countries. Its ¶ first meeting took place on August 17, 2011, in
Brasília, Brazil, at the deputy secretary level.¶ The SED is a result of a decade-old effort to institutionalize the energy
partnership ¶ between the United States and Brazil. In fact, it incorporates a two-track approach ¶ to bilateral
cooperation. In 2003, the DOE and the MME established an allencompassing mechanism, including oil and gas, coal,
nuclear, renewables, efficiency, ¶ and R&D. In 2007, a second, separate biofuels-only track was established under the ¶
leadership of the U.S. Department of State and the Brazilian Ministry of External ¶ Relations (MRE). The SED allows for
more synergies between both tracks and ¶ greater priority for energy-related issues by both governments.
When the US and Brazil engage in energy trade their clean energy goals are reflected.
Brazil US Business Council 11 (Brazil US Business Council, premier business advocacy organization dedicated to
¶
strengthening the economic and commercial relationship between Brazil and the United States, Bolstering Security Growth and Job
Creation, March 19, 2011, http://www.brazilcouncil.org/sites/default/files/Brazil_EnergyReport.pdf, DAG)
¶
U.S. energy production is largely focused on nonrenewable sources, with coal, natural ¶ gas, oil, and nuclear energy
representing more than 90% of the total energy produced ¶ in the United States. In Brazil, oil represents the largest
share of energy production in ¶ the country, followed closely by biomass and hydropower. In addition, Brazilian
power ¶ generation is dominated by hydropower, representing more than 80% of all electricity ¶ in Brazil. These
complementarities, as well as both governments’ goals toward a clean ¶ energy economy, are reflected in bilateral
energy trade.¶ In 2001, bilateral energy trade between the United States and Brazil was ¶ $1.4 billion. In 2011, it reached
more than $13 billion. While total trade ¶ between both countries increased during this period and has already surpassed
¶ the pre-2008 and 2009 crisis level, trade in energy products increased at a greater ¶ rate than bilateral trade as a
whole.¶ In 2001, energy products represented only 7% of Brazilian exports to the United ¶ States and less than 4% of U.S.
exports to Brazil. In 2011, 25% of all Brazilian exports ¶ to the United States and 21% of all U.S. exports to Brazil were
energy products.¶ Brazil’s top energy products exports to the United States in 2011 included oil ¶ ($5.8 billion) and
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ethanol ($567 million). The United States’ top energy products ¶ exports to Brazil in 2011 included oil and oil products,
diesel in particular ¶ ($4.5 billion); coal ($1.9 billion); and ethanol ($791 million).¶ While these are impressive
amounts, they reflect trade in energy products, not in ¶ all energy-related goods, such as machinery and equipment.
In addition, there is ¶ untapped potential in trade of other energy products, such as liquefied natural gas ¶ (LNG) and
uranium.
Relations key to energy development
CRS 13, Congressional Research Service (Peter Meyer, “Brazil-US Relations”, February 27, 2013,
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL33456.pdf)
Energy has been another important area of U.S.-Brazilian cooperation in recent years. Brazil is ? widely regarded as a
world leader in energy policy for successfully reducing its reliance on ? foreign oil through the development of
alternative energy resources and increased domestic ? production. In addition to being the world’s second-largest
producer of ethanol (after the United ? States), Brazil currently generates 85% of its electricity through hydropower.
Brazil also has ? recently discovered large offshore oil deposits that have the potential to turn the country into a ?
major oil and gas producer and an important source of energy for the United States.106 To ? facilitate greater
cooperation in the development of safe, secure, and affordable energy, President ? Obama and President Rousseff
launched a Strategic Energy Dialogue in March 2011.
Key to Biofuel distribution
ITF 11, Independent Task Force Report No. 66 (Council on Foreign Relations, “Global Brazil and? U.S.-Brazil
Relations”, 2011, i.cfr.org/content/publications/attachments/Brazil_TFR_66.pdf)
Developing biofuel programs in the Western Hemisphere is a principal? goal of a 2007 MOU signed by Brazil and the
United States. In 2009, the? two countries agreed to expand science cooperation on standards and? research on
biofuels.? El Salvador and Haiti were among the first nations, along with the? Dominican Republic and St. Kitts and
Nevis, to receive bilateral biofuels? assistance from Brazil and the United States. In 2008, Brazil and the? United
States expanded this biofuel cooperation to include Guatemala,? Honduras, Jamaica, Guinea-Bissau, and Senegal.
These primarily Central? American and Caribbean countries benefit from the development of? biofuels for domestic
consumption. At the same time, expanding these? markets aims to entice investors into producing biofuels in the
region,? which has preferential access to the U.S. market through the Caribbean? Basin Initiative. (The Task Force
encourages lifting U.S. protectionist? measures that limit the expansion of Brazilian biofuels in the American market, as
discussed earlier.) Brazil is also in the early stages of helping? Cuba develop its nascent biofuels capacity.
Brazil relations key to Ethanol
CRS 13, Congressional Research Service (Peter Meyer, “Brazil-US Relations”, February 27, 2013,
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL33456.pdf)
Brazil stands out as an example of a country that has become a net exporter of energy, partially by ? increasing its use
and production of ethanol. In 1975, in response to sharp increases in global oil ? prices, the Brazilian government
began a national program to promote the production and ? consumption of sugarcane ethanol. Brazil now produces
some 390,000 barrels per day.108 Within ? Brazil, pure ethanol is available at nearly every fueling station and gasoline
is required to include ? a 20% ethanol blend. About 90% of new cars sold in Brazil each year are fitted with “flex-fuel”
engines capable of running on fuel blends ranging from pure ethanol to pure gasoline. As a result, ? ethanol accounts
for over half of all fuel pumped in Brazil.109? On March 9, 2007, the United States and Brazil, the world’s two largest
ethanol-producing ? countries, signed a memorandum of understanding to promote greater cooperation on ethanol and
? biofuels. The agreement involves (1) technology sharing between the United States and Brazil; ? (2) feasibility studies
and technical assistance to build domestic biofuels industries in third ? countries; and (3) multilateral efforts to
advance the global development of biofuels.110 Over the ? past six years, the United States and Brazil have moved
forward on all three facets of the ? agreement. Presidents Obama and Rousseff signed onto a partnership agreement
for the ? development of aviation biofuels in March 2011,111 and in October 2011, Boeing and Brazil’s ? Embraer
announced plans to build a joint research center.112 Brazil and the United States have ? also worked together in a
number of Latin American, Caribbean, and African countries. In March ? 2011, Presidents Obama and Rousseff agreed to
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commit $3 million to support the development of ? legal regimes and domestic biofuels production in the Dominican
Republic, El Salvador, ? Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica, and Senegal.113 Additionally, the United States and
Brazil ? are working with other members of the International Biofuels Forum (IBF) to make biofuels ? standards and
codes more uniform. ? Brazil and the United States have taken steps to liberalize trade in ethanol over the past year.
In ? December 2011, the Brazilian government issued a resolution to extend its duty-free treatment of ? imported ethanol
until December 31, 2015.114 Similarly, the U.S. Congress allowed a 54-cent-pergallon duty on imported ethanol to
expire at the end of 2011. Prior to its expiration, the duty ? served as a significant barrier to direct imports of Brazilian
ethanol in most years. Although some ? Brazilian ethanol was allowed to enter the United States duty-free after being
reprocessed in ? Caribbean Basin Initiative (CBI) countries, such imports could only account for up to 7% of the ? U.S.
ethanol market. A 2.5% ad valorem tariff on ethanol imports to the United States remains in ? place permanently unless
the Harmonized Tariff Schedule code is changed.
US-Brazil relations key to US energy
Meyer 13 (Peter, 2/27, Analyst in Latin American Affairs, “Brazil-U.S. Relations”, Date accessed: 7/6/13,
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL33456.pdf, LE)
Energy has been another important area of U.S.-Brazilian cooperation in recent years. Brazil is ¶ widely regarded as a
world leader in energy policy for successfully reducing its reliance on ¶ foreign oil through the development of
alternative energy resources and increased domestic ¶ production. In addition to being the world’s second-la¶ rgest
producer of ethanol (after the United ¶ States), Brazil currently generates 85% of its electricity through hydropower.
Brazil also has ¶ recently discovered large offshore oil deposits that have the potential to turn the country into a ¶
major oil and gas producer and an important source of energy for the United States.¶ 106¶ To ¶ facilitate greater
cooperation in the development of safe, secure, and affordable energy, President ¶ Obama and President Rousseff
launched a Strategic Energy Dialogue in March 2011.
US-Brazil relations key to oil
Meyer 13 (Peter, 2/27, Analyst in Latin American Affairs, “Brazil-U.S. Relations”, Date accessed: 7/6/13,
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL33456.pdf, LE)
Brazil and the United States are working together under the Strategic Energy Dialogue to foster ¶ the safe and
efficient development of oil reserves in both countries. Through technical workshops ¶ and other activities, government
regulators and private industry have exchanged best practices on ¶ issues such as spill response, well integrity, subsea
containment, the use of dispersants, and ¶ national contingency plans. Brazil and the United States have also
cooperated on financing. In ¶ April 2009, the Export-Import Bank of the United States offered to consider up to $2
billion in ¶ financing for Petrobras to purchase U.S. goods and services. The Bank has approved $300 million ¶ located
beneath layers of rock and salt more than18,000 feet below the ocean surface. Analysts ¶ have estimated that the total
recoverable reserves of pre-salt oil and natural gas may exceed 50 ¶ billion barrels of oil equivalent.¶ 116
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Trade Internals:
US Brazil relations are key to trade.
Boadle 13 (Anthony Boadle, senior correspondent in Brazil and writes about politics, (Reuters) - U.S. Vice President Joe Biden
wound up a visit to Brazil on Friday saying it was high time the two largest economies in the Americas became closer partners in
trade, investment and energy, http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/05/31/us-brazil-usa-biden-idUSBRE94U14220130531, 5-31-13,
DAG)
"We're ready for a deeper, broader relationship across the board on everything from the military to education, trade
and investment," Biden told reporters after meeting with Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff.¶ The White House
announced on Wednesday that Rousseff will make a state visit to Washington on October 23, the only one that
President Barack Obama is offering a foreign head of state this year, indicating the importance his administration is
placing on closer ties with Latin America's largest nation.¶ Biden praised Brazil for recently writing off $900 million in
African debt, saying it showed the emergence of Brazil as a "responsible" nation on the world stage.¶ During his threeday visit, Biden also commended Brazil for lifting millions of people from poverty over the last decade and showing the
world that development and democracy are not incompatible. However, he also urged Brazil to open its economy more
to foreign bushiness and to be more vocal in defense of democracy and free-market values.¶ Relations between
Washington and Brasilia have improved since Rousseff took office in 2011 and adopted a less ideological foreign policy
than her predecessor, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who befriended Iran and drew Brazil closer to Venezuela's anti-U.S.
government under the late Hugo Chavez.¶ As the Brazilian economy surged on a commodity boom in the last decade,
China displaced the United States as Brazil's largest trading partner due to its massive purchases of Brazilian iron ore
and soy.¶ Perceiving the advent of better ties between Brasilia and Washington, U.S. and Brazilian businesses are
actively pushing for a strategic partnership between their countries that would allow for more flexible investment
rules, a treaty to eliminate double taxation and a visa waiver program to make travel easier for tourists and
executives.¶ "The atmospherics are improving rapidly, in part because Brazil has taken a lower profile on some
contentious global political issues like Iran," said Eric Farnsworth, vice president of the Americas Society, a business
forum dedicated to fostering ties between the United States and Latin America.¶ Brazil is also beginning to understand
that China and other leading emerging nations are not yet substitutes for economic ties with the United States. While
the so-called BRIC countries have rapidly gained a greater share of the global economy, they still are no match for
American businesses in terms of providing the investment and technology Brazil needs, Farnsworth said.¶ "There seems
to be a growing sense that the United States may unnecessarily and gratuitously have been pushed away by the
previous government, particularly as China slows and commodities markets soften," he said.¶ EMERGING POWER¶ Much
of the future relationship with the United States will depend on whether Brazil, whose economy still remains
relatively protected by high tariffs and other barriers, can make trade easier, Biden said in a speech in Rio de Janeiro.¶
Among many pending issues between the two nations are a longstanding effort to ease visa restrictions for travel and a
push by U.S. companies for protection of intellectual property rights in a Brazilian marketplace rife with pirated
software.¶ U.S. oil companies are keen to tap enormous offshore oil deposits that promise to turn Brazil into a major
oil producer.¶ The United States is also urging Brazil to buy F-18s made by Boeing Co. to upgrade its fighter jet fleet, a
multi-billion-dollar deal that would mark a significant jump in the strategic and security relationship between the two
nations.¶ Brazil is seeking U.S. backing for a long-coveted permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council. Washington
has said it "appreciates" Brazil's ambitions at the United Nations, but has stopped short of backing its call for a place
on the council.¶ While Biden stressed the potential of the world's largest and seventh-largest economies to grow closer,
a free trade agreement is not on the cards because Brazil is part of the South American customs union Mercosur. The
bloc's rules say member countries must act in unison on trade issues.¶ Some observers think it is not realistic to expect
any dramatic move towards a full-fledged strategic partnership any time soon.¶ "Brazil has achieved the stature and
recognition it enjoys today in part by maintaining its independence from the United States," said Michael Shifter of the
Inter-American Dialogue think tank in Washington.¶ "It will want to keep some distance, while seeking to take advantage
of what the United States has to offer."
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Cooperation key to regional development
ITF 11, Independent Task Force Report No. 66 (Council on Foreign Relations, “Global Brazil and? U.S.-Brazil
Relations”, 2011, i.cfr.org/content/publications/attachments/Brazil_TFR_66.pdf)
Brazil and the United States are working together on development? and health issues in Central America and the
Caribbean and in lusophone? Africa. Indeed, ABC and USAID have now stationed staff in one? another’s agencies to
advance third-country cooperation. For example,? Brazilian and U.S. health and aid institutions support the U.S.Brazil-? Mozambique trilateral technical assistance cooperation that works to? strengthen the Mozambican response
to its HIV/AIDS epidemic. In? 2010, a USAID-ABC-Embrapa partnership launched a program to support? NGOs that will
establish food security projects in Mozambique.? In São Tomé and Príncipe, off the West Coast of Africa, Brazil and the?
United States have committed to multiyear funding for an antimalaria? project. In El Salvador, Brazilian and U.S.
entities are helping develop a? National Public Health Institute.? Even before the 2010 earthquake, U.S. and Brazilian
officials had? identified Haiti as ground where the two countries could work together.? In 2009, ABC and USAID made
a joint trip to Port-au-Prince to explore? trilateral cooperation opportunities, including joint technical assistance? to
train garment sector workers and U.S. Southern Command? collaboration with the Brazilian engineering battalion of
Minustah? on infrastructure projects. After the earthquake and under the auspices? of the Brazilian-led UN mission,
the United States and Brazil have? worked together, along with a number of other partners, to provide? security and
rebuild infrastructure in Haiti.
US-Brazil relations key to trade
Meyer 13 (Peter, 2/27, Analyst in Latin American Affairs, “Brazil-U.S. Relations”, Date accessed: 7/6/13,
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL33456.pdf, LE)
Trade issues play a central role in U.S.-Brazil relations. Although both countries have been ¶ closely involved in global,
regional, and sub-regional trade talks, they have frequently disagreed ¶ on the substance of trade agreements. Within
the Doha Round of WTO trade negotiations that ¶ began in 2001, for example, Brazil has led the G-20 group of
developing countries in insisting ¶ that developed countries agree to reduce and eventually eliminate agricultural
subsidies as part of ¶ any settlement. Similarly, opposition from Brazil and several other South American countries ¶
effectively killed the U.S.-backed Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) in 2005. ¶ During President Obama’s March
2011 visit to Brazil, the U.S. and Brazilian governments ¶ concluded a Trade and Economic Cooperation Agreement.
The agreement creates a new bilateral ¶ trade dialogue designed to foster deeper cooperation on issues such as
intellectual property rights, ¶ trade facilitation, and technical barriers to trade.¶ 124¶ During Secretary of State Clinton’s
April 2012 ¶ visit to Brazil, she indicated that the United States is interested in furthering trade relations by ¶
negotiating a bilateral investment treaty and eventually a free trade agreement.¶ 125¶ It is unlikely ¶ that the United
States and Brazil will complete such agreements in the near-term, however, as ¶ Brazil has never ratified a bilateral
investment treaty and the two countries continue to have ¶ significant differences regarding trade issues.¶ 126¶ Despite
these differences and the lack of a free trade agreement, U.S.-Brazil trade has grown ¶ considerably over the past
decade (see ¶ Figure 2¶ ). Whereas total U.S. trade in goods with the ¶ world increased 93% between 2003 and 2012, U.S.Brazil trade increased 161% to $75.8 billion ¶ during the same time period. U.S. goods exports to Brazil increased
283% to $43.7 billion and ¶ U.S. goods imports from Brazil increased 75% to $32.1 billion. As a result of the relatively
faster ¶ growth of U.S. exports compared to imports (which¶ declined significantly in the aftermath of the ¶ financial
crisis), the United States has run a trade surplus in goods with Brazil since 2008. In ¶ 2012, the surplus was valued at
$11.6 billion.¶ 127¶ Top U.S. exports to Brazil included heavy and ¶ electric machinery, oil, and civilian aircraft and parts.
Top U.S. imports from Brazil included ¶ crude oil, iron and steel, machinery, ethanol, and coffee.¶ 128¶ U.S.-Brazil trade in
services has ¶ grown even more quickly, increasing by 336% between 2003 and 2011. In 2011, total trade in ¶ services
amounted to $28.6 billion. The United States continued to run a substantial trade surplus ¶ ($14.8 billion), with U.S.
services exports to ¶ Brazil totaling $21.7 billion and U.S. services ¶ imports from Brazil totaling $6.9 billion.¶ 129
US-Brazil relations key to Latin America influence
The American Magazine 13 (1/21-28, “Looking South”, http://americamagazine.org/issue/looking-south, LE)
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Brazil. A growing economic force, Brazil is asserting power in the region and on the global stage. Under President
Dilma Rousseff, Brazil refused to support U.N. intervention in Libya and Syria. Brazil will continue to exert influence on
other powers in the region, including Venezuela, where anti-American sentiment is strong. Yet Brazil should not be
seen as a rival to the United States, but instead a major player worthy of engagement and collaboration. “We’re all
focused on China. Latin America is a huge opportunity for us,” Governor Mitt Romney said during a presidential debate.
He was right, and that opportunity is nowhere greater than in Brazil.
Brazil will host three major world events in the next four years: World Youth Day in 2013, the World Cup in 2014 and the
Summer Olympics in 2016. The government is using this opportunity to improve living conditions in the infamous
slums of Rio, an important step but one that should not emphasize gentrification over the needs of Brazil’s poor. The
Obama administration seems to understand that Brazil must be cultivated; in 2011 Mr. Obama visited the country
even as the Arab Spring raged. Brazil’s combination of state-owned industry and free-market policies may seem an
odd mix to American observers, but it is a historic trend in Latin America, and one that is working in Brazil despite a
recent slowdown in growth.
Brazil is an emerging economic hegemon
Sells 12 (Heather, CBN News reporter, 6/23, “Brazil's Northeast Emerging as Economic Powerhouse”, Date Accessed:
7/8/13, http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2012/July/Brazils-Northeast-Emerging-as-Economic-Powerhouse/, LE)
"Brazil has become this global economic powerhouse and then we're talking about a region within Brazil that's
growing even faster than the rest of the country," Usha Pitts, principal officer at the U.S. Consulate in Recife,
said. Recife is a coastal city of 1.5 million in the Northeastern state of Pernambuco.
In the last two years, Brazil's gross domestic product grew 7.5 and 2.7 percent respectively. That is compared with 9.3
and 4.5 percent in Pernambuco and 7.9 and 4.3 percent in Ceara, another northeastern state, according to the Brazilian
Institute of Geography and Statistics.
The other driver of this boom is the more than 50 million people living in the region's nine states. The Northeast is
Brazil's fastest growing population center.
Many credit former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, himself a product of the Northeast, for leading the charge to
insist the government invest here.
Today the payoff is a northeast migration as Brazilians from Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo find jobs here.
US-Brazil relations key to trade—now is the key time.
Biden, 2013 (Joseph, Vice President of the US, May 31, “Remarks to the Press by Vice President Biden and Brazilian Vice
President Temer”, http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2013/05/31/remarks-press-vice-president-biden-andbrazilian-vice-president-temer, DVO)
As I said on Wednesday, I believe that 2013 can and should mark the beginning of a new era in U.S.-Brazil
relations. But words will not get us there. We have a good deal of work that we have to get done between now and
the end of the year to make that promise a reality. But we’re on our way.
Over the past four years, the President of the United States has been here. I have been here. Ten of our Cabinet
members have been here. That has never happened before in the history of the relationship to the best of my
knowledge between our country and yours. And it is a clear reflection of how important we believe this relationship to
be.
We both acknowledge that there are gaps between what we have accomplished together and what we are capable of
together. And I discussed with your President and Vice President the ambitious agenda that I think we should be
focusing on to bridge that gap.
We spoke about how to deepen trade and investment in both our nations. Our annual trading relationship has now
surpassed $100 billion a year, but there is literally no reason -- no reason why the world’s largest and seventh largest
economies can’t increase that fivefold over time. That would generate so many jobs in both our countries and further
tighten the relationships between our countries.
We spoke about how to remove barriers to trade and also how to achieve greater certainty for investors in both our
countries. You have significantly increased direct foreign investment in the United States, and we welcome it, and we
seek more.
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Latin American economies key to US economy.
Cardenas, 2011 (Mauricia, March 17, Director of the Latin American Initiative at Brookings Institution, “Thanks Again:
Latin America” Foreign Policy Magazine
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/03/17/think_again_latin_america?page=0,3, DVO)
Listen to some of the rhetoric in Washington and you would think that Latin America only impacts the U.S. economy by
sucking away manufacturing jobs and flooding the country with illegal immigrants. The truth is that U.S. economic
interests are more entwined with those of its southern neighbors than ever. This is an overwhelmingly positive
development.
For instance, U.S. oil imports from Latin America are larger than those from the Middle East. Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and
Kuwait combined make up only 20 percent of U.S. oil imports. Latin American countries -- specifically Venezuela,
Mexico, Ecuador, Colombia, and Trinidad and Tobago -- account for one third of U.S imports. For the United States,
assuring a stable oil supply from its Latin American neighbors should be no less important than preserving stability in
the Middle East.
