The new U.S. National Security Strategy for 2025, signed by that country’s president this week, Donald Trump, reorganizes Washington’s priorities around a central objective: preserving U.S. supremacy in the face of China’s rise and preventing the emergence of any competing power in the Western Hemisphere.
In the assessment of geographer and economics professor at UERJ (State University of Rio de Janeiro) Elias Jabbour, in an interview with TV 247, this move is not limited to containing Beijing: it also includes a direct offensive to limit Brazil whenever the country tries to build its own national project.
Jabbour stated that the document functions as a plan for dual containment. “Trump wants to contain China and also Brazil,” he said, classifying Trump’s initiative as an attempt by the U.S. to supposedly “put the house in order,” while Washington’s global leadership sees itself as decadent.
Comparing the current moment to the government of former U.S. President Ronald Reagan in the 1980s, he summarized the logic of the new official text: “Trump observes the world as something very oscillatory to the United States and he seeks, through this launched document, to try to reorder the world in the image and likeness of U.S. interests. He wakes up to reality.”
Jabbour associates the new U.S. strategic design with an ongoing process of political and informational pressure on Brazil. For him, the country already lives in a scenario of undeclared confrontation. “I believe that we have been living under a hybrid war for a long time,” he stated, projecting the practical effect of Washington’s new orientation on Brazilian domestic politics.From the document, he anticipates an escalation. “This hybrid war will increase its reach. For example, we should expect, from this document, direct interference from the United States via Big Techs in the next elections,” he said. In the professor’s assessment, the control of information flows, digital platforms, and public debate environments is treated, in practice, as an instrument to contain political projects that do not align with Washington’s strategy for the hemisphere.Therefore, Jabbour argues that the Brazilian electoral calendar should be seen as part of a larger dispute. According to him, “from a political standpoint as well, it is fundamental that the Brazilian left or patriots in general have very clear what is at stake in the next elections”.
Jabbour argues that the country can no longer sustain an ambiguous position between Washington and Beijing. “It’s time for Brazil to make a decision. Are we going to have a loose relationship with China, are we going to try to keep one foot there and one here?,” he questioned.
He defends that China be seen as a concrete opportunity for reindustrialization and productive repositioning.
“I believe, for example, that China can be a huge external window for a reindustrialization process in Brazil, because China today offers itself as an exporter of public goods,” he assessed. At the same time, he recognizes that Donald Trump’s interest in Brazil may open spaces in specific areas, such as semiconductors or chains linked to Brazilian mineral reserves.
He emphasized that the axis of his analysis is the Brazilian national interest as a parameter for any external relationship. “I don’t want to close the door to the United States, I don’t want to create animosity with the United States, I want to have excellent relations with them, but we have to see what the national interest is first, right?,” he stated.
From this criterion, Jabbour assesses that “observing the national interest, that is how I see China as the most ideal strategic partner for our interests”.
One of the points where Brazil’s containment manifests, according to Jabbour, is the dispute for rare earths and other strategic minerals present in South America. Jabbour notes that there is already potential demand, especially from the United States, for these raw materials. Brazil’s response, in his view, should be the creation of a strategy to internalize processing chains and add value to natural resources.
“Brazil should seek, with the Chinese or without the Chinese, via import substitution or via research in science, technology, and innovation, to internalize the productive chains that process these earths,” he defended.Remembering that China dominates both the reserves and the processing of rare earths, he points out the difference in trajectory between Beijing and Brasília. “China today holds between 60 and 70% of international rare earth reserves and it is responsible for 90% of their processing, right? So how did they manage it and Brazil doesn’t?,” he questioned. For the professor, the country needs an “institutional scheme” that protects these resources and, at the same time, converts them into an engine for a new industrial revolution.
However, Jabbour concludes that Brazil finds itself in a strategically fragile position. “For now, Brazil has very little to do from a political, institutional, financial, industrial standpoint to deal with a threat like this, right? That is, a threat of direct interference even from a military point of view,” he assessed.He describes a country without adequate instruments to respond to the combination of hybrid war, economic pressure, and eventual military escalation in the region. “Brazil is a country that is unprepared to deal with this scenario. We urgently need to discuss a national project in light of this foreign threat to Brazil,” he stated.
Source: brasil247.com