Last Monday, the Brazilians woke up stunned by the result of the first ballot. The current president’s supporters expressed sadness at the defeat in the first round. The strange thing, however, is that the mood in the opposition was not one of jubilation, but of fear and concern. In other words, both sides started the week anxious and unsatisfied. Therefore, in this article, I want to reflect on what this year’s dispute is really about, which will have major consequences not only for Brazil but for the whole world.
For that, I’m going to bring up some lessons of geopolitical thinking about controlling the world. Yes, for those of you who thought plans to control the world were babble of conspiracy theories, a good chunk of world powers’ military handbooks outline strategies for global control.
Brazil is the new heartland, the new region that can define who will control the world. This year we have acquired unprecedented geopolitical importance.
Alfred Thayer Mahan is now considered the father of American foreign policy. His pivotal work was The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, published in 1890. In the work, the author argued that control of certain sea regions would determine dominion over the entire world. Under Mahan’s influence, Halford Mackinder published The Geographical Pivot of History in 1904, in which he shifted geopolitical importance to control of land zones, not seas. In this work, Mackinder argued that control of the “heartland” (comprising Russia and Central Asia) would be the linchpin for hegemony over the “island” (namely, all of Eurasia). It also separates the world into other regions, such as the ‘inner crescent’, which includes Europe, China, India, and the Middle East, and the ‘outer crescent’ (‘outer crescent’), which includes the Americas and the Middle East. In other words, it’s an arrangement of the world map that places Russia at the center and America and Australia at the ends. However, I will suggest that recent and drastic changes in the international geopolitical landscape point to a shift in this global map layout. To this end, I continue with the reflection on the theory of the “heartland”.
In 2019, identifying control of Eastern Europe as a gateway to the domain of the Heartland, Mackinder wrote the phrase that inspired the title of this article: “Whoever controls Eastern Europe controls the Heartland; she who controls the heartland rules the world island; who controls the world island rules the world.” Next, Nicholas Spykman renamed the heartland and called it “rimland,” adapting the previous sentence to “who controls the rim rules Eurasia; who rules Eurasia controls the fortunes of the world.” Would that idea still be valid today, or do we have a new “heartland”?
First, it is worth remembering that it was these concepts of Mackinder and Spykman that eventually defined Western foreign policy in relation to Russia, making control of that region a primary goal of its geopolitical endeavors. In fact, we can say that recent history has been largely shaped by a struggle for control of this region over the last 100 years, and later by a USRussia struggle for world domination. The recent crisis in Ukraine repositioned the world in this NATORussia dichotomy, creating a kind of Cold War 2.0, as I have analyzed in previous articles.
However, the reasoning I want to propose here is that Brazil is the new heartland, the new region that can determine who will control the world. This year we have acquired unprecedented geopolitical importance. The world has realized that without food and energy there can be no iPhones or Tesla cars or even social stability. We know that some activities have always been essential for the proper functioning of a society, such as those aimed at housing and food. For no other reason does this type of activity receive major tax incentives such as: B. Investments in LCIs (Real Estate Letters of Credit) and LCAs (Agricultural Letters of Credit). The world has learned to appreciate food producers. And at this point we gain a new approach in the global geopolitical theater.
With the rapidly evolving energy and food crisis in the world, Brazil is one of the few that can restore Europe’s energy security and provide the planet with food security. Not to mention that Brazil is positioning itself as a strategic zone in the extreme scenario (but less distant every day) of a nuclear conflict. Because a conflict of this magnitude would be concentrated in the Northern Hemisphere, the impact on the Global South would be less as it would be somehow shielded from eventual destruction, although exposed to some of the radiation and ensuing nuclear winter. This is all part of the “rear zones” theory that Colonel Enio Fontenele has presented so well in his books and lectures.
In the end, the power that controls Brazil (albeit indirectly through a local agent) will be able to guarantee the flow of food and basic infrastructure for a war scenario, such as energy, weapons and ammunition. Thus the theory of “posterior zones” was born. With Brazil as an ally, a world power could capitalize on our vast territory, far from the enemies of the north, blessed with countless natural reserves, a vast coastline, a favorable climate and gigantic development potential. Also because the US is moving its semiconductor fabs from Asia to America and the countries most likely to become the new Western technology hubs are Mexico and Brazil.
For all these reasons, given what is at stake in Brazil today, I propose an adaptation of Mackinder’s phrase: “Who controls Brazil will rule the fate of the world”. God bless us.