Also, the Latin American consumer market is by no means irrelevant for U.S. companies. The region's GDP is $4.2 trillion,
roughly 84 percent of China's $5 trillion. With only 40 percent of China's population, Latin America's average per capita
income is twice that of China's. Therefore, Latin American households are important consumers of U.S. manufactured
goods and services. For example, in 2010, 20 percent of Citicorp's overall profits came from Latin America.
While the Middle East is currently forging its own path toward democracy and Asian nations are rapidly competing with
the United States for global market share, the United States can partner with its democratic Latin American neighbors
to set a strong path toward mutual economic prosperity.
Stronger hemispheric economic integration is the natural first step. But moving forward in this direction requires
debunking the most pernicious myth. Many in Washington still believe that the United States is exporting jobs to Latin
America. Rather, the opposite is true: The region buys goods and services that generate jobs in the United States.
Mexico is the second-largest market for U.S. exports, Brazil the 8th, and Colombia the 20th -- even without the passage
of the pending free-trade agreement. Their combined imports from the United States in 2010 exceeded $210 billion,
which represent thousands of jobs in America, especially in the manufacturing sector. But today, Latin America has
signed free-trade agreements with countries like Canada and South Korea that can supply similar goods. Signing the
pending free-trade agreements with Panama and Colombia would be an effective way to preserve U.S. competitiveness
in the region.
Economic success, social inclusion, and political assertiveness are the buzzwords of the new Latin America, a region that
now exudes confidence and optimism. Long-term U.S. strategic interests will be much better served by a reengagement with this often-ignored neighbor.
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Trade Impacts
Protectionism will lead to terrorism, genocide, world war, and extinction.
Panzner 8 (faculty at the New York Institute of Finance, 25-year veteran of the global stock, bond, and currency markets
who has worked in New York and London for HSBC, Soros Funds, ABN Amro, Dresdner Bank, and JPMorgan Chase
(Michael, Financial Armageddon: Protect Your Future from Economic Collapse, Revised and Updated Edition, p. 136-138,
googlebooks)
Continuing calls for curbs on the flow of finance and trade will inspire the United States and other nations to spew
forth protectionist legislation like the notorious Smoot-Hawley bill. Introduced at the start of the Great Depression,
it triggered a series of tit-for-tat economic responses, which many commentators believe helped turn a serious
economic downturn into a prolonged and devastating global disaster, But if history is any guide, those lessons will have
been long forgotten during the next collapse. Eventually, fed by a mood of desperation and growing public anger,
restrictions on trade, finance, investment, and immigration will almost certainly intensify. Authorities and ordinary
citizens will likely scrutinize the cross-border movement of Americans and outsiders alike, and lawmakers may even call
for a general crackdown on nonessential travel. Meanwhile, many nations will make transporting or sending funds to
other countries exceedingly difficult. As desperate officials try to limit the fallout from decades of ill-conceived, corrupt,
and reckless policies, they will introduce controls on foreign exchange, foreign individuals and companies seeking to
acquire certain American infrastructure assets, or trying to buy property and other assets on the (heap thanks to a
rapidly depreciating dollar, will be stymied by limits on investment by noncitizens. Those efforts will cause spasms to
ripple across economies and markets, disrupting global payment, settlement, and clearing mechanisms. All of this will, of
course, continue to undermine business confidence and consumer spending. In a world of lockouts and lockdowns, any
link that transmits systemic financial pressures across markets through arbitrage or portfolio-based risk management, or
that allows diseases to be easily spread from one country to the next by tourists and wildlife, or that otherwise
facilitates unwelcome exchanges of any kind will be viewed with suspicion and dealt with accordingly. The rise
in isolationism and protectionism will bring about ever more heated arguments and dangerous confrontations over
shared sources of oil, gas, and other key commodities as well as factors of production that must, out of necessity, be
acquired from less-than-friendly nations. Whether involving raw materials used in strategic industries or basic
necessities such as food, water, and energy, efforts to secure adequate supplies will take increasing precedence in a
world where demand seems constantly out of kilter with supply. Disputes over the misuse, overuse, and pollution of the
environment and natural resources will become more commonplace. Around the world, such tensions will give rise to
full-scale military encounters, often with minimal provocation. In some instances, economic conditions will serve as a
convenient pretext for conflicts that stem from cultural and religious differences. Alternatively,nations may look
to divert attention away from domestic problems by channeling frustration and populist sentimenttoward other
countries and cultures. Enabled by cheap technology and the waning threat of American retribution,terrorist groups
will likely boost the frequency and scale of their horrifying attacks, bringing the threat of random violence to
a whole new level. Turbulent conditions will encourage aggressive saber rattling and interdictions by rogue nations
running amok. Age-old clashes will also take on a new, more healed sense of urgency. China will likely assumean
increasingly belligerent posture toward Taiwan, while Iran may embark on overt colonization of its neighbors in the
Mideast. Israel, for its part, may look to draw a dwindling list of allies from around the world into a growing number of
conflicts. Some observers, like John Mearsheimer, a political scientist at the University of Chicago, have even speculated
that an "intense confrontation" between the United States and China is "inevitable" at some point. More than a few
disputes will turn out to be almost wholly ideological. Growing cultural and religious differences will be transformed
from wars of words to battles soaked in blood. Long-simmering resentments could also degenerate quickly, spurring the
basest of human instincts and triggering genocidal acts. Terrorists employing biological or nuclear weapons will vie with
conventional forces using jets, cruise missiles, and bunker-busting bombs to cause widespread destruction. Many will
interpret stepped-up conflicts between Muslims and Western societies as the beginnings of a new world war.
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FREE TRADE PREVENTS NUCLEAR WAR.
Copley News Service, December 1, 1999 [Winner of the 2006 Pulitzer prize]
For decades, many children in America and other countries went to bed fearing annihilation by nuclear war. The specter
of nuclear winter freezing the life out of planet Earth seemed very real. Activists protesting the World Trade
Organization's meeting in Seattle apparently have forgotten that threat. The truth is that nations join together in groups
like the WTO not just to further their own prosperity, but also to forestall conflict with other nations. In a way, our
planet has traded in the threat of a worldwide nuclear war for the benefit of cooperative global economics. Some
Seattle protesters clearly fancy themselves to be in the mold of nuclear disarmament or anti-Vietnam War protesters of
decades past. But they're not. They're special-interest activists, whether the cause is environmental, labor or paranoia
about global government. Actually, most of the demonstrators in Seattle are very much unlike yesterday's peace
activists, such as Beatle John Lennon or philosopher Bertrand Russell, the father of the nuclear disarmament movement,
both of whom urged people and nations to work together rather than strive against each other. These and other war
protesters would probably approve of 135 WTO nations sitting down peacefully to discuss economic issues that in the
past might have been settled by bullets and bombs. As long as nations are trading peacefully, and their economies are
built on exports to other countries, they have a major disincentive to wage war. That's why bringing China, a budding
superpower, into the WTO is so important. As exports to the United States and the rest of the world feed Chinese
prosperity, and that prosperity increases demand for the goods we produce, the threat of hostility diminishes. Many
anti-trade protesters in Seattle claim that only multinational corporations benefit from global trade, and that it's the
everyday wage earners who get hurt. That's just plain wrong. First of all, it's not the military-industrial complex
benefiting. It's U.S. companies that make high-tech goods. And those companies provide a growing number of jobs for
Americans. In San Diego, many people have good jobs at Qualcomm, Solar Turbines and other companies for whom
overseas markets are essential. In Seattle, many of the 100,000 people who work at Boeing would lose their livelihoods
without world trade. Foreign trade today accounts for 30 percent of our gross domestic product. That's a lot of jobs for
everyday workers. Growing global prosperity has helped counter the specter of nuclear winter. Nations of the world are
learning to live and work together, like the singers of anti-war songs once imagined. Those who care about world peace
shouldn't be protesting world trade. They should be celebrating it.
Lack of trade causes nuclear war
Michael Spicer, economist; member of the British Parliament, The Challenge from the East and the Rebirth of the West,
1996, p. 1211
The choice facing the West today is much the same as that which faced the Soviet bloc after World War II: between
meeting head-on the challenge of world trade with the adjustments and the benefits that it will bring, or of attempting
to shut out markets that are growing and where a dynamic new pace is being set for innovative production. The problem
about the second approach is not simply that it won't hold: satellite technology alone will ensure that he consumers will
begin to demand those goods that the East is able to provide most cheaply. More fundamentally, it will guarantee the
emergence of a fragmented world in which natural fears will be fanned and inflamed. A world divided into rigid trade
blocs will be a deeply troubled and unstable place in which suspicion and ultimately envy will possibly erupt into a
major war. I do not say that the converse will necessarily be true, that in a free trading world there will be an absence of
all strife. Such a proposition would manifestly be absurd. But to trade is to become interdependent, and that is a good
step in the direction of world stability. With nuclear weapons at two a penny, stability will be at a premium in the
years ahead.
Free trade solves war and promotes peace.
Unger 7-- Roberto Mangabeira Unger is a philosopher, social theorist, and politician. His writings offer a comprehensive view of our humanity, and present a
path by which humankind and each individual can hope to rise to a greater life. In 1976, at 29 years old, Unger became one of the youngest faculty members to
receive tenure from the Harvard Law School. In that same year, he also won a coveted Guggenheim Fellowship. (“Free Trade Reimagined: The World Division of Labor
and the Method of Economics”—2007 www.law.harvard.edu/unger/english/docs/FREE%20TRADE.doc)
A fourth source of the magnetism of free-trade doctrine is the power of the political hopes concealed within its prosaic
frame. Remember the political emphasis in David Ricardo's canonical statement of the theory of free trade and
comparative advantage: "Under a system of perfectly free commerce each country naturally devotes its capital and
labor to such employments as are most beneficial to each. By stimulating industry, by rewarding ingenuity, and by
using efficaciously the peculiar powers bestowed by nature, it distributes labor most effectively and economically;
while, by increasing the general mass of productions, it diffuses benefit, and binds together, by one common interest
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and intercourse, the universal society of nations throughout the civilized world" (On the Principles of Political Economy
and Taxation, Chapter VII, On Foreign Trade.)¶ The theme of trade as a union of interests capable of smothering or
diluting the passions of national glory and power had been a familiar idea for at least several generations before Ricardo
wrote. The Ricardian conception of open commerce on the basis of comparative advantage added a vital twist: common
sense and material interest, although relatively uncontroversial, would lend support to a project of untrammeled
commercial intercourse among nations that was very controversial. Once the controversial implications of free trade
acquired the authority and the solidity of the much less controversial premises, we would all find a way of buying and
selling instead of making war or lighting ideological fires. Free-trade liberalism not only seemed less dangerous than
pre-liberal mercantilism; it also held out the prospect of helping to get beyond the savage and inconclusive contest of
national rivalries, further aroused and poisoned by wars¶ of religion and of ideology. Commercial interest would do more
than foster economic growth; it would serve civilization. It would help establish intercourse and peace on a basis more
solid than philosophy, fear, and fellow feeling. Free trade among nations would be a way of agreeing to disagree. It is
impossible to contemplate the contemporary rhetorical expressions and political uses of the doctrine I study here
without concluding that this view still lives.
Free trade is vital to the U.S. economy—saves jobs and promotes economic growth
Brewer’11, (Jason Brewer Jason Brewer's business profile as Vice President of Communications and Advocacy at Retail
Industry Leaders Association,
http://www.rila.org/news/topnews/Pages/PutAmericaBacktoWorkFreeTradeisKeytoEconomicGrowth.aspx).
The Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA) joined over 1,655 business groups and employers from across the country
today in sending a letter to incoming members of the House and Senate to urge the 112th Congress to expand free trade
to promote economic growth and job creation. “The ability for American businesses to buy, create and sell products
around the world through free trade is vital to expanding our economy, promoting economic growth and putting
America back to work,” said Stephanie Lester, RILA’s vice president for international trade. Lester said the letter serves
as an important statement to incoming members of Congress from the nation’s job creators that free trade is vital to
virtually every sector of the American economy. With trade supporting 38 million jobs in the United States—more than
one in five American jobs—it’s an issue Congress should make a priority in its economic agenda. “Over 95 percent of the
world’s consumers live outside the United States,” said Lester. “As the global economy creates new demand for goods
and services, we need to be ahead of the curve, ready to sell American-made products around the globe.” Despite a
severe economic slump, the United States remains the world’s largest economy and the largest exporter and importer of
goods and services. To remain at the top, Lester urged lawmakers to continue opening markets and giving America
companies the chance to compete. “In a competitive global economy, the United States can ill-afford to fall behind
other nations in forging mutually-beneficial trading relationships,” said Lester. “To stay on top and put America back to
work, Congress should make free trade policies one of its top priorities.” The relative importance of trade to the U.S.
economy has also increased. Trade supports 38 million jobs in the United States — more than one in five American
jobs. Nearly 18 million of these U.S. jobs depend on trade with America’s free trade agreement partners. Twenty
years ago, the total value of U.S. exports and imports amounted to 17 percent of America’s GDP. In recent years,
trade has accounted for as much as a quarter of our economic output. 1. The United States remains an economic
phenomenon, with annual output exceeding $14 trillion – greater than the total output of the next five most
productive economies combined. This unprecedented economic success is not due to the size of the U.S. population
or its natural resources – other countries have more – but to the free-market principles and policies around which the
economy is organized. Free trade is a critical ingredient in that proven recipe for prosperity. Because international
trade and investment are vital to growing the American economy and creating new jobs, they must be a focus of
bipartisan cooperation between Congress and the Administration. We strongly urge the 112th Congress to pursue
trade and investment policies and agreements that will help American companies and workers to remain the most
competitive in world. A great first step would be for Congress to consider and approve pending trade initiatives, such
as the free trade agreements with Korea, Colombia and Panama. We look forward to working with you on these and
other important economic growth and job creation issues in the 112th Congress.
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Drugs Internals:
Key to Bolivian Counter narcotics
ITF 11, Independent Task Force Report No. 66 (Council on Foreign Relations, “Global Brazil and? U.S.-Brazil
Relations”, 2011, i.cfr.org/content/publications/attachments/Brazil_TFR_66.pdf)
Counternarcotics efforts in Bolivia represent an opportunity for effective? third-country cooperation that maximizes
Brazilian and U.S. capabilities? and allows for all three countries to learn from one another. Just? weeks after Evo
Morales expelled the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency? (DEA) from Bolivia in 2008, Brazil and Bolivia announced a
strategic? alliance to combat drug production and trafficking. Brazil has a significant? national interest in Bolivia’s
drug war: the shared Brazilian-? Bolivian border is longer than that between the United States and? Mexico, and
Brazil’s police estimate that 60 percent of cocaine entering? the country comes from Bolivia.50 Brazilians have
acknowledged that they are unable to match the U.S.? capacity to fund Bolivian police forces and equip them with
expensive? hardware like patrol helicopters. In August 2009, just eight months? after the Brazil-Bolivia treaty went into
effect, officials from Brazil’s? Ministry of External Relations—or Itamaraty—began a series of discussions? with U.S.
diplomats about Bolivia’s interest in trilateral cooperation? with the United States. According to American diplomats,
the? Brazilian willingness to collaborate with the United States on counternarcotics? signaled “a significant departure”
from the status quo and an? “about face” within Itamaraty.51? Trilateral counternarcotics efforts in Bolivia have the
potential for? greater effectiveness in reducing coca cultivation and drug trafficking,? and increase opportunities for
discussion, partnership, and confidence-? building between Brazil and the United States. At the same time,? while
advancing a common agenda, the United States and Brazil can? capitalize on their comparative advantages. The
United States provides? experience and funding but avoids leaving a heavy footprint. Brazil—? without the storied
and controversial U.S. counternarcotics profile in? the region—takes on greater responsibility, living up to
expectations? that a regional powerhouse uses its resources for the good of the neighborhood.? Currently,
negotiations are under way with the Bolivian government? about joint monitoring efforts. Despite good intentions and a?
high degree of openness and cooperation between Brazil and the United? States, successful trilateral collaboration
requires a commitment from? Bolivia in addition to the existing goodwill and bilateral consensus.
US-Brazil Relations key to counter narcotics
Meyer 13 (Peter, 2/27, Analyst in Latin American Affairs, “Brazil-U.S. Relations”, Date accessed: 7/6/13,
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL33456.pdf, LE)
The United States and Brazil cooperate on counternarcotics issues in a number of ways. U.S. ¶ counternarcotics
assistance provides training for Brazilian law enforcement, assists interdiction ¶ programs at Brazil’s international
airports, supports drug prevention programs, and is designed to ¶ improve Brazil’s capacity to dismantle criminal
organizations. Brazil received $1 million in U.S. ¶ counternarcotics assistance in FY2010, $1 million in FY2011, and an
estimated $2.9 million in ¶ FY2012. Under the Obama Administration’s request for FY2013, Brazil would receive $1.9 ¶
million in counternarcotics assistance.¶ 91¶ Brazil has also served as a bridge between the United States and Bolivia,
which expelled the Drug ¶ Enforcement Administration (DEA) fr¶ om its territory in 2008 as a result of alleged
interference in ¶ the country’s internal affairs. Under a trilateral ¶ anti-drug cooperation agreement signed in January ¶
2012, the United States and Brazil are providing assistance to Bolivia in the monitoring and ¶ eradication of coca
crops. According to the agreement, the United States is responsible for ¶ providing monitoring equipment, Brazil is
responsible for obtaining and interpreting satellite ¶ images, and Bolivia is responsible for conducting any necessary
field work.¶ 92
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Drugs Impacts:
The Drug Trade is Funding Genocide
Chalk ‘11
Peter Chalk is a senior political scientist at the RAND Corporation He is a correspondent for Jane's Intelligence Review
and associate editor of Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, one of the foremost journals in the international security field.
Chalk has regularly testified before the U.S. Senate on issues pertaining to national and international terrorism and is
author of numerous publications on various aspects of low-intensity conflict in the contemporary world. Chalk is also an
adjunct professor at the Postgraduate Naval School in Monterey, California, and contractor for the Asia Pacific Center for
Security Studies in Honolulu, Hawaii, and the United States Institute of Peace in Washington, D.C. Before coming to
RAND, Chalk was an assistant professor of politics at the University of Queensland, Brisbane, and a postdoctoral fellow
in the Strategic and Defense Studies Centre of the Australian National University, Canberra. Chalk earned his M.A. in
political studies and international relations at the University of Aberdeen and his Ph.D. in political science at the
University of British Columbia.
http://www.rand.org/about/people/c/chalk_peter.html)
The Latin American drug trade has had a pervasive and insidious impact that has affected a wide spectrum of national,
regional, and even international security interests. In Colombia, revenue from the production and trafficking of heroin
and cocaine has provided FARC with sufficient operational capital to maintain an active war footing in its ongoing
conflict against Bogotá. Although the organization does not pose a strategic threat to the central government, its
activities have undermined popular confidence in the administration’s ability to project a concerted territorial presence,
guarantee public security, and maintain a (legitimate) monopoly of violence—all key components of sovereign
statehood. There is little question that, without access to the enormous profits availed by the drug trade, FARC’s ability
to “achieve” these debilitating effects would have been greatly curtailed.1 Compounding the situation in Colombia are
the activities of reemerging paramilitary gangs. In particular, fighting and competition between these groups has
contributed to an increasingly serious humanitarian crisis. Beyond Colombia, the drug trade is helping to reenergize the
SL guerrilla war in Peru, which supposedly ended in 2000. According to analysts with the Catholic University in Lima, at
least two factions of the organization are currently seeking to entrench themselves in the country’s cocaine trade by
acting as security subcontractors for indigenous farmers.4 These blocs allegedly employ about 350 combatants to
protect farmers and their fields and, in 2008, were linked to the deaths of at least 26 people (including 22 soldiers and
police), making it the bloodiest year in almost a decade. According to Guillermo Valdés Castellanos, director of the
National Security and Intelligence Center (Centro de Investigación y Seguridad Nacional, or CISEN), more than 28,000
drug-related murders have occurred since Felipe Calderón launched an all-out offensive on the country’s cartels in
2006.9 To put these figures in perspective, note that fewer than 4,300 U.S. soldiers lost their lives in Iraq between 2003
and 2008. The enormous human toll has triggered the formation of various self-defense forces across the border
provinces. In January 2009, for instance, a group calling itself the Juárez Citizens Command announced that it was
preparing to take the law into its own hands and would execute a criminal every 24 hours to bring order to the city.10. It
is not unusual for victims to be dismembered, beheaded, boiled in giant pots filled with lye (a process known as pozole
after the Mexican word for stew), or even skinned.13 As one official in Tijuana candidly remarked, Criminals earn
respect and credibility with creative killing methods. Your status is based on your capacity to commit the most sadistic
acts. Burning corpses, using acid, beheading victims. . . . This generation is setting a new standard for savagery.14 The
extent of cartel violence has begun to take on a disturbing new dimension with the deliberate targeting of ordinary
civilians. A particularly bloody attack took place in September 2008, when two fragmentation grenades were hurled into
a crowd celebrating Mexico’s Independence Day at the Plaza Melchor Ocampo in Morelia, Michoacán state. One
atrocity, which was originally blamed on La Familia but ultimately tied to Los Zetas, resulted in eight deaths and more
than 12,100 injuries.15 According to the daily El Diario, one of the victims had been a witness to a multiple homicide
and was due to have testified in an upcoming trial.17
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Genocide will eat away at the structure of global society and civilization
Campbell 01
(Kenneth, associate professor of political science and international relations and director of the international relations
program at the University of Delaware, Genocide and the Global Village, p. 26)
Genocide is the supreme crime! It is arguably the worst crime that can be committed in the present global system of
nation-states and peoples. Genocide is equal to or worse than the crime of aggression. Genocide attacks civilization
itself. Contemporary civilization is based upon certain fundamental shared moral values; one of which is the principle
that groups of people have the right to exist as a distinct nationality, race, ethnicity, and religion. The International Court
of Justice (ICJ) spoke to this point in an Advisory Opinion on the Genocide Convention in 1951: The Convention was
manifestly adopted for a purely humanitarian and civilizing purpose…its object on the one had is to safeguard the very
existence of certain human groups and on the other to confirm and endorse the most elementary principles of morality.
In such a convention the contracting states do not have any interests of their own; they merely have, one and all, a
common interest, mainly, the accomplishment of those high purposes. If left unchecked, genocide eats away like a
cancer at the structure of global society, eventually undermining and destroying just those international institutions
designed to foster global cooperation, mitigate global conflict, and avoid global catastrophe such as the world
experienced in the 1930s and 1940s. Most scholars, political analysts, and policymakers, unfortunately, treat genocide
as a mere humanitarian concern, having little to do with the traditional interests of nation-states. They too often fail to
see genocide is a threat to strategic global interests, such as political stability, economic prosperity, peace, and security.
Genocide, in fact, occupies a unique area of overlap between humanitarian concerns and more traditional state interests
to the degree that international peace and security are indivisible in a world of rapidly increasing globalization. For
globalization not only speeds up the positive effects of open markets, open technologies, and open societies, it increases
the spread of pathological behavior such as genocide.
Hezbollah is creating ties with drug cartels
Davis 4/27/12
Writer for the International Project on Terrorism, former professor of international relations at Berkeley
http://www.investigativeproject.org/3358/hizballah-fundraising-and-operations-in-the-us
The growing nexus between Hizballah and Mexican drug cartels is for the Iran-backed extremist group to make use of
drug cartel transit routes to gain entry into the United States through its porous border with Mexico. Hizballah, in turn,
offers Mexican syndicates expertise on smuggling and explosives as well as access to its drug trafficking networks in
the Middle East and South Asia. Hizballah has a long history of violent attacks against U.S. and Israeli targets. In 1983
the Lebanon-based group was accused of bombing the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut that killed 240 soldiers. Hizballah,
along with its patron Iran, have been considered responsible for the attacks on the Israeli Embassy in Argentina in
1992 and a Jewish cultural center in Buenos Aires in 1994.
A terrorist attack escalates to a global nuclear exchange
Speice 06
06 JD Candidate @ College of William and Mary [Patrick F. Speice, Jr., “NEGLIGENCE AND NUCLEAR NONPROLIFERATION:
ELIMINATING THE CURRENT LIABILITY BARRIER TO BILATERAL U.S.-RUSSIAN NONPROLIFERATION ASSISTANCE
PROGRAMS,” William & Mary Law Review, February 2006, 47 Wm and Mary L. Rev. 1427]edlee
Accordingly, there is a significant and ever-present risk that terrorists could acquire a nuclear device or fissile material
from Russia as a result of the confluence of Russian economic decline and the end of stringent Soviet-era nuclear
security measures. 39Terrorist groups could acquire a nuclear weapon by a number of methods, including "steal[ing]
one intact from the stockpile of a country possessing such weapons, or ... [being] sold or given one by [*1438] such a
country, or [buying or stealing] one from another subnational group that had obtained it in one of these ways." 40
Equally threatening, however, is the risk that terrorists will steal or purchase fissile material and construct a nuclear
device on their own. Very little material is necessary to construct a highly destructive nuclear weapon. 41 Although
nuclear devices are extraordinarily complex, the technical barriers to constructing a workable weapon are not
significant. 42 Moreover, the sheer number of methods that could be used to deliver a nuclear device into the United
States makes it incredibly likely that terrorists could successfully employ a nuclear weapon once it was built. 43
Accordingly, supply-side controls that are aimed at preventing terrorists from acquiring nuclear material in the first place
are the most effective means of countering the risk of nuclear terrorism. 44Moreover, the end of the Cold War
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eliminated the rationale for maintaining a large military-industrial complex in Russia, and the nuclear cities were closed.
45 This resulted in at least 35,000 nuclear scientists becoming unemployed in an economy that was collapsing. 46
Although the economy has stabilized somewhat, there [*1439] are still at least 20,000 former scientists who are
unemployed or underpaid and who are too young to retire, 47 raising the chilling prospect that these scientists will be
tempted to sell their nuclear knowledge, or steal nuclear material to sell, to states or terrorist organizations with nuclear
ambitions. 48The potential consequences of the unchecked spread of nuclear knowledge and material to terrorist
groups that seek to cause mass destruction in the United States are truly horrifying. A terrorist attack with a nuclear
weapon would be devastating in terms of immediate human and economic losses. 49 Moreover, there would be
immense political pressure in the United States to discover the perpetrators and retaliate with nuclear weapons,
massively increasing the number of casualties and potentially triggering a full-scale nuclear conflict. 50 In addition to
the threat posed by terrorists, leakage of nuclear knowledge and material from Russia will reduce the barriers that
states with nuclear ambitions face and may trigger widespread proliferation of nuclear weapons. 51 This proliferation
will increase the risk of nuclear attacks against the United States [*1440] or its allies by hostile states, 52 as well as
increase the likelihood that regional conflicts will draw in the United States and escalate to the use of nuclear
weapons.
The drug trade has undermined Mexico’s political standpoint
Chalk 11 (Peter Chalk is a senior political scientist at the RAND Corporation He is a correspondent for Jane's Intelligence
Review and associate editor of Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, one of the foremost journals in the international
security field. Chalk has regularly testified before the U.S. Senate on issues pertaining to national and international
terrorism and is author of numerous publications on various aspects of low-intensity conflict in the contemporary world.
Chalk is also an adjunct professor at the Postgraduate Naval School in Monterey, California, and contractor for the Asia
Pacific Center for Security Studies in Honolulu, Hawaii, and the United States Institute of Peace in Washington, D.C.
Before coming to RAND, Chalk was an assistant professor of politics at the University of Queensland, Brisbane, and a
postdoctoral fellow in the Strategic and Defense Studies Centre of the Australian National University, Canberra. Chalk
earned his M.A. in political studies and international relations at the University of Aberdeen and his Ph.D. in political
science at the University of British Columbia.
http://www.rand.org/about/people/c/chalk_peter.html)
Apart from fostering extreme violence, the narcotics trade has decisively undermined political stability in Mexico by
feeding pervasive corruption throughout the police and administrative bureaucracy. 18 Although the overall extent of
the problem is unknown, its seriousness can be gauged by the following statistics: One-fifth of Mexico’s entire federal
police force was under investigation for corruption as of 2005.19 • Between 2006 and 2008, 11,500 public servants
were fined or suspended from their jobs for corruption.20 • In April 2007, the Monterrey state government arrested an
unprecedented 141 police officers for collaborating with the Gulf cartel and accepting kickbacks in exchange for
intelligence or ignoring trafficking activities taking place in their respective jurisdictions.21 • In 2008, more than 35 highranking security officials were detained, notably including Noe Ramírez, a former head of the anti–organized crime unit
in the attorney general’s office, and Ricardo Gutiérrez Vargas, director for International Police Affairs at the Federal
Investigative Agency (FIA).22 •
Mexican drug cartels are powerful because they get money and consumers from the US
Keefe 6/12/12 (Patrick Radden Keefe is a staff writer for The New Yorker and a fellow at the Century Foundation. From
2010 to 2011, he was a policy adviser in the Office of the Secretary of Defense.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/17/magazine/how-a-mexican-drug-cartel-makes-its-billions.html?pagewanted=all)
When Pablo Escobar was Chapo’s age, he had been dead for more than a decade. In fact, according to the Drug
Enforcement Administration, Chapo sells more drugs today than Escobar did at the height of his career. To some extent,
this success is easily explained: as Hillary Clinton acknowledged several years ago, America’s “insatiable demand for
illegal drugs” is what drives the clandestine industry. It’s no accident that the world’s biggest supplier of narcotics and
the world’s biggest consumer of narcotics just happen to be neighbors. “Poor Mexico,” its former president Porfirio
Díaz is said to have remarked. “So far from God and so close to the United States.” And Chapo’s great comparative
advantage still lies along that fraught boundary between Mexico and the United States. Even if the kingpin is killed or
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captured, one of his associates will quite likely take his place, and the smuggling infrastructure that Chapo created will
endure, channeling the product, reaping the profits and feeding, with barely a blip in service, the enduring demand on
this side of the border — with what the historian Héctor Aguilar Camín once referred to as “the insatiable North
American nose.”
Drug trafficking destroys the Amazon rainforest – U.S. consumption is a direct cause.
Mongabay, ’08 (Environmental News Source,5-26-08 “Cocaine use is destroying the Amazon”,
http://news.mongabay.com/2008/0526-cocaine.html, ACC: 9.23.11, p. online)
The campaign estimates that 2.2 million hectares of forest have been cleared for cocaine production in Colombia.
Pollution from production — kerosene, sulfuric acid, acetone, and carbide are used to process the leaves — has fouled
waterways while armed groups operating in forests areas have decimated wildlife. "The real price of cocaine is not
just among communities and on the streets here, but in communities and on the streets of Colombia," British Home
Office Minister Vernon Coaker was quoted as saying by Reuters. A new campaign has linked cocaine consumption in
the United States to destruction of the Amazon rainforest in Colombia. The "Shared Responsibility" drive, a joint
initiative by the British and Colombian governments, features a collection of photographs showing the destruction of
rainforest for coca plantations, the raw ingredient used for cocaine production.Cocaine production destroys rainforest In
a speech in London marketing the launch of the initiative, Francisco Santos, Colombia's Vice President, said that every
gram of cocaine consumed "destroys four square meters of rainforest."
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Human Rights:
US-Brazil relations key to human rights
Meyer 13 (Peter, 2/27, Analyst in Latin American Affairs, “Brazil-U.S. Relations”, Date accessed: 7/6/13,
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL33456.pdf, LE)
In March 2008, Brazil and the United States signed an agreement known as the United States-¶ Brazil Joint Action Plan
to Eliminate Racial and Ethnic Discrimination and Promote Equality. ¶ The initiative recognizes that Brazil and the
United States are multi-ethnic, multi-racial ¶ democracies, and seeks to promote equality of opportunity for the
members of all racial and ¶ ethnic communities. To that end, Brazil and the United States share best practices through ¶
activities such as training programs, workshops, technical expert exchanges, scholarships, and ¶ public-private
partnerships.¶ 157¶ Current areas of focus include expanding access to education for ¶ students of African descent,
eliminating racial health disparities, mitigating environmental ¶ impacts in communities of African descent, addressi¶
ng challenges in criminal justice systems, and ¶ guaranteeing equal access to economic opportunities.¶ 158¶ Congress
called for continued U.S. ¶ support for the Joint Action Plan in the report ¶ (H.Rept. 112-331) accompanying the
Consolidated ¶ Appropriations Act of 2012 (P.L. 112-74).
Brazil is key to democracy in the Americas
Walser, Ph.D.Senior Policy Analyst, 12
[Ray 3/2/12, heritage.org, “U.S.–Brazil Summit Must Address Differences on Democracy, Human Rights, and Iran,”
http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2012/04/us-brazil-summit-must-address-democracy-human-rights-and-iran, 7/6/13, MVL]
In 2001, the U.S. and Brazil signed the Inter-American Democratic Charter. Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice
observed that “the Democratic Charter must become the core of a principled, effective multilateralism for the
Americas. Together, we must insist that leaders who are elected democratically have a responsibility to govern
democratically.” Differences between Brazil and the U.S. over recent events in Honduras and the challenges to
democratic governance in Ecuador, Nicaragua, and Venezuela merit serious review of the democratic norms enshrined in
the Democratic Charter. Without Brazil’s commitment to an effective Organization of American States (OAS) and other
inter-American bodies, multilateral efforts to protect democracy and human rights will continue to diminish.
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Amazon Internals:
The U.S. and Brazil work together to preserve the Amazon which is key to stop warming.
Meyer, Analyst in Latin American Affairs, 2/27/13 (Peter Congressional research service: “Brazil-U.S. Relations”
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL33456.pdf Date accessed: 7/6/13)KG
The Amazon basin spans the borders of eight countries and is the most biodiverse tract of tropical rainforest in the
world. It holds 20% of the Earth’s fresh water and 10% of all known species. The Amazon also holds 10% of the
world’s carbon stores and absorbs nearly 2 billion tons of carbon dioxide each year, making it a sink for global carbon
emissions and an important asset in the mitigation of climate change. Approximately 60% of the Amazon falls within
Brazilian borders, making Brazil home to 40% of the world’s remaining tropical forests. 159 The Brazilian Amazon was
largely undeveloped until the 1960s, when the military government began subsidizing the settlement and development
of the region as a matter of national security. The human population grew from 6 million in 1960 to 25 million in 2010,
and approximately 20% of the Brazilian Amazon has now been deforested as a result of settlements, roads, logging,
farming and other activities.160 U.S. environment programs in Brazil are designed to support tropical forest
conservation through the promotion of proper land-use and encouragement of environmentally friendly income
generation activities for the rural poor. In FY2006, USAID initiated the Amazon Basin Conservation Initiative, which
supports community groups, governments, and other organizations working throughout the Amazon Basin to
conserve the forest’s biodiversity. USAID provided Brazil with $14 million for environmental programs in FY2010,
$11.5 million in FY2011, and an estimated $10 million in FY2012.169 The Obama Administration did not request any aid
for environmental programs in Brazil in FY2013; however, Congress has specifically directed USAID to fund such
programs in previous appropriations measures and could do so once again. In August 2010, the United States and
Brazil signed a debt-for-nature agreement under the Tropical Forest Conservation Act of 2008 (P.L. 105-214).
According to the agreement, the United States will reduce Brazil’s debt payments by $21 million over five years. In
exchange, the Brazilian government will commit those funds to activities to conserve protected areas, improve
natural resource management, and develop sustainable livelihoods in endangered areas outside of the Amazon such
as the Atlantic Rainforest, Caatinga, and Cerrado ecosystems.
US Brazil cooperation solves the Amazon.
Meyer 13 (Peter, 2/27, Analyst in Latin American Affairs, “Brazil-U.S. Relations”, Date accessed: 7/6/13,
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL33456.pdf, LE)
U.S. environment programs in Brazil are designed to support tropical forest conservation through ¶ the promotion of
proper land-use and encouragement of environmentally friendly income ¶ generation activities for the rural poor. In
FY2006, USAID initiated the Amazon Basin ¶ Conservation Initiative, which supports community groups, governments,
and other organizations ¶ working throughout the Amazon Basin to conserve the forest’s biodiversity. USAID provided
¶ Brazil with $14 million for environmental programs in FY2010, $11.5 million in FY2011, and an ¶ estimated $10 million in
FY2012.¶ 169¶ The Obama Administration did not request any aid for ¶ environmental programs in Brazil in FY2013; ¶
however, Congress has specifically directed ¶ USAID to fund such programs in previous appr¶ opriations measures
and could do so once again. ¶ In August 2010, the United States and Brazil ¶ signed a debt-for-nature agreement under
the ¶ Tropical Forest Conservation Act of 2008 (P.L. 105-214). According to the agreement, the United ¶ States will
reduce Brazil’s debt payments by $21 million over five years. In exchange, the ¶ Brazilian government will commit
those funds to activities to conserve protected areas, improve ¶ Brazil-U.S. Relations ¶ Congressional Research
Service ¶ 31 ¶ natural resource management, and develop sustainable livelihoods in endangered areas outside of ¶
the Amazon such as the Atlantic Rainforest, Caatinga, and Cerrado ecosystems.¶ 170
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Amazon Impacts:
And, Amazon destruction causes extinction
Takacs 96 - Ph.D. in science and technology studies @ Cornell, Professor of Environmental Humanities, Institute for
Earth Systems Science and Policy, California State University, Monterey Bay, David, The Idea of Biodiversity: Philosophies
of Paradise, p. 200-1]
"Habitat destruction and conversion are eliminating species at such a frightening pace that extinction of many
contemporary species and the systems they live in and support ... may lead to ecological disaster and severe
alteration of the evolutionary process," Terry Erwin writes." And E. 0. Wilson notes: "The question I am asked most frequently about the diversity of
life: if enough species are extinguished, will the ecosystem collapse, and will the extinction of most other species
follow soon afterward? The only answer anyone can give is: possibly. By the time we find out, however, it might be too late. One
planet, one experiment."" So biodiversity keeps the world running. It has value in and for itself, as well as for us. Raven, Erwin, and Wilson oblige us to think about the
value of biodiversity for our own lives. The Ehrlichs' rivet-popper trope makes this same point; by eliminating rivets, we play Russian roulette with global ecology and
destruction of the rich complex of species in the Amazon basin could trigger rapid changes in
global climate patterns. Agriculture remains heavily dependent on stable climate, and human beings remain heavily
dependent on food. By the end of the century the extinction of perhaps a million species in the Amazon basin could
have entrained famines in which a billion human beings perished. And if our species is very unlucky, the famines
could lead to a thermonuclear war, which could extinguish civilization.""
human futures: "It is likely that
The Amazon is key to medicine and solving warming
Brown, President of the Amazon International Rain Forest Reserve, 7/12/13(Annett, President of Amazon
International Rain Forest Reserve, “WHY SHOULD I HELP SAVE THE AMAZON RAINFOREST”
http://en.amazonrainforest.org/Community/Letters/WhyShouldIHelpSaveTheAmazonRainforest/tabid/78/Default.aspx
Date accessed: 7/12/13)KG
Although the rainforest is the Earth’s oldest living ecosystem and has been around for millions of years, it may not be
around for much longer. At the present rate of destruction, the rainforest will be gone in 20 years or less. And, unlike
North American rainforests, once the Amazon Rainforest is destroyed, it doesn’t come back. The Amazon Rainforest
supplies most of the air in our lungs and when the rainforest is gone, so is most of our air. This definitely caught my
attention. I work in a hospital and see many people having to pull oxygen tanks around with them in order to catch a
breath of air. Without the rainforest, in 20 years or less, none of us will be able to breathe without these tanks.
Destruction of the rainforest is the second largest cause of global warming. Scientists believe that if global warming
continues, it could cause serious problems like floods and droughts in different parts of the world. We have already
seen evidence of this worldwide. I live in Texas, and last summer we experienced the longest drought in our state’s
history. One out of every four medicines in pharmacies today comes from the rainforest. These include treatments for
serious diseases like cancer, heart disease, arthritis, and childhood leukemia. However, many of these plants are
being destroyed before even being studied for their life saving qualities. My grandmother and my father have had
cancer. Is there a cure out there? Three thousand plants have anti-cancer properties. Of these, 70% inhabit the
rainforest and right now they are going up in smoke. Land half the size of San Francisco contains 845 kinds of birds, 100
species of dragonflies, and 729 types of butterflies. It has 205 kinds of mammals and 10,000 different varieties of plants
and trees. I live in North Texas, and I don’t even have a tree in my yard. About one million people call the Amazon home.
These people’s ancestors have lived in the Amazon for thousands of years, and the survival of their culture depends on
the rainforest’s survival. The rate of destruction is approximately two football fields per second. In the time it takes to
read this editorial, hundreds of lives have been destroyed or changed forever. Am I an activist? I never thought I was,
but I am indeed passionate about something I believe in. The destruction of the Amazon Rainforest is not just a
horrible thing happening somewhere else. The actual cause may be happening somewhere in South America in the
Amazon, but the effect is right here, right now, right where you and I live.
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Heg:
Strong US-Brazil relations bolster US soft power and heg
Brown ’13 (Lawrence T. Brown, Director of Operations for the Office of the Defense Representative–Pakistan, “Restoring the
‘Unwritten Alliance’:Brazil-U.S. Relations”, National Defense University Enterprise issue 69, second quarter 2013,
http://www.ndu.edu/press/lib/pdf/jfq-69/JFQ-69_42-48_Brown.pdf)
The primary challenge the United States faces in the 21st century, according to historian and diplomat Joseph Nye, “is not one of
decline but what to do in light of the realization that even the largest country cannot achieve the outcomes it wants
without the help of others.”1 Acknowledging Brazil as a genuine partner is problematic for American leaders since the United States exercised tremendous
unilateral influence in South American affairs throughout the 19th and 20th centuries. Today, U.S. hubris lingers in relations with Brazil. This
residual attitude prompts some U.S. leaders to consider any Brazilian disregard for U.S. interests as an affront. Instead of regarding Brazil’s economic
growth as a challenge to U.S. hegemony, U.S. leaders should commend it as a regional achievement. Additionally, some
current perceptions of the two countries’ strategic interests as continuing to diverge are historically shortsighted. Such a view affirms a U.S. failure to adapt longrange diplomatic strategies to match the global rise of many countries. Undeniably,
the United States needs Brazil—now and in the future.
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Prolif:
Tensions in relations risk Brazilian proliferation
Hakim 10
[Peter, senior fellow of the Inter-American Dialogue, October 21, 2010, “US-Brazil Relations: Expect More Conflict,”
http://www.thedialogue.org/page.cfm?pageID=32&pubID=2490] WD
Brazil’s close, supportive ties with Iran have most exasperated Washington and unsettled the US-Brazilian relations in
recent years. And there is considerable justification in the US position. Brazil has long defended Iran’s nuclear
program—claiming, despite mounting and broadly accepted evidence to the contrary, that it is directed only toward
civilian purposes. It has overlooked Iran’s repression at home, its continuing support of terrorist groups abroad, and its
unrelenting threats toward Israel. Washington was particularly galled when, this past May, Brazil joined with Turkey to
negotiate an agreement with Iran to halt a US-led drive for new UN sanctions against Tehran for its persistent violations
of UN resolutions regarding its nuclear development activities. Neither Brazil nor the US managed this incident
particularly well. A letter from Barack Obama to Lula da Silva initially appeared to encourage the Brazil-Turkey-Iran
talks—although Washington subsequently made clear its strong opposition to the talks, and its unwillingness to back
down from its demand for harsher sanctions. At the same, however, the US—if it had not been so narrowly focused on
preserving a big power consensus for the sanctions—might well have recognized that there was potentially some value
in the deal negotiated by Brazil and Turkey and not simply rejected it out of hand. Iran will surely be a cause of
continuing friction in the US-Brazilian relation, primarily because of Brazil’s defense of Iran’s uranium enrichment
efforts—while the US is persuaded these are directed toward building a nuclear bomb. Brazil will almost certainly
continue to oppose sanctions against Iran (although it has pledged to respect those that have been imposed by the
UN). The US and Brazil together might usefully explore the question of what evidence would be sufficient to conclude
either that Tehran is pursuing a weapons capability or that its intentions are peaceful. Narrowing the gap between
the two countries on this issue would help to ease tensions. Over time, Brazil’s own nuclear program may emerge as
an even more contentious issue than Iran for US-Brazilian relations. To be sure, Brazil has signed the Nuclear
Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT), and is bound to forego nuclear weaponry by its own constitution, by an agreement with
Argentina, and by the Latin American-wide Tlateloco treaty. The US today has little concern that Brazil is preparing to
develop an atomic weapon. But Brazil has embarked on a uranium enrichment program, and will almost certainly
acquire the capacity to build such a weapon. Today, Brazil and the US are at odds over Brazil’s refusal to sign the
NPT’s additional protocol, which requires far more intrusive inspections of enrichment facilities than the original
treaty. Washington sees Brazil’s rejection of the NPT’s additional protocol as vitiating an already weakened nonproliferation regime. Brazil, on the other hand, claims it is entirely within its rights, and asserts that it is the US and
Russia who are most in violation of the NPT provision because of their failure to vigorously pursue its nuclear
disarmament provisions. US-Brazilian frictions over the issues involved may increase as Brazil and several other
countries come closer to a weapons capacity. Ironically, nuclear development could be an area for cooperation
between the US and Brazil. Certainly US scientific and technical resources could importantly bolster Brazil’s efforts to
develop its nuclear energy industry. The recent US agreement with India (a country that has already has a nuclear
arsenal) may serve as model for US technology transfer to Brazil. What the US would surely want from Brazil in
exchange, however, is sustained support for enhanced nonproliferation policies.
US-Brazil relations solve global nuclear proliferation
Hakim 10
[Peter, senior fellow of the Inter-American Dialogue, December 19, 2010, “Why Brazil-US Relations Will Remain Tense,”
http://www.thedialogue.org/page.cfm?pageID=32&pubID=2542] WD
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Dilma Rouseff inherits a deeply strained US-Brazilian relationship. No matter how adroitly she manages foreign policy,
it is now almost inevitable that the two countries will, for years to come, be colliding with one another. Their
international agendas reflect divergent interests, priorities, and approaches. They will not always be able to keep
disagreements in check. In regional affairs, Brazil deeply irritated the US last year when it opposed the US’s access to
Colombian bases—even though it later reached its own, albeit more modest, military accord with Washington. Brazil
and the US continue to quarrel over Honduras, sustaining a divisive standoff in hemispheric relations. They also have
polar opposite positions regarding Cuba. But, US-Brazil ties will be most buffeted in the coming period by global, not
regional, issues. What most exasperates Washington is Brazil’s unwavering defense of Iran’s nuclear program along
with its seeming indifference to Iran’s repression at home, support of terrorist groups, and unrelenting threats against
Israel. Brazil’s own nuclear program may soon become a contentious issue in US-Brazilian relations. The US is not
today concerned about Brazil developing atomic weapons—but is troubled that its position on Iran and limits on
inspections of its nuclear facilities will weaken global nonproliferation efforts. Ideally, nuclear development should be
an area of cooperation. Washington’s three-year old agreement with India could serve as model for US technology
transfer to Brazil—if Brazil were willing to actively support nonproliferation initiatives. Trade is another source of
friction. Last year, trade tensions rose sharply after Brazil prevailed in its WTO suit, which found US cotton subsidies to
be illegal. Washington has defused the dispute by compensating Brazil for its lost cotton sales. But rampant US
agriculture protectionism will remain a source of discord in bilateral relations. Brazil and the US share many interests in
global commercial arrangements. Although it now appears unlikely, by joining forces, the US and Brazil would
substantially increase the chances that the nearly moribund Doha global trade talks would have a productive outcome.
Brazil and the US will have major roles in addressing problems of climate change and energy . What is uncertain is
whether on these and other issues, they will end up cooperating or clashing, but they will surely confront one another
time and again in many different arenas. Brazil has demonstrated its independence from the US and shown its ability
to pursue its international aims without US support. Brazil is not ready to shift to a close, cooperative relationship.
Despite its rising profile and influence, the US does not yet view Brazil as a potential strategic ally either as a crucial
economic actor or as a major player on critical security issues. And the US sees Brazil’s foreign policy on issues of human
rights, democracy, and nonproliferation as erratic. Still, even with their strained relations, Brazil and the US have never
considered themselves adversaries. Both governments are willing to tolerate considerable disagreement and cooperate
in specific instances. For the US and an increasingly powerful Brazil to build a constructive relationship into the future,
however, will demand far greater effort and attention by both governments than has been the case to date. Still,
conflict may be more common than partnership. That should be expected when two powerful countries have to
contend with one another.
Brazil is developing nuclear weapons under the cover of nuclear submarines
Rühle 10--Hans Rühle was head of the Social Science Institute of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation. From 1982 to 1988 he was director of the Policy Planning
Staff at the Federal Ministry of Defence. (“Nuclear Proliferation in Latin America: Is Brazil Developing the Bomb?”—5/7/2010
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/nuclear-proliferation-in-latin-america-is-brazil-developing-the-bomb-a-693336.html)
In October 2009, the prestigious American periodical Foreign Policy published an article titled "The Future Nuclear Powers You Should Be Worried About." According
to the author, Kazakhstan, Bangladesh, Burma, the United Arab Emirates and Venezuela are the next candidates -- after Iran -- for membership in the club of nuclear
powers. Despite his interesting arguments, the author neglected to mention the most important potential nuclear power: Brazil. ¶ Nowadays,
Brazil is held in high esteem by the rest of the world. Its president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has become a star on the international stage. "That's my man right here,"
US President Barack Obama once said, in praise of his Brazilian counterpart. Lula, as he is known, can even afford to receive Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
with all honors and demonstratively endorse his nuclear program, for which Iran is now ostracized around the world.¶ Lula da Silva's self-confidence is indicative of
Brazil's claim to the status of a major power -- including in military terms. The military claim is reflected in the country's National Defense Strategy, which was
unveiled in late 2008. In addition to the mastery of the complete nuclear fuel cycle -- which has since been achieved -- the document calls for the building of nuclearpowered submarines.¶ Close to Building a Bomb¶ It sounds harmless enough, but it isn't, because the term "nuclear-powered submarines" could in fact be a cover for
a nuclear weapons program. Brazil
already had three secret military nuclear programs between 1975 and 1990, with each
branch of its armed forces pursuing its own route. The navy's approach proved to be the most successful: using imported high-performance
centrifuges to produce highly enriched uranium from imported uranium hexafluoride, so as to be able to operate small reactors for submarines. At the appropriate
time, the country's newly acquired nuclear capabilities were to be revealed to the world with a "peaceful nuclear explosion," based on the example set by India. The
300-meter (984-foot) shaft for the test had already been drilled. According to statements by the former president of the National Nuclear Energy Commission, in
1990 the Brazilian military was on the verge of building a bomb.¶ Brazil is developing nuclear weapons under the cover of nuclear submarines¶ But it never came to
that. During the course of Brazil's democratization, the secret nuclear programs were effectively abandoned. Under the country's 1988 constitution, nuclear activities
were restricted to "peaceful uses." Brazil ratified the Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Latin America and the Caribbean in 1994 and, in 1998, the
Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) and the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty. Brazil's flirtation with the bomb had apparently ended.¶ Under Lula da Silva,
however, this flirtation has now been reignited, and the Brazilians are becoming
less and less hesitant about toying with their own
nuclear option. Only a few months after Lula's inauguration in 2003, the country officially resumed the development
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of a nuclear-powered submarine.¶ Even during his election campaign, Lula criticized the NPT, calling it unfair and obsolete. Although Brazil did not
withdraw from the treaty, it demonstratively tightened working conditions for inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Authority (IAEA). The situation
became tense in April 2004, when the IAEA was denied unlimited access to a newly built enrichment facility in
Resende, near Rio de Janeiro. The Brazilian government also made it clear that it did not intend to sign the additional protocol to the NPT, which would
have required it to open previously undeclared facilities to inspection.¶ In mid-January 2009, during a meeting of the Nuclear Suppliers Group, a group of nuclear
supplier countries that works toward nonproliferation by controlling exports of nuclear materials, the reasons for this restrictive policy became clear to attendees
when Brazil's representative did his utmost to fight requirements that would have made the nuclear submarine program transparent.¶ 'Open to Negotiation'¶ Why
all this secrecy? What is there to hide in the development of small reactors to power submarines, systems that several
countries have had for decades? The answer is as simple as it is unsettling: Brazil is probably also developing something else in the
plants it has declared as production facilities for nuclear submarines: nuclear weapons. Vice President José Alencar offered a reason when he openly
advocated Brazil's acquisition of nuclear weapons in September 2009. For a country with a 15,000-kilometer border and rich offshore oil reserves, Alencar says, these
weapons would not only be an important tool of "deterrence," but would also give Brazil the means to increase its importance on the international stage. When it
was pointed out that Brazil had signed the NPT, Alencar reacted calmly, saying it was "a matter that was open to negotiation."¶ How exactly could Brazil go about
building nuclear weapons? The answer, unfortunately, is that it would be relatively easy. A precondition for the legal construction of small reactors for submarine
engines is that nuclear material regulated by the IAEA is approved. But because Brazil designates its production facilities for nuclear submarine construction as
restricted military areas, the IAEA inspectors are no longer given access. In other words, once
the legally supplied enriched uranium has passed
through the gate of the plant where nuclear submarines are being built, it can be used for any purpose, including the
production of nuclear weapons. And because almost all nuclear submarines are operated with highly enriched uranium, which also happens to be
weapons grade uranium, Brazil can easily justify producing highly enriched nuclear fuel.¶ Even if there is no definitive proof of Brazil's nuclear activities (yet), past
events suggest that it is highly likely that Brazil is developing nuclear weapon s. Neither the constitutional prohibition nor the NPT will
prevent this from happening. All it would take to obtain a parliamentary resolution to eliminate these obstacles would be for Lula da Silva to say that the United
States is not entitled to a monopoly on nuclear weapons in the Americas. If that happens, Latin America would no longer be a nuclear weapons-free zone -- and
Obama's vision of a nuclear-free world would be finished.
Brazil has had a nuclear weapons program and is working to enrich uranium
Global Security 12—globalsecurity.org GlobalSecurity.org is the leading source for reliable news and security information, directed by John Pike.
(“Nuclear Weapons Programs”—9/21/2012 http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/world/brazil/nuke.htm)
Brazil pursued a covert nuclear weapons program in response to Argentina's program. It developed a modest nuclear
power program, enrichment facilities (including a large ultracentrifuge enrichment plant and several laboratory-scale facilities), a limited reprocessing
capability, a missile program, a uranium mining and processing industry, and fuel fabrication facilities. Brazil was
supplied with nuclear materials and equipment by West Germany (which supplied reactors, enrichment and reprocessing facilities),
France, and the US. The country has a dependable raw material base for developing atomic power engineering, highly skilled scientific cadres have been
trained, technologies for enriching uranium have been obtained, and there are several nuclear research centers. ¶ Brazil's nuclear capabilities are the most advanced
in Latin America; only Argentina has provided serious competition. Brazil
has two nuclear power plants in operation (Angra I and Angra II) and
one under construction (Angra III). Its fissile material production program was multifaceted, with the military services involved in separate projects: the
navy, centrifuge enrichment; the air force, laser enrichment; and the army, gas graphite reactor for plutonium production. With the return of democracy in both
Brazil and Argentina, the two countries abandoned their nuclear weapons programs in 1990. Later in 1998, Brazil joined the NPT. As late as mid-2008, despite growing
resistance from the Ministry of Defense (MOD) some within the GoB were considering the possibility of signing an International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)
Additional Protocol. In December 2008 the GoB adopted a new Defense Strategy that rejects accepting any new non-proliferation measures unless the nuclear
powers "disarm." This hardening of position by Brazil undercut USG efforts to have the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) adopt a new rule regarding a criteria based
procedure for transferring enrichment and reprocessing (ENR) technology, including the requirement that the recipient have an IAEA Additional Protocol in place.
Brazil's opposition to an IAEA Additional Protocol has had the collateral effect of preventing Argentina from signing one, both for legal reasons (Brazil and Argentina
are linked with the IAEA by the Quadpartite Agreement) and political grounds, not wanting to upset its large neighbor.¶ The GoB has not clearly articulated its
rationale for opposing an Additional Protocol; several reasons have been offered from time to time. GoB officials have said that an Additional Protocol would mean
that the IAEA is suspicious of Brazil's intentions regarding its future nuclear program. The MRE's Director of the Division for Disarmament and Sensitive Technologies,
Santiago Mourao, opined that this would be treating Brazil "as if it were Iraq or Iran." At the same time, Mourao and civilian officials from National Commission on
Nuclear Energy (CNEN) have indicated that technically there is not a problem with complying with an Additional Protocol. The obstacle is a political one, and Mourao
and others have consistently pointed to the MOD, particularly the Navy, as the primary source of opposition.¶ Admiral Othon Pinheiro, the President of Eletronuclear
(the operator of Brazil's nuclear power plants), commented that the Navy was very concerned about obtrusive inspections, which could reveal to outsiders Brazil's
most sensitive technology. There is also a faction of the Brazilian leadership that believes joining the NPT was a mistake because it meant accepting a sort of second
class status for Brazil. This group believes an Additional Protocol would compound this mistake. Whatever the reasons, the GoB has moved from a position of leaning
toward signing an IAEA Additional Protocol just a year ago to stiff opposition. It is generally supposed that Brazilian enrichment technology may have been illegally
obtained from Germany, and Brazil may want to hide evidence of this.¶ Multilaterally, the GoB is cautious about taking an active role on non-proliferation and has
consistently refused to take a strong position against Iran's nuclear efforts. Brazil strives not to break ranks with the G-77. Although the GoB has been careful to
comply fully with UN sanctions against Iran and has asserted the importance of Iranian compliance with UN resolutions, the GoB has also stressed Iran's right to
develop nuclear energy for peaceful purposes and occasionally cast doubts on IAEA findings that certain Iranian activities were inconsistent with a peaceful nuclear
program. The GoB is looking to improve political and economic ties with Iran. President Lula met with Iran's President Ahmadinejad in New York in September 2009.¶
Citing efforts with North Korea, the GoB has made clear that it believes dialogue is the best option to ensure Iran is not a threat to the global community, and has
commended P5+1 efforts to engage Iran. North Korea's testing of a nuclear device in early 2009 only delayed Brazil's opening of an Embassy there temporarily. In
discussions on non-proliferation, GoB officials frequently avoid supporting non-proliferation efforts by resorting to oft-repeated protestations that the nuclear
powers are not doing enough on disarmament ignoring progress being made in this area. In
addition to building more reactors, Brazil is seeking
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to complete the nuclear fuel cycle and master enrichment and reprocessing (ENR) technologies. Brazil is installing cascades
of centrifuges to enrich uranium. While rich in uranium, with the sixth largest reserves in the world, Brazil ships yellowcake to Canada and then to Europe
(URENCO) for processing into fuel. President Lula has directed the GoB to develop the skills to do the processing itself and become self-sufficient. This is estimated to
take through 2030, after which Brazil may become a supplier within South America and possibly elsewhere of nuclear fuel. The Presidents of Brazil and Argentina
have announced that they will form a joint entity to process nuclear fuel, but there has been little progress. While Brazil uses centrifuges for enrichment, Argentina
uses gas technology. Brazilians sometimes regard efforts to urge them to join the Additional Protocol with concern that such efforts could be part of an agenda to
deny Brazilian mastery of the full fuel cycle.
Decline in relations causes Brazilian prolif.
Stalcup, 2012 (Travis, Fellow at the GHWBush School of Government and Public Policy at Texas A&M, October 10,
Georgetown Journal of International Affairs, “What is Brazil Up To With Its Nuclear Policy?”,
http://journal.georgetown.edu/2012/10/10/what-is-brazil-up-to-with-its-nuclear-policy-by-travis-stalcup/, DVO)
Further north, the United States, long the guarantor of South American stability, appears hamstrung by economic
challenges. According to former Argentine diplomat Emilio Cárdenas, Brazil believes that the West is in gradual
decline and that Brazil is jockeying with other rising nations for position. This shift in the balance of power engenders
a greater degree of uncertainty about U.S. capabilities and intentions in the future. Such uncertainty, in addition to
Brazil’s new political and economic prowess, gives it the ability to challenge the U.S. at the margins of its power.
Moreover, if the ability of the U.S. to maintain order in the hemisphere is truly constrained, it is incumbent upon the
Brazilian government to seek alternative sources of security.
This perceived shift in the balance of power presents Brazil with an opportunity for international leadership. That is
why Brazil is seeking to achieve a degree of political clout commensurate with its new economic power, setting as its
chief foreign policy goal a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. A key component of permanent
membership is the ability to share the burdens of maintaining international security. Currently, there is some question
as to whether Brazil is capable of such a charge. Looking at the current permanent members as well as the other BRICs –
Russia, India, and China – Brazil sees nothing but countries with nuclear weapons.
According to Kenneth Waltz, the preeminent realist international relations scholar, states mirror other states – states
without nuclear weapons see the power and prestige of states with nuclear weapons and they want in. Former
Brazilian Vice President José Alencar who died last year, remarked that Pakistan won international relevance “precisely
because it has a nuclear bomb.” A nuclear weapon would not only deter rogue neighbors but solidify Brazil’s regional
dominance and prove that it possesses the military capability to contribute to international security.
In addition to this perceived shift in the balance of power, consider Brazil’s more aggressive military strategy from
2003 to 2010 during the presidency of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Part of that strategy is the development of an
enormous nuclear attack submarine analogous to India’s ballistic missile-capable Arihant-class. In addition to its
potential as a missile platform, the propulsion reactors in Brazil’s submarines would require a higher degree of
uranium enrichment than those for commercial power, possibly above 90 percent. In 2004, Brazilian Ambassador to
the United States Roberto Abdenu remarked that “submarines are not subject to the [IAEA] safeguards regime.” This
interpretation provides Brazil the capability to enrich weapons-grade uranium and develop a full fuel cycle outside of
international scrutiny and without violating its agreements, such as the Treaty of Tlatelolco.
Furthermore, although Brazil does participate in various nonproliferation agreements, it refuses to adopt the Additional
Protocol of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). This protocol would strengthen the International Atomic Energy Agency
(IAEA)’s ability to detect clandestine weapons programs through various mechanisms, including a stronger inspections
regime. According to Brazil’s National Strategy of Defense, a precondition to any additional restrictions under the NPT,
such as the Additional Protocol, is the disarmament of nuclear states. However, even modest decreases in the nuclear
inventories of the United States and Russia have proven difficult to accomplish. If the U.S. and Russia are unable or
unwilling to disarm, Brazil feels no responsibility to take further steps to tie its hands by acceding to the Additional
Protocol.
Taken independently, these actions are not necessarily provocative. However, when one considers how Brazil’s
security environment is changing, these actions bring Brazil’s intentions into question. The perceived decline in the
United States’ willingness and ability to intervene militarily in Latin America, hostility of neighboring countries to Brazil’s
economic interests, and the hopelessness of nuclear disarmament provide powerful incentives to explore nuclear
capability. None can claim that Brazil is actively pursuing a nuclear weapon, but its more assertive military posture,
refusal to sign the NPT’s Additional Protocol, and pursuit of nuclear propulsion technology should give American
policymakers and nonproliferation analysts pause.
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***CONSULT CP CARDS:
Brazil – US relations are growing the squo, Brazil needs to considered and cooperated with for US
measures taken in the region
Sotero 12 - Director of the Brazil Institute at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, in Washington. (Paulo, “Why United States and Brazil Will
Pursue a More Productive Bilateral Relationship”, 11/9/12, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/paulo-sotero/why-united-states-and-bra_b_2102004.html, HW)
The growing presence of Brazilian global companies in the United Stated, complementing traditionally strong
American investments in Brazil, has created a two-way street where common interests are more visible and pressure
both governments to recognize the benefits of working together or risk paying a political price for not doing so.
Converging economic interests and similar challenges are emerging as the principal driver of United States-Brazil
relations in the years ahead. A reelected President Barack Obama and President Dilma Rousseff, at the half mark of her government, are confronted with
daunting tasks. Both need to significantly improve the economic performance of their countries in the face of political major obstacles at home, and an adverse
economic outlook abroad. In both countries, sustainable growth will require investment in infrastructure, education and innovation more than consumption. How
they respond will determine the success or failure of their administrations. It will also affect the two countries'
bilateral relationship and their regional and global standing. After four years of anemic recovery and a victory on November 6th without a
clear political mandate, President Obama has now to find a path of economic growth that reduces unemployment while avoiding the pitfalls of a fragile fiscal and
financial situation, which, if mishandled, could easily throw the United States and the world economy back into recession. Both
governments and the
private sector have recognized the importance of constructive engagement between the Americas' two economic and
political powerhouses. After a period of estrangement caused by foreign policy differences at the end of the Lula da Silva administration, Washington
and Brasilia kissed and made up right before Rousseff's inauguration in January 2011. Since then, the two capitals
have spurred an array of bilateral and global initiatives and intensified the frequency of their mid and high-level
meetings. Whereas previous conversations between Brazilian and American policymakers might have been limited to
a few areas of core interest, it is now all-encompassing. There are mechanisms for regular ministerial cooperation and
consultation ranging from challenging topics such as trade, finance and defense, to 21st century concerns such as cyber security, open
government, and innovation in science and technology, to issues that directly affect the average citizen such as education and social policies. People to people
exchanges are on the rise, strengthening and expanding networks particularly in education and scientific research. Viewed by skeptics as window dressing and no
substitute for concrete agreements on hard issues such as trade and taxation, the rapid increase in the breadth and depth of the
bilateral dialogue and
the Brazilian and American governments' efforts to maintain the doors open for a more productive and consequential
relationship suggest, at a minimum, that they understand they need each other, benefit from working together and
risk paying a political price for not doing so. Brazil and the U.S. have also taken on global challenges together , benefiting
from Brazil's ability to wield soft power and newfound status in multilateral fora. The Open Government Initiative (OGI) that Brazil and the United States launched last
year has attracted over forty countries committed to promoting transparency, fighting corruption and harnessing new technologies to make government more open,
effective, and accountable. On
the positive side, under the Obama administration the United States has increasingly
recognized Brazil's growing weight and relevance in a region where the United States was once the hegemon and
where today Brazil faces new challenges to advance its interest and values , and to assert leadership. Pursuing a strategy of
cooperation rather than competition is the wiser decision for both countries.
Cooperation is key to future relations.
Hanson, 2012 (Stephanie, Associate Director of the Council on Foreign Relations, focusing on Latin America, July 2,
“Brazil on the International Stage”, http://www.cfr.org/brazil/brazil-international-stage/p19883, DVO)
Brazil's ascendancy poses opportunities and challenges for the United States, which would like to have a stronger
partnership with the country on security, trade, and energy matters. Under the Bush and Obama administrations, the
United States has increasingly regarded Brazil as a significant power, especially in its role as a stabilizing force in Latin
America. While Brazil and the United States share common goals for regional stability, Brazil's independent approach to
foreign policy has led to periodic disputes with the United States on trade and political issues, including how and
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whether to create a Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA), Brazil's vocal opposition to the war in Iraq, and the U.S.
embargo of Cuba. Experts differ on how the United States should handle this tension. David Rothkopf suggests that the
United States should seek "a new special relationship with Brazil" to keep Brazil from feeling slighted by U.S.
prioritization of other matters. If the Obama administration "only pays lip service to Brazil but slow walks the most
important issues while seeking disproportionate payment in turn from the Brazilians ... then tension and distrust are
likely to manifest themselves," he writes. Other analysts say the United States just needs to treat Brazil on more equal
footing.
Consult card—consultation on trade key.
Council on Foreign Relations, 2011 (“Global Brazil and US-Brazil Relations”, July 19, Independent Task Force Report No.
66, Samuel W Bodman and James D Wolfensohn, Chairs, http://www.cfr.org/brazil/global-brazil-us-brazilrelations/p25407, DVO)
The Task Force finds that it is in the interest of the United States to welcome Brazil’s regional leadership and
encourage Brazil’s promotion of inclusiveness, development, and democracy. Developing a more comprehensive U.S.
policy toward Brazil should not come at the expense of deepening U.S. relationships with its other partners in the
Americas.
The United States will need to adjust to a more assertive and independent Brazil. And Brazil must adjust to its new role
as a global power. While the United States adapts to Brazil, it should also encourage Brazil to use its newfound
multilateral and diplomatic influence in ways that look not only to its own national interests but to those of its
neighbors and beyond.
Brazil and the United States face similar domestic challenges—including education, innovation, health care, and
infrastructure—that should serve as an opportunity for deepening bilateral understanding and cooperation. The Task
Force notes the critical importance of
Brazil’s continued progress in redressing its significant domestic constraints, which could jeopardize the sustainability of
Brazil’s long-term economic growth and deter its international ambitions.
Consultation key to check China’s influence in Latin America.
Council on Foreign Relations, 2011 (“Global Brazil and US-Brazil Relations”, July 19, Independent Task Force Report No.
66, Samuel W Bodman and James D Wolfensohn, Chairs, http://www.cfr.org/brazil/global-brazil-us-brazilrelations/p25407, DVO)
The Task Force encourages both governments to maintain and expand channels of communication on trade and
monetary policy, especially with respect to China. Brazil and the United States each approach China carefully,
balancing relationships that are both complementary and competitive. Both Brazil and the United States have
concerns about China’s undervalued yuan, and though a joint approach is unrealistic, the Task Force suggests that
Brazil and the United States agree on common language to describe the currency challenges presented by China in
order to encourage China to allow its yuan to appreciate.
Third party collaboration key to deepening US-Brazil relations.
Council on Foreign Relations, 2011 (“Global Brazil and US-Brazil Relations”, July 19, Independent Task Force Report No.
66, Samuel W Bodman and James D Wolfensohn, Chairs, http://www.cfr.org/brazil/global-brazil-us-brazilrelations/p25407, DVO)
The richest and deepest connections between Brazil and the United States tend not to involve direct bilateral
relations between the governments, but rather third-country or subnational collaboration and private-sector
partnerships. Some of the most promising collaborations between Brazil and the United States take place outside
both countries’ borders on counternarcotics, health and development goals, promotion of decent work, and biofuels
cooperation.
The Task Force finds that there is ample room for the federal governments of the United States and Brazil to capitalize
on the relationships being built in third countries and by the countries’ governors, private sectors, trade unions, and
civil society organizations. The growth of these secondary and tertiary interactions presents an opportunity to build
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confidence and demonstrate commonality to the two societies, at the same time laying the groundwork for more
structured bilateral relations that benefit from the confidence and partnerships already in place.
Consultation on counter narcotics good.
Council on Foreign Relations, 2011 (“Global Brazil and US-Brazil Relations”, July 19, Independent Task Force Report No.
66, Samuel W Bodman and James D Wolfensohn, Chairs, http://www.cfr.org/brazil/global-brazil-us-brazilrelations/p25407, DVO)
Counternarcotics efforts in Bolivia represent an opportunity for effective third-country cooperation that maximizes
Brazilian and U.S. capabilities and allows for all three countries to learn from one another. Just weeks after Evo
Morales expelled the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) from Bolivia in 2008, Brazil and Bolivia announced a
strategic alliance to combat drug production and trafficking. Brazil has a significant national interest in Bolivia’s drug
war: the shared Brazilian-Bolivian border is longer than that between the United States and Mexico, and Brazil’s police
estimate that 60 percent of cocaine entering the country comes from Bolivia.50
Brazilians have acknowledged that they are unable to match the U.S. capacity to fund Bolivian police forces and equip
them with expensive hardware like patrol helicopters. In August 2009, just eight months after the Brazil-Bolivia treaty
went into effect, officials from Brazil’s Ministry of External Relations—or Itamaraty—began a series of discussions with
U.S. diplomats about Bolivia’s interest in trilateral cooperation with the United States. According to American diplomats,
the Brazilian willingness to collaborate with the United States on counternarcotics signaled “a significant departure”
from the status quo and an “about face” within Itamaraty.51
Trilateral counternarcotics efforts in Bolivia have the potential for greater effectiveness in reducing coca cultivation
and drug trafficking, and increase opportunities for discussion, partnership, and confidence-building between Brazil
and the United States. At the same time, while advancing a common agenda, the United States and Brazil can
capitalize on their comparative advantages. The United States provides experience and funding but avoids leaving a
heavy footprint. Brazil—without the storied and controversial U.S. counternarcotics profile in the region—takes on
greater responsibility, living up to expectations that a regional powerhouse uses its resources for the good of the
neighborhood.
Currently, negotiations are under way with the Bolivian government about joint monitoring efforts. Despite good
intentions and a high degree of openness and cooperation between Brazil and the United States, successful trilateral
collaboration requires a commitment from Bolivia in addition to the existing goodwill and bilateral consensus.
Conclusions and Recommendations
The Task Force welcomes Brazil’s involvement in counternarcotics, harm reduction, and transnational crime issues on
its borders, especially in Bolivia, and encourages other such cooperation between Brazil and the United States
elsewhere. The Task Force encourages Brazil’s leadership as a voice for reform of the region’s counternarcotics
strategy.
The Task Force supports Brazil’s promotion, by former president Cardoso with former presidents Ricardo Lagos (Chile),
Ernesto Zedillo (Mexico), and César Gaviria (Colombia), of harm reduction policies (which treat drug use as a public
health issue and promote the reduction of drug consumption) in addition to interdiction and eradication.
52 The Task Force encourages the DEA and USAID and their Brazilian counterparts working in Bolivia to reinforce one
another’s efforts to reassure the Bolivian government that outside counternarcotics support—like monitoring of coca
cultivation and eradication—does not threaten Bolivian sovereignty.
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***AFF ANSWERS:
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Relations Down:
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Generic
No relations now—Brazil gains international clout by disagreeing with the US publicly.
Hakim, 2012 (Peter, President Emeritus of the Inter-American Dialogue, April 09, PBS Newshour, “US, Brazil Disagree
More Than They Agree, Analyst Says”, http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/world/jan-june12/brazil_04-09.html, DVO)
MARGARET WARNER: A country once best known by Americans for postcard-perfect beaches and a passion for the
game of soccer, Brazil has emerged as a powerhouse competitor in the global economy, achieving the number six
world GDP ranking this year.
Along with Russia, India and China, it's part of the so- called BRIC club of rapidly developing economies. Now this
country of 200 million, Latin America's largest, is demanding to be taken more seriously on the world political stage as
well. And, today, President Dilma Rousseff was given a cordial welcome by President Obama at the White House.
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: I'm -- feel very fortunate to have such a capable and far-sighted partner as President
Rousseff.
DILMA ROUSSEFF, President of Brazil (through translator): The U.S.-Brazil bilateral relations are, for Brazil, a very
important relationship, not only from a bilateral but also from a multilateral perspective.
MARGARET WARNER: But though the hemisphere's two biggest democracies should be natural allies, they often don't
see eye to eye.
PETER HAKIM, president emeritus, Inter-American Dialogue: It would certainly be hard to say the U.S. and Brazil are
adversaries or in conflict, but the fact is, they disagree more than they agree.
MARGARET WARNER: Peter Hakim is senior fellow and president emeritus at Inter-American Dialogue in Washington.
PETER HAKIM: Americans and Brazilians love to talk about a strategic relationship. Yet, the U.S. rarely consults with
Brazil on the important global issues.
MARGARET WARNER: That shouldn't be surprising, given Brazil's history of being a thorn in the U.S. side. In 2010, then
President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva tried to broker a deal with Turkey on Iran's nuclear program and derail Secretary of
State Clinton's push for U.N. sanctions against Tehran.
Brazil has staked out positions contrary to Washington's on Cuba, climate change, and the 2009 coup in Honduras as
well.
PETER HAKIM: Brazil is in many respects still learning what it means to be a global power. And the way it's been
successful, ironically, is not by joining with the United States, which would have been one route, but rather in
opposition to the United States, that it sort of has gained its international prestige precisely by showing its
independence of the United States.
No relations now—US refuses to openly support Brazil’s campaign for permanent Security Council seat.
Neves, 2012 (Joao Augusto De Castro Neves, Eurasia Group Analyst, April 09, PBS Newshour, “US, Brazil Disagree More
Than They Agree, Analyst Says”, http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/world/jan-june12/brazil_04-09.html, DVO)
MARGARET WARNER: When Dilma Rousseff won Brazil's 2010 presidential election campaign, Washington had high
hopes she would be easier to work with than her one-time boss and mentor Lula. The former Marxist-guerrilla-turnedtechnocrat has been less assertive and flamboyant on the global stage.
Noted Eurasia group analyst Joao Augusto de Castro Neves.
JOAO AUGUSTO DE CASTRO NEVES, analyst, Eurasia Group: President Dilma's foreign policy is a little bit less rhetorical
or ideological than President Lula's, her predecessor, was. I think that in the sense that more risk-averse diplomacy, that
more conservative in some sense diplomacy is good for not only relations with Brazil and the United States, but
actually for Brazil's goals abroad.
MARGARET WARNER: President Obama made a point of visiting Brazil just two months after Rousseff took office. But it
wasn't long before Rousseff was renewing Brazil's call for greater global recognition. She used her first appearance at
the U.N. General Assembly last fall to declare that Brazil and other emerging powers like India should have permanent
seats on the Security Council.
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DILMA ROUSSEFF (through translator): It is not possible, Mr. President, to delay this any more. The world needs a
Security Council that reflects the contemporary reality we're living in, a council that includes new permanent and
non-permanent members.
MARGARET WARNER: President Obama endorsed another BRIC country, India's bid for a seat in 2010, but has not done
the same for Brazil. And that's galling to Brazilians.
JOAO AUGUSTO DE CASTRO NEVES: What Brazil expects from the U.S. today, I think, is a treatment similar that the
U.S. has with China and India, with other big, large, rising countries. And Brazil thinks that it holds many credentials to
be in that seat, to have that permanent seat. And it's quite puzzling in Brazil to try to understand, why hasn't this
endorsement come?
Variety of alternate causes prevent relations; US only pays lip service to Brazil’s importance.
PBS News Hour, 2012 (April 09, PBS Newshour, “US, Brazil Disagree More Than They Agree, Analyst Says”,
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/world/jan-june12/brazil_04-09.html, DVO)
MARGARET WARNER: Paulo Sotero, director of the Woodrow Wilson Center's Brazil Institute, believes the slight is a
source of real tension in the relationship.¶ PAULO SOTERO, director, Woodrow Wilson Center's Brazil Institute: Brazil has
always had this aspiration to sit at the table.¶ MARGARET WARNER: What does this say to Brazil and to Latin America
that President Obama isn't ready to endorse that?¶ PAULO SOTERO: It says that -- well, that the United States is not
ready to recognize Brazil's role. It pays lip service to it from time to time. President Obama needs to recognize that
Brazil's rise is real. I think that he doesn't.¶ MARGARET WARNER: None of that political tension was apparent today.
Both leaders stressed basic economic issues.¶ BARACK OBAMA: Brazil's been a extraordinary leader in biofuels and
obviously is also becoming a world player when it comes to oil and gas development. And the United States is not only
a potential large customer to Brazil, but we think that we can cooperate closely on a whole range of energy projects
together.¶ MARGARET WARNER: Rousseff spoke bluntly about the blowback on developing countries from the monetary
policies of the U.S. and Europe.¶ DILMA ROUSSEFF (through translator): They lead to a depreciation in the value of the
currencies of developed countries, thus impairing growth outlooks in emerging countries.¶ MARGARET WARNER:
Brazilian journalist Luciana Coelho said the tone is in keeping with each leader's cool, businesslike personality.¶ LUCIANA
COELHO, Brazilian journalist: I don't think we will be seeing something like President Bush and President Lula, you
know, the two guys who could go for a beer. I would never imagine President Rousseff going for a beer with President
Obama. But she's a very focused and hands on-person. And I think people in Brazil like that.¶ MARGARET WARNER:
Rousseff will concentrate on addressing what's been a sudden economic slowdown at home, Sotero predicts, with less
time for diplomatic adventures abroad like Lula's bid to get in the Iran game.¶ PAULO SOTERO: I believe that you will not
see Brazil doing the same type of initiative under President Dilma Rousseff. Dilma Rousseff I think understands that
Brazil's presence and influence in the world depends much more on what happens in Brazil.¶ MARGARET WARNER:
Rousseff left the White House today with deals on expanding economic, education and energy cooperation, but without
support for a Security Council seat. One administration official described the evolving relationship as a slow courtship,
saying you can't expect a great leap forward from any single visit.¶ That's a law, said Castro Neves.¶ JOAO AUGUSTO DE
CASTRO NEVES: These two countries could have a -- could do a lot, much more than they do today. The agenda is not
as ambitious as it should be.¶ MARGARET WARNER: So a missed opportunity?¶ JOAO AUGUSTO DE CASTRO NEVES: It's a
missed opportunity. Or some people would say it's benign indifference.¶ MARGARET WARNER: For these two leaders,
preoccupied with more pressing problems, this step-by-step diplomacy might be the most that can be expected for
now.
Multiple historical tensions sour relations.
Steunkel, 2012 (Oliver, Professor of IR at the Getulio Vargas Foundation in Sao Paolo, February 26, “Can Dilma Roussef
fix US Brazil Relations?”, Post Western World, http://www.postwesternworld.com/2012/02/26/can-dilma-rousseff-fix-us-brazil-relations/, DVO)
At the same time, Brazil's rise has not gone unnoticed in Washington, D.C., but the report's key recommendation that
the U.S. should "recognize Brazil as a global actor" and adopt a strategy that "reflects the new regional reality" may
still strike U.S. American policy makers as difficult to implement - after all, US-Brazil relations are complicated by
several thorny issues, ranging from Brazil's break with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), its
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stance on Libya, Syria, and differing positions on climate change and the question of how to deal with Iran, Cuba and
Venezuela.
Historically, the United States' often reacted angrily whenever it felt its generous policy towards an emerging power
did not create the unbreakable alliance and eternal thankfulness it expected in return - a problem particularly visible in
its policy towards India, which, just like Brazil, would never agree to a formal alliance with the United States. Such an
agreement would simply reduce their space for maneuvre too much, complicating ties with countries that dislike the
U.S.
Brazil is also likely to react allergically to blunt attempts by the United States to drive a wedge between Brazil and the
other BRICS - as I have mentioned in previous posts, U.S. dipomats sometimes state such objectives explicitly during
meetings, a practice that justifiably causes suspicion among Brazilian scholars and policy makers who do not see any
contradiction between stronger ties with both the United States and other emerging powers.
No relations—US and Brazil happy with distant status quo.
Hakim, 2012 (Peter, President Emeritus of Inter-American Dialogue, April 9, “A US Brazil Respect Deficit”, LA Times,
http://articles.latimes.com/2012/apr/09/opinion/la-oe-hakim-brazil-policy-20120409, DVO)
But beyond disagreements on economic issues, U.S.-Brazil relations are strained by geopolitical tensions. Particularly
galling for Brazil has been Washington's reluctance to support its bid for a permanent seat on the U.N. Security
Council, even though President Obama gave U.S. backing to India two years ago. For its part, Brazil has pursued its
global aspirations largely by standing apart from the U.S. and emphasizing its differences on critical regional and world
issues, most disturbingly on Iran'snuclear program.
Washington hoped Rousseff, who took office in January 2011, would set a new tone by initiating a more pragmatic and
moderate foreign policy than that of her flamboyant predecessor. There have been differences, but they are modest,
and the U.S. has not responded to the changes in any significant way.
No one anticipates that the Brazilian president's visit will alter bilateral relations in any substantial way.
Still, it is time for the U.S. to consider dropping its ambivalence over Brazil's international ambitions and acknowledge —
more than halfheartedly — its emergence as a powerful nation. The U.S. should support Brazil's pursuit of a Security
Council seat (which Brazil will almost surely occupy within several years). There is no good reason for Washington to
continue favoring India over Brazil. Brazil does not have an untarnished record on foreign policy, but it has a better
profile than India on most global questions that concern the U.S. — including the Middle East generally. And Brazil could
play a helpful role in negotiations on these issues because it enjoys the confidence of many countries that remain wary
of the United States and its European allies.
Brazil has made clear it would welcome U.S. assistance to create a robust scientific and technological industry.
Although Washington says it wants to be helpful, its efforts have been modest and lackluster. Again, India provides a
model. A U.S.-Brazil accord, similar to Washington's 3-year-old nuclear technology agreement with New Delhi, would
contribute greatly to Brazil's development of a world-class nuclear energy industry, and might be the best way to secure
Brazil's active support for nonproliferation initiatives.
The two countries need to be more respectful of each other. Frequently, the U.S. treats Brazil as an interloper in
world affairs, which does not match the status it has achieved. For its part, Brazil seems intent on demonstrating its
influence by flaunting its independence of the U.S. and, on many issues, showing off its opposition, even when
bedrock U.S. interests are at stake.
Changes in approach would benefit both nations. For now, however, they seem comfortable with the status quo, with
two governments tolerating and accommodating each other, while maintaining their distance. Unfortunately, neither
is prepared to invest very much in building a more robust relationship.
US Brazil relations down
Rapalyea, Council on Foreign Relations, 2013
[Blair, March 2013, University of North Carolina, “The Future of United States Public Diplomacy in Brazil”,
http://www.unc.edu/depts/diplomat/item/2013/0105/ca/rapalyea_uspd.html, 7-6-13, JB]
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Brazil and the United States are not always on the most stable footing – take, for example, Brazil’s offer of assistance
to Iran regarding their nuclear energy program. This action stood in direct contrast to U.S. directives in the region, but
Brazil saw Iran as a potential partner in development and disregarded the wishes of the U.S. government. Though a
change in leadership in Brazil prevented this plan from coming to fruition, it provides an example of how a sense of
obligation deep enough to prevent an action undermining U.S. interests does not exist.
Relations impossible-Laundry list
Yale Global 13 (Alistair Burnett, He editor of The World Tonight, a BBC News program, Brazil and the US – Not on Same
Page, 12 April 2013, http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/content/brazil-and-us-%E2%80%93-not-same-page, 7-8-13, DAG)
RIO DE JANEIRO: Relations between the two giant democracies of the Americas, Brazil and the US, should be easy.
After all, the two countries have much in common. Both are complex societies, with territory stretching across their
respective continents and a history of European colonists taking land from indigenous Americans. Granting differences
between British and Portuguese colonial traditions, both were built by immigrants, most who came willingly and others
like slaves, indentured servants or prisoners who didn’t. Both are well-established democratic federal republics.¶ Yet,
when it comes to foreign policy and trade relations there are constant tensions. These could be addressed soon, with
reports that President Dilma Rousseff will make a formal state visit to the United States, the first of a Brazilian leader in
two decades.¶ To the irritation of Washington, Brazil has failed to extend support on issues such as the 2011
intervention in Libya, where Brasilia thought the Western powers were jumping the gun and abused the UN mandate
to pursue regime change. For its part, Brazil has been irked by US failure to support its long-held ambition for a
permanent seat on the UN Security Council.¶ Washington, traditionally the main foreign-arms supplier to the Brazilian
armed forces, won’t overlook Russian Prime Minister Dmitri Medvedev’s February visit to Brazil to sign an agreement on
selling air-defense equipment with President Rousseff. ¶ But the highest profile disagreement between the two has been
over the Brazilian attempt, along with Turkey, to break the deadlock between Iran and the West over Tehran’s nuclear
program. Former Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva went to Iran with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip
Erdoğan, in May 2010 to sign a confidence-building deal with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to send some Iranianenriched uranium for reprocessing abroad, so it could not be diverted to any weapons program. ¶ Brazil has tried, along
with Turkey, to break the deadlock between Iran and the US over Tehran’s nuclear program.¶ The US immediately
rejected the deal. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton accused Brazil and Turkey of making the world “a more dangerous
place.” Then Foreign Minister Celso Amorim insisted the US had been kept abreast of the negotiations; when asked at
an international security conference later in the year why the US had later rejected the deal, he said “some people
just can’t take ‘Yes’ for an answer.” He suggests the Americans were happy to go along with the initiative because
they thought it would fail; when it succeeded, they turned on Brasilia. The agreement was essentially the same as a
proposed deal that Iran and the UN Security Council’s permanent five powers, plus Germany, almost signed eight
months before in Geneva – another reason Brazil was taken aback by the US condemnation.¶ US diplomats and
analysts take the view that Brazil is often unhelpful, by which they seem to mean it doesn’t always support US policy.
For their part, the Brazilians say the US doesn’t want to accept that the world has changed and Washington can’t
accept that it must deal with emerging economies on an equal footing.¶ The countries have also had their share of
trade disputes over products from orange juice to cotton, whereas the US has tried to limit access to its markets for
Brazilian produce. Since the 2008 crash, Brazil has accused the US of currency manipulation by using quantitative easing
to devalue the dollar.¶ There may be more to US-Brazil tensions than simple policy disagreements. Comparing US
relations with another emerging power, India, is instructive.¶ US analysts take a view that Brazil is often unhelpful.
Brazilians say the US doesn’t accept that the world has changed.¶ India, like Brazil, is an emerging power and, unlike
China and Russia, a multiparty democracy. The US has come out in support of Delhi’s bid for a permanent seat on the UN
Security Council, despite the fact that India also refused to follow US lead on issues like Libya. The US has courted India,
partly for the obvious reason that it borders China and both countries share suspicion of growing Chinese military
power. But the US has received little in return for its support of India – not even a guaranteed market for arms exports.
Last year, for instance, US companies lost out to French competitors on a contract to sell fighter jets to Delhi.¶
Washington cuts Brasilia far less slack. One reason may be a surprising lack of knowledge and understanding of each
other’s policies and priorities. A member of a leading Washington think tank recently confided that relations are poor,
partly because of a lack of US expertise on Brazil. With a few exceptions, like historian Thomas Skidmore or former
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journalist Paulo Sotero at the Wilson Center, few in the US specialize in Brazil. While tourism has increased in both
directions in recent years, it’s noteworthy there are still no direct flights between Brasilia and Washington.¶ Americans
seem in no hurry to make up for this deficit in knowledge. South America is not high on Washington’s list of priorities,
given the challenges from an increasingly powerful China, turmoil in the Middle East, war in Afghanistan and nuclear
threats from North Korea. Historically, the US has regarded the rest of the Americas as its backyard, taking for granted
it will remain that way. Despite direct challenge to US policies in the region from the late Venezuelan President Hugo
Chavez, this US outlook on southern neighbors has not changed much. ¶ Brasilia has begun to project influence on the
world stage – greater activism means it rubs against US interests more often.¶ President Barack Obama, unlike his
predecessor, has stressed that Washington needs to work with allies and friends to achieve foreign-policy goals, rather
than go it alone. But old habits die hard. Part of the reaction to Brazil’s Iran initiative lies in a Washington mindset that
the US is predominant; it welcomes policies of emerging powers if they accord with Washington’s.¶ Brazil, too, has
blinders. Like the US, it’s a huge, complex country more concerned with matters at home than abroad. Like the US, it
supports the interests of domestic constituencies, such as the huge agribusinesses producing soya; this brings it into
direct competition with the US, also a major agricultural producer.¶ With its recently established status as a BRIC nation
and an emerging economy with burgeoning economic links with Asia and Africa, Brasilia has begun to project influence
on the world stage with an expanded diplomatic service and new embassies across the global South. This greater
activism, added to its distinct policy agenda, means it rubs against American interests more often. Brazil sees itself as a
consensus-seeker in global affairs and emphasizes soft power, eschewing use of military force in international affairs.
¶ In many ways, Brazil represents an implicit challenge to the US sense of its role in the world.¶ A strong thread
through US foreign policy has been the idea of US exceptionalism – that the US serves as an example to the world. In
recent years, this ideology has tempted US theorists like Samuel Huntington or Ivo Daalder to think that if only the
whole world were democratic and shared “its values” there could be a true Pax Americana.¶ Yet Brazil is a democracy
that does not always agree with the US, especially when it comes to use of force. Crucially, unlike India, which is
culturally and geographically distant from the US, Brazil is a New World society and political system and as such
represents a potentially attractive alternative model to a US for emerging economies. ¶ This ideational challenge,
added to different approaches in how international affairs should be conducted, and the reluctance of Washington to
accept the changing global balance of power produce fundamental tensions between Brasilia and Washington, not easily
resolved even if there was a will in either capital to do so.
Brazil-US tensions in the sqou means relations are low
Burnett 4/12/13- is the editor of The World Tonight, a BBC News program (Alistair, “Brazil and the US – Not on Same
Page”, YaleGlobal 4/12/13, http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/content/about-yaleglobal, MB)¶
The US is reported to be planning a state visit for Brazil’s president, the first of a Brazilian leader in two decades. The two largest
democracies in the Western Hemisphere have much in common, yet are often at odds. The US has the world’s largest military, Brazil’s ranks 10th; the US
has the world’s largest economy, Brazil ranks sixth. Some in the US are surprised by the notion that its neighbor does not
automatically follow a superpower’s lead on trade or foreign policy. A key example: US disapproval of a joint initiative
by Brazil and Turkey to broker a deal with Iran, sending Iranian enriched uranium for reprocessing abroad to prevent diversion to
weapons programs, reports Alistair Burnett, editor of the BBC’s The World Tonight. The US, busy elsewhere in the world, often assigns low priority to regional
relationships to the point of neglect. As a consensus-seeker in global affairs, one that emphasizes soft power, Brazil is building global influence,
offering other emerging economies an alternative to an American point of view. – YaleGlobal¶ Yet, when it comes to
foreign policy and trade relations there are constant tensions. These could be addressed soon, with reports that President Dilma Rousseff
will make a formal state visit to the United States, the first of a Brazilian leader in two decades.¶ To the irritation of Washington, Brazil has failed
to extend support on issues such as the 2011 intervention in Libya, where Brasilia thought the Western powers were jumping the gun and
abused the UN mandate to pursue regime change. For its part, Brazil has been irked by US failure to support its long-held ambition for a
permanent seat on the UN Security Council.¶ Washington, traditionally the main foreign-arms supplier to the Brazilian armed forces, won’t overlook
Russian Prime Minister Dmitri Medvedev’s February visit to Brazil to sign an agreement on selling air-defense equipment with President Rousseff. ¶ But the
highest profile disagreement between the two has been over the Brazilian attempt, along with Turkey, to break the
deadlock between Iran and the West over Tehran’s nuclear program. Former Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva went to Iran with
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, in May 2010 to sign a confidence-building deal with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to send some Iranian-enriched
uranium for reprocessing abroad, so it could not be diverted to any weapons program. ¶ In many ways, Brazil
represents an implicit challenge to the
US sense of its role in the world.¶ A strong thread through US foreign policy has been the idea of US exceptionalism – that the US serves as an example
to the world. In recent years, this ideology has tempted US theorists like Samuel Huntington or Ivo Daalder to think that if only the whole world were democratic and
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shared “its values” there could be a true Pax Americana.¶ Yet Brazil
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is a democracy that does not always agree with the US, especially
when it comes to use of force. Crucially, unlike India, which is culturally and geographically distant from the US, Brazil is a New World society and political
system and as such represents a potentially attractive alternative model to a US for emerging economies.
US-Brazil relations stalled in the status quo—posturing and tension between leaders
Kozloff 12-the author of Revolution! South America and the Rise of the New Left and journalist for Aljazeera (Nikolas,
“Is Obama wary of Brazil and Dilma Rousseff?”, Algezeera 5/5/12,
http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/04/2012428134850333757.html, MB)
Are there hidden tensions which stand to undermine the important diplomatic relationship between Washington and
rising star Brazil? During a recent meeting at the White House, Obama and Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff sought to put on a good
face. Brazil had made "extraordinary progress" under Rousseff, Obama declared effusively. Returning the praise, Rousseff called for greater Brazilian-US economic
cooperation. ¶ The meeting built upon a flurry of back and forth visits intended to solidify greater ties: in March, the US deputy secretary of state travelled to Brasilia,
where he lobbied for greater joint trade and investment. On the defence front, too, the two nations recently signed an important cooperation agreement. Officially
then, the US and Brazil enjoy cordial relations. ¶ Look
below the surface, however, and all is not well. Washington, which is used to
calling the shots in South America, is wary of Brasilia's intentions, and has been slow to accommodate the region's
newest up and coming player. In Brazil, many commentators claimed that Obama snubbed Rousseff in Washington by not
granting her leader the honour of a full White House dinner.¶ Such slights were not lost on the likes of Caio Blinder, a columnist for Brazilian
magazine Veja, who declared that Obama had intentionally "downgraded" Rousseff's visit. Going yet further, the Veja writer
lamented the "considerable lack of mutual respect" between the US and Brazil .¶ According to the New York Times, the tension
between Rousseff and Obama was palpably apparent at times. During the Washington summit, the paper noted, the "leaders' eyes rarely met
and Ms Rousseff rarely looked at Mr Obama as he spoke. He looked intently at her during her remarks, nodding in agreement at times. But he seemed to
bristle when she expressed concern that America's 'monetary expansion policy' could impair growth in emerging
economies like Brazil's".
Geopolitical conflict between the US and Brazil hurts relations now
Broder 12-Writer for CQ Weekly news (Jonathan, “A Surprisingly Uneasy Alliance With Brazil”, CQ Weekly 10/6/12,
http://public.cq.com/docs/weeklyreport/weeklyreport-000004163405.html, MB)
As the two most populous democracies in the Western Hemisphere, the U nited States and Brazil seem like natural allies.
But their relationship has been tumultuous, roiled most recently by Brazil’s decision to move ahead with a controversial program
to build, of all things, a nuclear submarine.¶ The dispute threatens to reverberate beyond this hemisphere to the Middle East. Iran, citing a loophole in the
nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty which Brazil has used to justify its program, now says it too plans to build nuclear submarines. The United States wants Brazil
to abandon its program in order to deny Iran another precedent. But so far, Brazil refuses to bend.¶ The nuclear dispute plays into
a larger issue that Brazil watchers call a “respect deficit” on both sides. Dynamic, fast-growing Brazil feels it deserves more
respect from the United States as befits a new global power, while Washington sees Brazil in less grandiose terms. At the
same time, the United States, asserting its historic role as the hemisphere’s overlord, expects Brazil to show it more deference — a posture
Brazil feels it has outgrown.¶ This is playing out in several disputes, including nuclear policy, Middle East diplomacy and Brazil’s ambitions for a permanent
membership on the United Nations Security Council. There are also long-running disputes over trade and U.S. tourist visas that have been aggravated by the deadlock
on Capitol Hill.¶ Yet despite the economic benefits to both sides, geopolitical
tensions have prevented the United States and Brazil from
developing the strategic relationship that both claim to want. At the top of the list of Washington’s complaints is the independent position Brazil has
taken on its own nuclear efforts.¶ In addition to its refusal to halt its submarine program, Brazil defied the United States when it joined with
Turkey in 2010 to broker a deal under which Iran would export most of its low-enriched uranium in exchange for
processed nuclear fuel. The deal went nowhere after the United States angrily rejected it, saying there was no guarantee Iran would stop enriching
uranium, a process that violates five U.N. resolutions, as part of its suspected nuclear-weapons ambitions.¶ The episode was a sign of the tensions that have emerged
as rising powers such as Brazil have challenged major powers such as the United States on the international stage. Many Brazilians thought the White House tried to
put Brazil in its place in April when it denied a visiting Rousseff the pomp and ceremony of a full state dinner.
US-Brazil relations poor now
Hakim 12- Senior fellow for Inter-American Dialogue, a Washington based think-tank (Peter, “Inter-American Discord:
Brazil and the United States”, Inter-American Dialogue 2012,
http://www.thedialogue.org/page.cfm?pageID=32&pubID=3115, MB)
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The US and Brazil have not had an easy time with each other in recent years. Although relations between the two countries are by no
means adversarial or even unfriendly, they have featured more discord than cooperation—both regionally and globally. And there is little reason to
expect dramatic change any time soon.¶ Even more unsettling for US-Brazilian relations have been the clashes over
global issues. Washington has been especially troubled, and the bilateral relationship most bruised, by Brazil’s defense of Iran’s
nuclear program and its opposition to UN sanctions on Iran. The two countries have also taken conflicting positions on
nonproliferation questions, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and international responses to the uprisings in Syria and
Libya. World trade negotiations have long been a matter of contention for both nations.¶ Even when the two nations have identified
shared objectives that would advance the interests of both, they have rarely developed the cooperation needed to pursue them. The US
and Brazil clearly have an array of common economic interests. Yet, they have not signed a single major economic pact in more than two decades—a period when
Washington has reached free trade accords with some 20 countries worldwide, 11 in Latin America alone. In 2007, the two countries, which produce nearly 90
percent of the world’s ethanol, agreed to work together to establish world markets for the fuel and develop improved technologies for its production. But they have
made little progress on either front. ¶ More generally, as the world’s two largest agricultural exporters, Brazil and the US are well aware of how much they would gain
by diminishing global trade barriers to food products. But they have never been able to collaborate effectively to achieve that goal. On the contrary, agricultural
trade issues remain a source of bitter dispute between the two countries. Cooperation has been equally elusive and
disappointing in many other areas of interest to both governments including, for example, nuclear nonproliferation, transnational drug
and crime challenges, and climate change. ¶
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Alt causes
Rising Brazil
Brazil’s growing economy challenges US power
Sweig, CFR Project Director, 2010
[Julia E. Sweig, December 2010, Council on Foreign Relations, “A New Global Player: Brazil's Far-Flung Agenda,”
http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/66868/julia-e-sweig/a-new-global-player?cid=oth-partner_site-cfra_new_global_player-102610, 7-5-13, JZ]
In the last decade, Brazil has recast itself as a global brand and a global power. It is home to the world's fifth-largest
land mass and eighth-largest economy and is one of the top global producers of stuff everyone else needs: from
animals, vegetables, and minerals to water, energy, and airplanes. The new conventional wisdom suggests that Brazil
is now poised to make its name on the global stage and balance the other power in its neck of the woods, the United
States. Brazil's ascent coincides with the relative decline of U.S. influence in Latin America and the rise of new centers
of power in Asia. This dynamic reinforces Brazil's central foreign policy message: with both place and purpose for a
new global player on the world stage, Brazil can be the Mac to the United States' PC -- with an ethos and an
international agenda to match.
Rising Brazil undermines U.S. influence
Sabatini, founder and editor-in-chief of Americas Quarterly, 11
[Christopher Sabatini, 10-11-11, World Politics Review, “U.S.-South America Relations: Rising Rivalry, Prickly
Partnership,” http://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/articles/10300/u-s-south-america-relations-rising-rivalry-pricklypartnership, 7-6-13, JZ]
Recent developments in South America have upended the United States' historical -- and often misguided -- tendency
to lump the region into a one-size-fits-all policy. A politically and economically muscular Brazil, the rise of an antiAmerican bloc of countries led by Venezuela, and the emergence of economic and even political extraregional rivals in
the hemisphere have created a more diverse, independent and contentious region for the United States. At the same
time, the looming shadow of a double-dip U.S. recession and the spectacle of partisan intransigence leaving
Washington paralyzed have led to an overwhelming impression across the region that the U.S. is broken and in
decline, economically and politically. Combined with the fact that the past two administrations in Washington have
often struggled to pay consistent attention to the region and failed to stay ahead of trends, this has led many to
declare the end of U.S. influence in the Western Hemisphere.
Defense Bid
Suspended defense bid will destroy Brazil relations in the status quo
Sreeharsha 12
[Vinod, McClatchy Newspapers, April 6, 2012, “Brazil-U.S. dispute over planes for Afghanistan likely topic of presidential
talks,” http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2012/04/06/144456/brazil-us-dispute-over-planes.html] WD
When Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff meets with President Barack Obama on Monday at the White House, the two
leaders are likely to publicly use phrases like "deepening friendship" and "partnership" and highlight collaborations in
science and education. They are less likely to call attention to a recent source of tension between the two countries —
a dispute involving American military aircraft procurement. The conflict began in December when Brazil's top aviation
company and one of the world's largest plane manufacturers, Embraer, partnered with Sierra Nevada Corp. of Sparks,
Nev., to win a U.S. Air Force contract for $355 million to make 20 fighter aircraft for Afghanistan's military. The losing
bidder, Hawker-Beechcraft Defense Corp., based in Wichita, Kan., complained of unfair treatment and sued. After the
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Department of Justice found documentation errors, the Air Force suspended the contract and is now conducting an
internal investigation. The about-face created consternation in Brazil. The country's foreign ministry expressed
surprise and cautioned that "this development is not considered conducive to strengthening relations between the
two countries on defense affairs." Embraer is not a state company. But similar to U.S. officials lobbying foreign
governments on behalf of American companies, Brazilian leaders promote their own country's interests. Brazil's
minister of trade and development, Fernando Pimentel, recently told reporters that he expects President Rousseff to
raise the issue with Obama. The case is important to Brazil. At a time when the country's economy remains highly
dependent on the export of commodities such as soy beans and orange juice, and its manufacturing sector is losing
out to Chinese imports and an overvalued currency, Embraer is a great source of pride here, a reminder of Brazil's
industrial and technical capabilities. The company, which has had a U.S. headquarters in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., since
1979, has tried previously to crack the U.S. defense sector. It has won two prior contracts and has leased planes to the
U.S. Navy, though Congress later killed the program. The then congressman from Wichita, Republican Todd Tiahrt,
played a role in killing that contract in 2010, arguing, as his office did in a news release, that "the Navy's planned
Brazilian lease project ... would have cost taxpayers more than the purchase price of an American-made version." Tiahrt
left office last year after he ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate. Winning the bid to provide light attack aircraft to the
Afghan air force was seen finally as a success for Embraer overcoming American favoritism. Brazilian officials say the
reversal of the contract smacks of politics.
Cotton
Cotton dispute and farm bill
McClanahan 6-4-13
[Paige, The Guardian, June 4, 2013, “US farm bill promises reduced cotton subsidies as Brazil pressure pays off,”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/2013/jun/04/us-farm-bill-reduced-cotton-subsidies] WD
US lawmakers are getting closer to bringing American cotton subsidies in line with global trade rules, a move that
would help to level the playing field for cotton farmers in the developing world. The potential changes come after
many years of intense pressure from Brazil, which won an international trade dispute against US cotton subsidies in
2004. "Cotton now will have the lowest subsidies of all US field crops, when it used to have the highest," says Harry de
Gorter, a professor of economics at Cornell University and author of a report (pdf) on the potential effects of the new
cotton policies, which are being debated in Congress. "Instead of a poster child for bad behaviour, [cotton] is now the
poster child of policy reform." The changes have been proposed under the latest version of the US farm bill, a five-year,
$500bn piece of legislation that regulates farm subsidies, domestic nutritional assistance and overseas food aid, among
other programmes. The Senate has been debating the bill since mid-May; a vote is expected in early June. The House of
Representatives should begin debates on the bill in the next few weeks. Committees in both houses have already passed
drafts of the bill that include substantial changes to the cotton programme. As they stand, both the Senate and House
versions of the farm bill would eliminate several of the most trade-distorting aspects of US cotton subsidies, including
direct payments to farmers and counter-cyclical payments, which prop up farmers' incomes when prices drop. Both
versions of the bill would also require farmers' loan deficiency payments to fluctuate with market prices, a change from
the past. The House and Senate bills include a new policy, the stacked income protection programme (Stax), which
would effectively serve as a form of income insurance for cotton farmers. Stax could skew the international market, De
Gorter says, but overall the programme is "less pernicious" than the measures that are being phased out. "In good faith,
the United States has changed their programme substantially," says De Gorter. "It's possible that [Brazil] wouldn't win
if they reopened the dispute based on the way the legislation stands right now." The changes come after more than a
decade of pressure from Brazil, which launched a suit against US cotton subsidies at the World Trade Organisation's
(WTO) dispute settlement body in 2002. A panel ruled largely in Brazil's favour in 2004; five years later, a WTO panel
granted Brazil the right to "retaliate" against US products as recompense for the damage caused by America's illegal
cotton subsidies. Brazil came "very, very, very close" to imposing sanctions, which would have targeted US intellectual
property, says Pedro Camargo Neto, who was serving as secretary of production and trade at Brazil's ministry of
agriculture when the WTO case was brought in 2002. The threat of sanctions, which would have lifted patents on
American goods such as films and pharmaceuticals, was enough to bring US officials to the negotiating table, Camargo
Neto says. Under terms that were negotiated in an 11th-hour meeting to prevent sanctions taking effect, US officials
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agreed to pay the Brazilian government $147m annually, money that is passed on to Brazilian cotton farmers. They
also agreed to make immediate changes to one of the most egregious subsidy policies. That agreement, which was
struck in April 2010, was enough to delay Brazilian sanctions in the short term, but only a new farm bill can end the
dispute. The current draft of the legislation is promising, says Camargo Neto. "You never know until the last day – you
know how Congress is – but it looks like everything is going to be OK," he says. "It's a pity that it took so long." US cotton
subsidies have long been a delicate topic of negotiations in the WTO's Doha round trade talks, but years of pressure
from Brazil and cotton-producing African nations – Benin, Burkina Faso, Chad, and Mali – have produced no tangible
changes to the subsidy programme. Ultimately, it took a dispute – and the threat of sanctions – to force the hand of
the US. Despite the delay, other cotton-producing countries in the global south would gain from the changes that may
soon be introduced to American cotton subsidies, says Aisha Moriani, the economic counsellor at Pakistan's mission to
the WTO in Geneva. "I think that all cotton-producing countries have benefited" from Brazil's WTO case against the US,
says Moriani. "We would very much like that no one would subsidise cotton, because we don't have the money to
subsidise cotton … If prices fall, everyone should feel the pressure the same way."
Iran
Relations low now—military conflicts, Iran, trade, climate change, energy all areas of clash.
Hakim, 2010 (Peter, President Emeritus of the Inter-American Dialogue, December 19, “Why Brazil US Relations Will
Remain Tense”, http://www.thedialogue.org/page.cfm?pageID=32&pubID=2542, DVO)
Dilma Rouseff inherits a deeply strained US-Brazilian relationship. No matter how adroitly she manages foreign policy,
it is now almost inevitable that the two countries will, for years to come, be colliding with one another. Their
international agendas reflect divergent interests, priorities, and approaches. They will not always be able to keep
disagreements in check.
In regional affairs, Brazil deeply irritated the US last year when it opposed the US’s access to Colombian bases—even
though it later reached its own, albeit more modest, military accord with Washington. Brazil and the US continue to
quarrel over Honduras, sustaining a divisive standoff in hemispheric relations. They also have polar opposite positions
regarding Cuba.
But, US-Brazil ties will be most buffeted in the coming period by global, not regional, issues.
What most exasperates Washington is Brazil’s unwavering defense of Iran’s nuclear program along with its seeming
indifference to Iran’s repression at home, support of terrorist groups, and unrelenting threats against Israel.
Brazil’s own nuclear program may soon become a contentious issue in US-Brazilian relations. The US is not today
concerned about Brazil developing atomic weapons—but is troubled that its position on Iran and limits on inspections
of its nuclear facilities will weaken global nonproliferation efforts. Ideally, nuclear development should be an area of
cooperation. Washington’s three-year old agreement with India could serve as model for US technology transfer to
Brazil—if Brazil were willing to actively support nonproliferation initiatives.
Trade is another source of friction. Last year, trade tensions rose sharply after Brazil prevailed in its WTO suit, which
found US cotton subsidies to be illegal. Washington has defused the dispute by compensating Brazil for its lost cotton
sales. But rampant US agriculture protectionism will remain a source of discord in bilateral relations. Brazil and the US
share many interests in global commercial arrangements. Although it now appears unlikely, by joining forces, the US
and Brazil would substantially increase the chances that the nearly moribund Doha global trade talks would have a
productive outcome.
Brazil and the US will have major roles in addressing problems of climate change and energy . What is uncertain is
whether on these and other issues, they will end up cooperating or clashing, but they will surely confront one another
time and again in many different arenas.
Brazil has demonstrated its independence from the US and shown its ability to pursue its international aims without
US support. Brazil is not ready to shift to a close, cooperative relationship. Despite its rising profile and influence, the
US does not yet view Brazil as a potential strategic ally either as a crucial economic actor or as a major player on critical
security issues. And the US sees Brazil’s foreign policy on issues of human rights, democracy, and nonproliferation as
erratic.
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Relations low now, Iranian nuclear program.
Council on Foreign Relations, 2011 (“Global Brazil and US-Brazil Relations”, July 19, Independent Task Force Report No.
66, Samuel W Bodman and James D Wolfensohn, Chairs, http://www.cfr.org/brazil/global-brazil-us-brazilrelations/p25407, DVO)
Despite national affinities, U.S.-Brazil relations have often been characterized by misperception and misunderstanding,
most recently demonstrated by conflict over how best to contain Iran’s nuclear program. This disagreement was
instructive to both countries: the UnitedStates learned to anticipate independence from Brazil and both countries
learned that expressions of friendship do not easily translate into coordinated action. Brazil also learned that
engagement in Iran’s nuclear program risks diluting its credentials to negotiate on other issues of international concern.
But Brazil and the United States have begun a dialogue on cooperation regarding food security and labor rights in the
Middle East, following the upheaval in the Arab world. In addition, Brazil and the United States are collaborating on a
number of issues in third countries in the Americas and Africa.
Relations low, Iran crisis.
Council on Foreign Relations, 2011 (“Global Brazil and US-Brazil Relations”, July 19, Independent Task Force Report No.
66, Samuel W Bodman and James D Wolfensohn, Chairs, http://www.cfr.org/brazil/global-brazil-us-brazilrelations/p25407, DVO)
Despite growing potential on the bilateral front, forging cooperative ties on an international security issue—Iran—
proved much more difficult. Early in Obama’s presidency, he and Lula discussed containing Iran’s nuclear ambitions.
Lula and his foreign minister understood, some say mistakenly, the White House to have offered a green light to
pursue what ultimately became the Brazil-Turkey nuclear fuel swap deal negotiated with Iran in spring 2010.48 Brazil
envisioned the deal as the first step toward ensuring that Iran’s nuclear program remained peaceful. But by the time the
agreement was reached, the United States and other P5 members had grown convinced that sanctions were the best
strategy for bringing Iran to the negotiating table. Indeed, Washington asked Brazil to support the sanctions and had
dispatched Clinton to Brazil in March 2010 to solicit Brasília’s cooperation. After the nuclear fuel swap agreement was
announced and after Washington’s negative reaction, Brazil manifested its sense of betrayal with a “no” vote at the
Security Council on a new round of sanctions.
Though it seems that Rousseff has deemphasized the security dimension of relations with Iran, Brazil’s initiative to
negotiate with Iran last year was not merely a product of the personalities in office at the time. Rather, engagement
with Iran demonstrated Brazil’s belief in the intrinsic value of its participation and contribution on major international
security issues. Brazil paid a high cost, domestically and diplomatically, for the failure of the initiative in the short term.
To date, the Rousseff administration has steered clear of engaging again on this issue. Brazil’s participation alerted the
major powers to its presence on global security issues and served notice that Brazil would remain a significant
international actor.
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Relations Resilient
US-Brazil military interdependence checks relations decline.
US Department of Defense, 2009 (March 3, “Mullen Notes Importance of US Relationship with Brazil”,
http://www.defense.gov/News/NewsArticle.aspx?ID=53296, DVO)
In his first visit to Brazil, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff met with top leaders here yesterday and emphasized
the importance of military-to-military cooperation as part of the overall U.S.-Brazilian relationship.¶ Navy Adm. Mike
Mullen met with Brazilian Defense Minister Nelson Jobim and the leaders of the Brazilian armed forces. Brazilian officials
said having the meetings here, in the heart of the Amazon rain forest, would give Mullen a good idea of the country’s
military capabilities and the challenges of defending areas such as the Amazon Basin. Military-to-military contacts
between the two nations are important to the overall relationship between Brazil and the United States, Mullen said
at an impromptu news conference before meetings at the Amazon Military Command headquarters. He said he was
impressed by the discipline and professionalism the Brazilian servicemembers displayed, and that he enjoyed meeting
the leaders and servicemembers in the field. “You learn a great deal more being in the field than being in the capital,”
the chairman said. “I can really see what the command does every single day, and how important the command is to the
country of Brazil.” Brazil is at the heart of a region that is vital not just to South America, but to the United States and
countries around the world, the admiral said. “We are greatly dependent and have a great deal of respect for the
leadership of Brazil,” he added. Jobim echoed Mullen’s emphasis on the importance of the U.S.-Brazil relationship, and
noted that trust is essential to that relationship. The Brazilian defense minister turned to Mullen and said, “We trust
Admiral Mullen.” Brazil is the fifth-largest nation in the world by population. The global economic crisis seems to have
affected the country less than other nations, with an economy that experienced 5.8 percent growth in 2008. U.S. and
Brazilian forces have worked together in United Nations peacekeeping operations in Haiti and elsewhere. U.S. and
Brazilian servicemembers conduct military exercises together, and military-to-military cooperation also includes an
extensive exchange program. U.S. Army noncommissioned officers attend the Brazilian Jungle School, and Brazilian
cadets attend the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y.
US-Brazil relations are incredibly resilient – recent NSA scandal proves
Sibaja 7-10-13
[Marco Sibaja, Associated Press, July 10, 2013, “Brazilian lawmaker: US spying won't hurt relations,”
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2013/07/10/brazil-us-spying/2506541/] WD
Disclosures alleging that the United States has collected data on billions of telephone and email conversations in Latin
America's biggest country will not affect Brazil-U.S. relations, the head of Brazil's joint congressional committee on
intelligence said Wednesday. Congressman Nelson Pellegrino told foreign correspondents in Brasilia that despite
Brazil's strong repudiation of the U.S. information gathering activities in Brazil "the good relations we have with the
United States will not be interrupted." "We have sent Washington a clear message that we are interested in
maintaining good relations, but that we will not accept these kinds of practices," he said. "We cannot accept that a
country spies another, on its citizens, its companies and its authorities." He said President Dilma Rousseff's state visit to
Washington October was still on and that it would not be affected by the recent disclosures. Meanwhile Wednesday,
Defense Minister Celso Amorim acknowledged that the country invests little in cyber-security, with just $22 million
earmarked in the 2013 budget. Still, he insisted that no amount of money can create a totally secure system. "No
country has the capacity to establish absolute protection" of its communication networks, Amorim told the Senate's
foreign relations committee. "Even in an ideal situation, there would not be a shield that could completely protect us."
The O Globo newspaper reported last week that information released by National Security Agency leaker Edward
Snowden showed Brazil is the top target in Latin America for the NSA's massive intelligence-gathering effort aimed at
monitoring communications around the world. Snowden's disclosures indicate that the NSA widely collects phone and
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Internet "metadata" — logs of message times, addresses and other information rather than the content of the
messages. The documents have indicated that the NSA has been collecting the phone records of millions of U.S. phone
customers, and has gathered data on phone and Internet usage outside the U.S., including those people who use any of
nine U.S.-based internet providers such as Google. Earlier, O Globo reported that in Brazil, the NSA collected data
through an association between U.S. and Brazilian telecommunications companies. It said it could not verify which
Brazilian companies were involved or if they were even aware their links were being used to collect the data.
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Link Uniqueness--Economy:
Brazil’s Economy declining
Winter & Pereira 12 (Brian and Vivian, 11/30, “Brazil economy surprisingly weak, adds to global fears”, Date
accessed: 7/8/13, http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/11/30/us-brazil-economy-gdp-idUSBRE8AT0KM20121130, LE
Brazil has been stuck in a pattern of slow growth since Ms. Rousseff took office last year, as companies struggle with
high costs and severe infrastructure and labour bottlenecks. Ms. Rousseff has tried to revive activity with numerous
tax cuts and other stimulus, but Friday’s data showed that companies are not responding, as investment fell for a fifth
straight quarter.¶ The continued weakness of Latin America’s biggest economy was likely to reverberate in global
markets, especially after India also posted lower-than-expected growth on Friday, putting it on track for its worst year
in a decade.¶ Russia’s economy is also slowing down, with growth of just 3.2 per cent expected next year, according to a
Reuters poll published Friday. China, which has been Brazil’s biggest trading partner, is on course to post its slowest
annual expansion in 13 years.¶ For Brazil, Friday’s data renews concerns that its slow growth is not a cyclical issue, but
the result of deeply rooted structural problems after strong growth of the previous decade.¶ “The measures that the
government imagined would be capable of bringing Brazil out of the global crisis weren’t enough,” said Walter Cover,
president of Abramat, an association of construction materials companies.¶ The IBGE also revised down second-quarter
growth to just 0.2 per cent compared to the first quarter from a previously reported 0.4 per cent.¶ Brazil’s economy had
been expected to grow about 1.5 per cent this year but several analysts said they were now likely to sharply lower their
forecasts. Rafael Bacciotti, an economist at Tendencias consultancy in Sao Paulo, said the economy now looks set to
grow a “maximum of 1 per cent” in 2012.¶ “In truth, (Brazil’s economic) model is not working out very well,” Mr.
Bacciotti said.¶ That model for years hinged on expanding consumer credit, which gave many poor Brazilians access to
cars, TVs and other middle-class goods for the first time. Data indicates that many consumers have reached their debt
limit, despite a massive year-long cycle of interest rate cuts, leaving few other strong motors to power Brazil’s $2.5trillion economy
Brazil no longer Latin Americas economic powerhouse
Boyle 13 (Catherine, Writer for CNBC, 1/17, “Why Brazil's economy is losing its shine”, Date Accessed: 7/8/13,
http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/business/global-economy/130117/brazil-brazilian-economy-powerhousedownturn, LE)
Brazil, long viewed as one of the most promising emerging markets, has seen its crown slip slightly in recent months.
The country has been enshrined as Latin America's economic powerhouse for more than a decade, fuelled by vast
resource wealth and investment from China.¶ Yet its dominance is under threat as other emerging markets compete
fiercely on cost.¶ "The last decade was very good for Brazil," James Lockhart Smith, head of Latin America, Maplecroft,
told CNBC.¶ "Now, Brazil is having to compete with a lot of other countries and it has an Achilles heel in the cost of
doing business, so it's much more complicated to generate growth."¶ After roaring to growth of 7.5 percent in 2010,
gross domestic product is expected to grow by 3.2 percent in 2013 by the Banco Central do Brasil, the country's central
bank. Of course, these figures are still much higher than the slow or negative growth forecast in the US and Europe.¶
Brazil's stock market has also been moribund. The benchmark index, Bovespa is up just 4 percent over the past year
and only $7.6 billion was raised by companies listing in Sao Paulo last year, compared to almost $50 billion in 2010, a
record year.¶ Inflation hit a 10-month high of 5.8 percent in December, despite a decline in the food price inflation which
the country suffered from earlier in 2012. Wages are continuing to rise, which is good news for the country's emerging
middle class and for consumption, but that is also causing concern about competitiveness.¶ The central bank has already
cut interest rates from 10.5 percent at the start of 2012 to the current rate of 7.25 percent. But it can't cut much further
because of the threat of inflation.¶ Late on Wednesday, the country's central bank left rates on hold even as it warned
that the country's domestic recovery had been less intense than expected.¶ The central bank also acknowledged
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inflation had worsened in the short term.¶ "Rates aren't particularly high in historical terms as inflation is so high. The
central bank has been extremely aggressive in lowering rates," Julian Thompson, global head of emerging markets at
AXA, told CNBC. "Repeated government intervention is undermining confidence and investment has been weak. Labor
costs are quite high and Brazil's a pretty protected market."¶ He expects the central bank to keep rates on hold until
March and then cut again if disappointing growth continues.¶ Inflation is also expected to be dampened by cuts to
energy tariffs – although Neil Shearing, chief emerging markets economist at Capital Economics, cautioned that severe
droughts last year could delay plans to cut the tariffs. The majority of Brazil's power comes from hydro-electricity.¶ There
are some hopes that China, one of the biggest investors in Brazil, may provide more investment, as it did before the
global financial crisis. Yet relatively subdued growth in China itself may limit the country's capacity to invest in Brazil,
Thompson said.
Latin America depends on U.S. trade and investment
Brand et al ’12 (Alexander Brand, Lecturer and Post-Doc Researcher at the Department of Political Science at the
University of Mainz, M.A. in Political Science, Philosophy and Media & Communication Sciences; Susan McEwen-Fial,
Lecturer at the Department of Political Science at the University of Mainz; Wolfgang Muno, Professor of Political
Science; Andrea Ribeiro Hoffmann, Lecturer at the Willy Brandt School of Public Policy; “BRICs and U.S. Hegemony:
Theoretical Reflections on Shifting Power Patterns and Empirical Evidence from Latin America”; Mainz Papers on
International and European Politics, Mainz: Chair of International Relations, Johannes Gutenberg University; April 2012;
https://international.politics.uni-mainz.de/files/2012/10/mpiep04.pdf”
In general, however, Latin America is not the most important trade partner for the U.S., except for the case of Mexico.
Mexico accounts for 11.7% of U.S. trade, the rest of Latin America constitutes only 8.3% (see Hornbeck 2011).The
other way round it is different. The U.S. is the most important trade partner for Latin America as a whole, although we
see remarkable subregional differences (see table). Considering foreign direct investment (FDI), we see the same
pattern (e.g. Rösler 2012). The U.S. is the single most important investor in Latin America, but investment primarily
went into the Caribbean offshore financial centers (OFCs), second to Mexico, third to Brazil. Latin America is the second
most important investment area for the United States, but data include OFCs. Excluding OFCs, Asia would be the second
most important investment region for U.S. capital (see table). In terms of monetary policy, the U.S.-Dollar is the
dominant currency worldwide (e.g. Eichengreen 2011), despite all crises, and so in Latin America, too. With the
exception of Brazil, where the Real is based on a basket of the euro, dollar and yen, we can speak of a solid dollar bloc.
Several countries have pegged their currency to the dollar or are de facto dollar- ized. Many Caribbean and Central
American countries accept the dollar officially as a second currency, so do Peru, Bolivia and Uruguay. Panama, El
Salvador and Ecuador even have com- pletely dollarized their economies, i.e. the U.S. dollar is the official currency. In
this respect, “the dollar standard is alive and well in Latin America” (Click 2007: 30). So far, we have to add (see
Cobarrubia Gómez 2011). To sum up, we see an asymmetrical economic situation. For Latin America as a whole, the
United States is a pivotal economic partner, while Latin America as a whole is of lesser importance for the U.S.
Differentiating the region, only Mexico plays a central role for the U.S. economy and, to a lesser extent, Venezuela which
supplies one-eighth of U.S. oil imports (Hellinger 2011). Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean, as well as the
Andean countries are highly dependent on the U.S. economy, both in terms of trade and investment. More south- ern
countries, on the other side, are more diversified and more oriented towards the EU and China. However, with the
partial exception of Brazil, the U.S. dollar still continues to play a pivotal role in Latin America.
Brazil’s economy still expanding—it’s a global player.
Periera, 2013 (Anthony, Director of the Brazil Institute at Kings College London, June 11, CNN, “Does Brazil Deserve Its B
for BRIC?”, http://edition.cnn.com/2013/06/03/business/opinion-pereira-brazil-bric-economies, DVO)
There are three main sets of reasons why it is too early to count Brazil out as a global economic player.¶ The first has
to do with fundamentals of its economy that are often ignored by short-term investors. Brazil's economy has a higher
per capita GDP than both China and India, and as a more mature economy, it is not surprising that its growth rate is
slower.¶ More importantly, the country is much less vulnerable to external shocks than it used to be. Public debt as a
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percentage of GDP declined from about 60% to 35% of GDP between 2002 and 2012.¶ International reserves are now
$377 billion. Brazil attracted around $62 billion in foreign direct investment in 2012, making it the largest recipient of
FDI in the world after China and the United States.¶ All of these factors are reasons to be confident in the capacity of the
Brazilian economy to continue to advance in an unspectacular but steady fashion.¶ Second, Brazil has a number of
enviable attributes. It has few threats to its security, meaning that it can afford to spend relatively little on national
defence. Brazil is alone among the BRIC countries in not possessing nuclear weapons.¶ Brazil also has a generous land to
people ratio, with a large basket of natural resources, including petroleum, for a population that is relatively small (200
million) compared to China and India. It boasts a world-class agricultural sector that has not yet reached its potential.¶
Already the largest producer in the world of soy and beef, it has the capacity to adapt more crops to its tropical soils and
develop its vast land frontier.¶ In addition, Brazil is becoming an environmental leader. Its management of the Amazon
rainforest is crucial to the health of the planet, which is why the recent large reduction in the rate of deforestation has
been so encouraging. It has some of the largest reserves of fresh water in the world.¶ Almost half of all energy coming
from renewable sources, mainly hydroelectric but also biofuels.¶ There is a third and final set of factors that make
Brazil stand out.¶ Together with Russia, and unlike China and India, Brazil has reduced economic inequality in recent
years. Its Gini index, a measure of income inequality, dropped from 0.63 to 0.52 from 1989 to 2009.¶ Between 2003 and
2011, about 30 million Brazilians joined the so-called "new middle class," earning between GBP100 and GBP400 per
capita per month, and gaining access to formal sector employment, credit, and the country's large consumer market.¶
This reduction in inequality has a racial component, because 75% of the new middle class is non-white. It also has a
gender component -- formal sector employment for females has increased 136% in the last twenty years.¶ It is true that
Brazil's rate of economic growth is slow compared to China and India.¶ But so are the growth rates of most countries.
Brazil tends to be the focus of exaggerated analyses of its economy.¶ If one looks past the superficial concern about
growth at Brazil's economic fundamentals, its resources, and the extraordinary social progress that the country has
made in recent decades, it seems premature to remove the "B" from BRIC.
Brazil still economically dependent on US—China decline means now is key
Diplomatic Courier, 2013 (June 27, “Breaking Apart: the End of BRIC”,
http://www.diplomaticourier.com/news/regions/brics/1504-breaking-apart-the-end-of-bric, DVO)
Not too long ago, Brazil, Russia, India, and China were looked upon with envy by the international arena. Predictions of
decoupling—a theory in which emerging economies have strengthened so much that they no longer depend on the
United States for economic growth—were seen as a foregone conclusion for the BRIC nations. To the surprise of many,
what was once a mere formality is now a distant reality.¶ Lately, BRIC nations have encountered different degrees of
turbulence with engineering economic growth. The European economic crisis, coupled with sluggish U.S. growth, has
hindered the BRIC’s economic growth when analyzed as a single bloc—discarding the decoupling phenomenon and
proving the opposite is still the norm, to the chagrin of BRIC leaders. In addition, corruption continues to be an endemic
problem for all BRIC members, dampening not only their political systems, but also investor confidence. High taxes and
heavy regulation are thorny matters that never appear to cease, stalling future productivity, investment and growth,
especially in Brazil and India. In short, not all is rosy in BRIC land.¶ However, to undervalue these emerging economies now would be a mistake, or living in a state of denial. Most
importantly, the state of the global economy should not be perceived as a G7 vs. BRICs battle for economic supremacy. Instead, the BRIC nations should be viewed as a market for exports not only for the United States, but also for the European Union and emerging
Latin American and Asian nations—another vehicle fueling the engines of economic growth. If we were to include South Africa in the BRIC bloc, as is increasingly common, the five nations would represent 40 percent of the world’s population and approximately 25
percent of the world’s GDP. South Africa has participated in the last two BRIC summits and will host the next summit in March 2013. I say the more the merrier, as long as the goal for BRIC nations is to integrate more profoundly with the world economy, instead of
designing a model of ‘us’ against ‘them’. The problems for BRIC nations are threefold. First, the BRIC economies are not performing at a rate that was forecasted by domestic and foreign economists. Second, although all BRIC nations appear to stutter simultaneously,
the notion that they are similar cannot be further from the truth. Each country has a unique economic model that is not duplicated by other BRIC members; in fact, the only two commonalities are that they are both emerging economies and they happen to be
lumped together in a catchy acronym. Third, no one can really answer who is leading the BRIC group, whereas the G7 and Western nations look to Washington, D.C. for leadership, The BRIC nations seem to jockeying for the leadership role, or at times shying away
from it (i.e. China). If there were to be a leader of the BRIC nations, the obvious candidate would be China. However, China is dealing with its own set of woes. In 2012, for the first time this century, China grew at a rate below 8 percent. Although a figure near 8
percent would be a miracle for crisis-laden EU countries and the United States, for China it is seen as average or less. Why the drop? China’s labor force is no longer growing as fast as before, the so-called labor dividend (a surplus of a cheap labor pool) has been
exhausted; moreover, wages in China are increasing, especially in factory labor, which causes a severe dent in China’s competitiveness. This has opened a new space for Mexico to reignite their exports for the United States, placing China in a position where it now
has to compete against other nations based on strategy, efficiency, and optimal productivity instead of relying on dirt-cheap labor. A portion of the slowdown can be also attributed to Chinese leaders, who made a bold decision earlier this year to increase interest
rates in order to tame inflation and cool the county’s real estate craze and avoid property bubbles similar to episodes in Japan during the 90s and the United States in 2008. China is still the second largest economy in the world, and out of all the BRIC members, it is
still the fasting growing economy. The country is projected to bounce back in 2013, avoiding a hard landing, and targeting the ever-important 8 percent growth rate for 2013. However, according to Ruchir Sharma, author of Breakout Nations, if China’s growth were
¶
¶
¶
¶
decelerated China will hurt other
growing nations, including BRIC partners India, South Africa, and Brazil.¶ The darling of the Americas, Brazil, is no
longer feeling the confidence it exuberated when they were awarded the 2014 World Cup and 2016 Rio Olympics. The
nation’s 2012 GDP is expected to come in below 1 percent—a very disappointing figure, especially compared to its 2010
growth rate of 7.5 percent. Brazil was once the hot spot for international investors and businesses, but lately the
samba country has lost some of its mojo, muddled with an overvalued currency against the U.S. dollar, high taxes,
poor infrastructure, constant government intervention, and self-placed barriers holding back entrepreneurial growth.
The slowdown in China has hurt Brazil, which now sees itself as a quasi-prisoner to China’s economic growth,
transferring their dependency from the U.S. to the Middle Kingdom. To counteract the economic bottleneck and
to fall to a GDP rate of 6 to 7 percent, recession would occur, but it would not be on the same scale as the Euro crisis or the United States’ Great Recession. The bad news is that a
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galvanize economic activity, Brazil is lowering interest rates and easing credit. It may work. However, what we have
learned as of late is that Brazil is miles away from decoupling from anybody.
BRICs on a downward turn.
Bloomberg BusinessWeek, 2012 (June 26, “Are the BRIC Nations Cracking?”,
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-06-26/are-the-bric-nations-cracking, DVO)
The bloc’s subsequent ascent has been breathtaking. Its output has grown more than fourfold. China has dinged Japan
to become the world’s second-largest economy. Brazil, which long sported a comparative advantage inhyperinflation,
has become such an economic powerhouse that the Economist bestowed upon the nation this classic cover. According
to the International Monetary Fund, the BRICs’ combined gross domestic product soared to $13.3 trillion last year, from
$2.8 trillion just 10 short years ago. The MSCI BRIC index has gained more than eight times what the S&P 500 index
returned during the past decade. Good call, Jim.¶ But like all fine investment bull runs, this one could be drawing to an
end. According to Bloomberg data, for the first time in 13 years Brazil’s real, Russia’s ruble, and India’s rupee are
weakening the most among emerging-market currencies, while China’s yuan has fallen the most since authorities
devalued it in 1994. The rupee is at a record low against the dollar, while India is being cited byStandard & Poor’s
(MHP) and Fitch as potentially the first BRIC country to lose its investment-grade rating.¶ Last month investors pulled
$6.3 billion out of Brazil’s stocks and bonds and $5.8 billion from Russia’s. Brazil’s consumer default rate is at a threeyear high; its stock market has round-tripped to where it was in 2009. Even though Brazil’s government has slashed
interest rates to a record low while extending tax breaks and subsidizing credit, its economy is growing nowhere near
the 7.5 percent clip it enjoyed in 2010; last year it managed a 2.7 percent gain. Russia’s oil exports—its economic
mother’s milk—are at an 18-month low. Home values fell in a record 54 of 70 cities tracked by China’s government;
growth in industrial production, China’s economic staple, slowed recently to a three-year low.¶ “In the absence of welldeveloped domestic consumption, the emerging markets—and by extension, their equities—are heavily dependent
upon exports,” says Jason Trennert of Strategas Research. “With Europe in recession and the U.S. flirting with one, many
investors might see BRICs stocks as a bridge too far.Ӧ BRIC governments are now working overtime to staunch capital
outflows and stoke their citizens’ spending. While all eyes are on the regressing “developed” economies of Europe, will
these developing giants find a way to keep growing? Possibly. Still, the BRIC troubles represent another knock against
the idea of decoupling—the fantastic notion that emerging markets can thrive, no matter what befalls the rest of the
world.
Brazilian economy has sagged since 2010—no longer an emerging market.
New York Times, 2013 (July 6, “In Brazil, A Reminder of Emerging Market Risks”,
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/07/business/mutfund/in-brazil-a-reminder-of-emerging-market-risks.html?_r=0,
DVO)
Yet Brazil was one of the investment darlings of the last decade — the “B” in the ballyhooed BRIC quartet that also
included Russia, India and China. Brazil’s economy at times grew at a rate of more than 5 percent a year. Most years, its
stock market rose by double digits — in 2009, it returned more than 100 percent. Millions of people moved from
poverty into the middle class, and Brazilian companies, like the oil driller Petrobras and the mining concern Vale,
attained international prominence.
So far this decade, though, the Brazilian stock market has been a bust. It has dropped by a cumulative 25.3 percent
over the last three years, and it has dragged Latin America stock mutual funds down with it. In the first half of 2013,
Latin America funds tracked by Morningstar lost almost 17 percent, on average. Over the last three years through June,
they lost 4.6 percent a year, annualized. But over the much longer term, they have still fared the best among emergingmarket regional funds tracked by Morningstar, returning 16.7 percent, annualized, over the last decade.
“Brazil needs to grow,” said Will Landers, manager of theBlackRock Latin America fund. “It has to deliver a G.D.P.
growth rate above 2.5 percent, or investors are going to stay away.” Growth sagged in 2012, with gross domestic
product increasing less than 1 percent.
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Brazil’s economy in decline—GDP lower than expected.
MoneyNews, 2013 (July 4, “Brazil Industry Group Cuts 2013 Growth Forecast”,
http://www.moneynews.com/InvestingAnalysis/Brazil-economy-growth-industry/2013/07/04/id/513402, DVO)
Brazil's main industrial lobby group on Thursday cut its forecast for GDP growth to two percent and that of the
industrial sector to one percent, in a gloomy assessment of Latin America's biggest economy.
The GDP projection was cut from 3.2 percent in March to two percent, and industrial output growth from 2.6 percent
to one percent, the National Confederation of Industry (CNI) said in its quarterly report.
Brazil's industrial production has been hard hit by declining competitiveness and investments.
CNI also projected inflation of six percent this year, well above the official target of 4.5 percent.
And it cut from 3.5 percent to 2.3 percent projected growth of private domestic consumption, the engine of Brazil's
economic expansion, as "the weak economic activity is reflected in the labor market, which is not creating jobs at the
pace of the past two years."
Two years of low growth and high inflation have dented the popularity of President Dilma Rousseff as have three
weeks of nationwide street protests by angry Brazilians demanding better public services and an end to corruption.
Brazil's industrial production contracted 0.8 percent in 2012 and there had been hopes of a rebound this year on the
back of strong government incentives.
Meanwhile the country's GDP expanded a paltry 0.9 percent last year, after 2.7 percent in 2011 and a sizzling 7.5
percent in 2010.
The Central Bank also projected lower GDP growth of 2.7 percent this year and inflation of six percent.
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No Link—Hegemony:
No Brazilian rivalry- no soft power
Brand et al ’12 (Alexander Brand, Lecturer and Post-Doc Researcher at the Department of Political Science at the
University of Mainz, M.A. in Political Science, Philosophy and Media & Communication Sciences; Susan McEwen-Fial,
Lecturer at the Department of Political Science at the University of Mainz; Wolfgang Muno, Professor of Political
Science; Andrea Ribeiro Hoffmann, Lecturer at the Willy Brandt School of Public Policy; “BRICs and U.S. Hegemony:
Theoretical Reflections on Shifting Power Patterns and Empirical Evidence from Latin America”; Mainz Papers on
International and European Politics, Mainz: Chair of International Relations, Johannes Gutenberg University; April 2012;
https://international.politics.uni-mainz.de/files/2012/10/mpiep04.pdf”
Burges defines Brazilian activism as a leadership project based on the concept of consensual hegemony, in which “the
central idea is the construction of a structural vision, or hegemony, that specifically includes the nominally
subordinate, engaging in a process of dialogue and interaction that causes the subordinate parties to appropriate and
absorb the substance and requisites of the hegemony as their own”, without relying on force (Burges 2008: 65). The
data presented in this paper is in line with the argument advanced by authors working on Brazilian leadership that the
country cannot perform the traditional, i.e. military and economic types of hegemony given its relative capabilities
limitations and the domestic instability derived from economic inequality and young democratic regime (Lima/Hirst
2006; Malamud 2009; Vieira 2011). In this sense, the concept of consensual hegemony, which corresponds to a large
extent with the concept of soft power as defined in this paper, fulfills the gap to understand Brazilian role in Latin
America, or rather, South America. A combination of mostly soft power with institutional activism seems to sustain
the Brazilian claim for leadership. Some leverage of military and economic power contributes to support that claim,
but they are not enough to consolidate a hegemonic role for Brazil in South America. If Brazil wanted to present itself
as a rival to the U.S. or perhaps China in the future, “soft power” is a central concept.
China, Brazil are not threats to US heg in Latin America
Brand et al ’12 (Alexander Brand, Lecturer and Post-Doc Researcher at the Department of Political Science at the
University of Mainz, M.A. in Political Science, Philosophy and Media & Communication Sciences; Susan McEwen-Fial,
Lecturer at the Department of Political Science at the University of Mainz; Wolfgang Muno, Professor of Political
Science; Andrea Ribeiro Hoffmann, Lecturer at the Willy Brandt School of Public Policy; “BRICs and U.S. Hegemony:
Theoretical Reflections on Shifting Power Patterns and Empirical Evidence from Latin America”; Mainz Papers on
International and European Politics, Mainz: Chair of International Relations, Johannes Gutenberg University; April 2012;
https://international.politics.uni-mainz.de/files/2012/10/mpiep04.pdf”
China has expanded its regional resource base in economic terms and it has used institutional as well as soft power
instruments to smooth its way towards enhanced economic ex- change. In terms of hegemony, however, it seems to
lack most of the ingredients to act as a regional hegemon, especially since most activities are both modest in size and
strictly tied to either narrow economic or narrow diplomatic goals; Chinese hegemonic aspirations can hardly be
detected in the Latin American region. Brazil has especially fostered institutional cooperation and presented itself as
an alternative to the U.S.; it thus has signaled at least rhetorically a will to balance U.S. hegemony. However, it lacks
the material power base and quite often – given a lot of similar policy objectives – a de facto will to challenge the U.S.
in Latin America as a whole.
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AT: Iran Impact
Iran-Brazil relations cooling under Rousseff.
New York Times, 2012 (January 23, “Iranian Adviser Accuses Brazil of Ruining Relations”,
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/24/world/americas/ahmadinejad-adviser-accuses-brazil-of-ruiningrelations.html?_r=0, DVO)
Iran’s efforts to cultivate political support in Latin America at a time of rising international tension over its nuclear
program appear to have encountered a significant obstacle: Brazil, the region’s economic powerhouse.¶ After President
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran took a four-country tour of Latin America this month, during which he met with several
outspoken critics of the United States but was notably not invited to stop in Brazil, one of his top advisers took a public
swipe at Brazil’s president, Dilma Rousseff, saying she had “destroyed years of good relations” between the two
nations.¶ “The Brazilian president has been striking against everything that Lula accomplished,” Ali Akbar Javanfekr, who
has worked as Mr. Ahmadinejad’s top media adviser, said in an interview published Monday by Folha de São Paulo, a
leading Brazilian newspaper, in which he compared Ms. Rousseff to her predecessor and political mentor, Luiz Inácio
Lula da Silva.¶ Mr. da Silva, who left office a year ago, visited Tehran in 2010, wading into Middle East diplomacy in an
attempt to defuse the crisis over Iran’s nuclear program. Together with Turkey’s government, he forged a fuel-swap
deal for Iran to ship low-enriched uranium abroad.¶ That agreement failed after the Obama administration rejected it
and Iran said it planned to continue enriching uranium. Even so, Brazil’s exports to Iran soared in the ensuing months;
Iran briefly surpassed Russia at one point in 2011 as the largest export market for Brazilian beef.¶ In recent months,
however, trade ties between the two nations have frayed somewhat. Brazil’s exports to Iran climbed to $2.1 billion in
2010 from $1.2 billion a year earlier. But now some Brazilian companies have complained that it has become harder
to obtain Iranian import licenses, curbing what had been an otherwise dynamic market for Brazil.¶ “Since October, we
noticed an abrupt break in purchases by Iran,” said Francisco Turra, president of the Brazilian Poultry Union, a trade
group. He said that officials at Iran’s Embassy in Brasília and at Brazil’s Embassy in Tehran had assured his group that
Brazilian exports were still welcome in Iran. Mr. Turra said he was awaiting the release of the new export statistics to
determine how to proceed.¶ The views of Mr. Javanfekr, an influential if polarizing political figure in Iran, present a
dilemma for Brazil as it attempts to hew to a pragmatic foreign policy that maintains access to important markets while
avoiding confrontation.¶ Nevertheless, last year, after the election of Ms. Rousseff, Mr. da Silva’s chosen successor,
Brazil supported a move by the United Nations to investigate claims of human rights abuses in Iran, an initiative led
by Washington. The decision was viewed as a subtle shift from Mr. da Silva’s previous relations with Tehran.
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Stability Impact
Strong Brazil causes Venezuelan counterbalancing—turns Latin American stability impact.
Stalcup, 2012 (Travis, Fellow at the GHWBush School of Government and Public Policy at Texas A&M, October 10, Georgetown Journal of
International Affairs, “What is Brazil Up To With Its Nuclear Policy?”, http://journal.georgetown.edu/2012/10/10/what-is-brazil-up-to-with-itsnuclear-policy-by-travis-stalcup/, DVO)
To Brazil, Latin America is not as stable as often believed. To the north, Venezuela chaffs at the prospect of Brazil as
regional hegemon. In 2010, Russia and Venezuela reached a deal to build the Latin American country’s first nuclear
reactor. Although the project was scrapped after the Fukushima disaster, the prospect remains. Venezuela has also
challenged Brazilian influence in Bolivia and Ecuador, two countries that have or have attempted to nationalize the
facilities of Petrobras, Brazil’s state oil company. In 2008, the government of Hugo Chavez levied a controversial $282
million tax on a Brazilian construction firm. Such actions have riled Brazilian leaders.
No impact--Latin American instability won’t spill over—no nukes, no history of cross-border
conflicts.
Cardenas, 2011 (Mauricio, March 17, Director of the Latin American Initiative at Brookings Institution, “Think Again:
Latin America”, Foreign Policy Magazine,
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/03/17/think_again_latin_america?page=0,3, DVO)
Violence in Latin America is strongly related to poverty and inequality. When combined with the insatiable
international appetite for the illegal drugs produced in the region, it's a noxious brew. As strongly argued by a number of
prominent regional leaders -- including Brazil's former president, Fernando H. Cardoso, and Colombia's former
president, Cesar Gaviria -- a strategy based on demand reduction, rather than supply, is the only way to reduce crime
in Latin America.
Although some fear the Mexican drug violence could spill over into the southern United States, Latin America poses
little to no threat to international peace or stability. The major global security concerns today are the proliferation of
nuclear weapons and terrorism. No country in the region is in possession of nuclear weapons -- nor has expressed an
interest in having them. Latin American countries, on the whole, do not have much history of engaging in cross-border
wars. Despite the recent tensions on the Venezuela-Colombia border, it should be pointed out that Venezuela has never
taken part in an international armed conflict.
Ethnic and religious conflicts are very uncommon in Latin America. Although the region has not been immune
to radical jihadist attacks -- the 1994 attack on a Jewish Community Center in Buenos Aires, for instance -- they have
been rare. Terrorist attacks on the civilian population have been limited to a large extent to the FARC organization in
Colombia, a tactic which contributed in large part to the organization's loss of popular support.
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Trade Impact—China Fills In
Chinese demand will sustain Brazilian economic influence in Latin America
Associated Press 12
[Associated Press, NPR, January 2, 2012, “Brazil Sets Trade Records, Due To Chinese Demand,”
http://www.npr.org/2012/01/02/144587105/brazil-sets-trade-records-due-to-chinese-demand] WD
Brazil had record trade figures in 2011, logging $256 billion in exports and maintaining a $29.7 billion surplus on the
back of high commodity prices and strong Chinese demand, officials said Monday. Exports to China hit $44.3 billion, an
increase of more than 43 percent over 2010. In 2009 China surpassed the U.S. as Brazil's biggest trading partner. "It
was an exceptional year for Brazilian foreign trade," said Alessandro Teixeira, deputy trade minister, who said China
represented 17 percent of Brazil's exports. Brazil's booming middle class and its growing consumption also led to a
record year for imports into Latin America's biggest economy, with $226.3 billion worth of goods flowing into the
nation, an increase of 25 percent over 2010. Brazil is a commodities superpower, and Teixeira said strong production
and high prices for iron ore, soybeans and crude oil aided the trade balance. The Trade Ministry said total trade with
China was $77.1 billion. That outpaced trade with the U.S., Brazil's No. 2 partner with $60.1 billion in bilateral trade.
Argentina was Brazil's third-largest partner in trade, with a total of $39.6 billion flowing between the two nations.
Teixeira, announcing the figures at a news conference, said the ministry expects 2012 to be another record year for
Brazilian trade.
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Brazilian Prolif Impact:
Brazil has zero intentions of nukes – constitution, reputation, UN security council
Oppenheimer 9 - Miami Herald writer and Pulitzer Prize winner (Andres, “Brazil a nuclear power? Probably not”, October 2009,
http://npsglobal.org/eng/component/content/article/147-articles/741-brazil-a-nuclear-power-probably-not-andres-oppenheimer.html/, HW)
Last week, I
interviewed Brazil Defense Minister Nelson Jobim, and asked him whether his country is planning to build
nuclear weapons. ``No, it was a mistake on the part of the vice president,'' Jobim said. ``There are two reasons why it's
prohibited for Brazil to develop nuclear weapons: The Brazilian Constitution bans the use and production of nuclear
weapons and international agreements signed by Brazil prohibit it as well.'' He added that Brazil will develop nuclear
energy for peaceful purposes, which is allowed under international treaties. That will include construction of a nuclear-fueled
submarine that will be faster than conventional submarines, but that will have no nuclear weapons, he said. Asked about Gen. Barros Moreira's 2007 statements, the
defense minister said, ``The general you are talking about was also speaking for himself.'' I
asked several academics which Brazilian officials we
should believe. Cristina Eguizabal, director of Florida International University's Latin American and Caribbean Center,
said she believes that the defense minister speaks for the government and for Brazil's political establishment.
``Brazil's foreign policy project is one of becoming a respected regional power, but not an anti-systemic pariah
power,'' she said. ``Developing nuclear weapons would put it alongside `undesirable' states, such as Iran or North
Korea.'' Jose Azel, a senior research associate at the University of Miami, said that Brazil's top foreign policy priority is
to obtain a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. ``Perhaps this talk about developing nuclear
weapons is a way of creating some political buzz to obtain that position,'' he said.
Brazil won’t proliferate – constitution and no regional indication
Forman 12 - J.D., Ph.D. is a Senior Associate with the CSIS Americas Program. (Joanna, Nuclear weapons: Brazil and the no nukes option”, 9/11/12,
http://www.voxxi.com/nuclear-weapons-brazil-nukes-option/, HW)
Brazil’s acquisition of six nuclear submarines raises the issue of nuclear proliferation in a region of the world that renounced the use of nuclear weapons. But not in
the way most casual observers would think. First, to set the record straight, the Brazil nuclear submarine joint venture with France will guard its 3000 miles of Atlantic
coast and is a logical extension of its rise as a global power. After all, Brazil’s extensive national wealth lies below the ocean floor. Second, the nuclear reactors used in
the submarines will be built by Brazil and coordinated through a new state-owned company, Blue Amazon Defense Technologies or Amazul. These reactors use lowenriched uranium, the same used in French submarines. The
decision to use this type of nuclear fuel enables enrichment and
manufacturing in its civilian plants. As such, the submarines are not in violation of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation
Treaty of which Brazil is a party. Brazil’s 1988 constitution affirms the use of nuclear materials for peaceful purposes,
but specifically renounces their use in arms. The American states are part of the global community, no longer the
junior partner in a relationship dominated by the United States. The challenge ahead will be to promote a more responsible approach to
regional problems we all face that go beyond our borders—crime, climate change, migration, trafficking, pandemics and more. Eleven countries in the
hemisphere have signed on to the 2003 Proliferation Security Initiative that seeks cooperation in interdicting nuclear
and other threatening arms concealed on ships and planes. In similar spirit, governments might embrace new
multilateral arrangements that offer the region and our own country peaceful means of resolving problems , while also
promoting a deeper partnership for the combating future threats. In the final analysis, we should never forget that a region without nuclear weapons gives us
common ground to build more constructive partnerships around other goals—stronger democratic governance, access to justice, and opportunities for workers to
become educated to meet future economic needs. The
hemisphere’s policymakers should consider how to riff off the success of a
45-year-old idea—a nuclear free zone—to create the Americas as a zone of peace, equality, justice and self-fulfillment
for all citizens. That would be the way to get respect from the major powers.
Empirics tend to lean towards nonproliferation – Brazil pursued nuclear weapons and backed away
Jones 13 – associate professor in the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa. He is also an Annenberg Distinguished
Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University.. (Peter, “Rapid nuclear proliferation simply doesn’t happen”, 2/18/13,
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/commentary/rapid-nuclear-proliferation-simply-doesnt-happen/article8729083/, HW)
Moreover, neighbours
were threatened when these countries acquired nuclear weapons but decided not to build nuclear
weapons in response. Japan and South Korea did not build them after China and then North Korea did, despite chilling
rhetoric from the one-party states that easily matched anything Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said about Israel. No Arab country built
them after Israel did. Yes, Pakistan followed India into the nuclear club, but no other country in the region has. Rather than build their own
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bombs, most countries faced with neighbours acquiring nuclear weapons have sought alliances and protection from
others – most often the United States. Thus, contrary to popular wisdom, experience has been that most states do not build
nuclear bombs, even when they have the opportunity and, seemingly, the motive to do so. If there is a norm of
international conduct regarding nuclear weapons, it is a norm of non-proliferation. For every state that has developed
nuclear weapons, there are dozens more, including Canada, that could have but did not. South Africa did but then gave them up. There
are several, including Brazil, Argentina and Sweden, that went down the road toward nuclear weapons but stopped and went back.
There are even a few – Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan – that inherited nuclear weapons when the Soviet Union collapsed but soon gave them up voluntarily.
Brazil won’t prolif – empirics
Graham 9 – associate editor at The Atlantic. (David, “Not-Quite-Nuclear Nations”, 8/27/9, http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2009/08/27/not-quitenuclear-nations.html/, HW)
During a military junta in
the late 1970s, Brazil began work on a secret nuclear-weapons program parallel to its civilian
power program, but São Paolo decided that nuclear weapons wouldn't help against an internal leftist threat, which was then
considered the nation's biggest strategic challenge. Although Brazil has the technical capacity to produce weapons, it has signed
several treaties pledging not to do so.