Russia in Latin America

It is critical to consider the Russia/Brazil deal for the development of the Brazilian nuclear powered submarine as a matter of state and not a governmental one. This is more so because polls indicate presidential candidate Lula as favourite against Bolsonaro in the next national elections. It was former Brazilian defence minister Nelson Jobim (a Russofobe) who under Lula's presidencial term in the 2000s, invited the French in an overall military partnership with Brazil, and this guy has very close relationship with Lula's candidate for the vice-presidency, Geraldo Alckmin.
There are two very powerful and traditional sectors in the Brazilian society: the Catholic and Evangelical churches, on the one side, and the military, on the other. There are close relationships between the Brazilian and the Argentinian military, who do not forget the Malvinas war outcome with Britain.

In national internal politics you might consider Lula a progressive pragmatic politician. On foreign policy, on the other hand, he's getting advice from Celso Amorim, his former Foreign Affairs minister, who's openly against the Ukrainian operation, much like is Francis in the Vatican.

lancelot wrote:

kvs wrote:Is Lula a fake leftist globalist whore?
I got the impression that he wasn't before.   But I do not follow the politics in Brazil in sufficient detail.

He had to cave in to Western interests of course or he would not have gotten into power in the first place.
But he and his party were despised enough by the capitalists in Brazil with his wealth redistribution schemes that he had to go.

Brazil bought Mi-35M helicopters from Russia when Lula was in power.
The current Bolsonaro government is going to take them out of service.
Supposedly Brazil cannot keep those Mi-35M operational. Which is funny considering countries like Iraq and Afghanistan with zero aviation industry manage to do it.
Bolsonaro is just doing it to please his masters in Washington. He also wanted to hand over Embraer to Boeing on a silver platter.

Now the deal with the nuclear submarines, I don't get it, Brazil has wanted nuclear submarines for a long time. They have had a nuclear program at least since the time of the military dictatorship. A lot of people thought when Lula came into power that he would kill the nuclear program, as it is considered a legacy of that, but instead he actually increased its funding. However it hasn't done much progress. And the French basically cut tail and ran after claiming they would assist Brazil if they bought the Scorpenes.

I hope after the whole business with Australia the French will reconsider the level of their assistance to Brazil's nuclear submarine program.

The Mi-35s were a consolation prize given by Jobim to Medvedev after Sukhoi & Mig failing to win the Brazilian FX fighter tender. The Brazilian deal with the French on the subs have the issue, as always with the French, of full ToT, which the Brazilians are asking for. As you know, Russia is the world's leader in top-notch submarine development. The French imposed the costly Scorpenes in the deal. As the Brazilian military pretend to dominate the whole South Atlantic area, it has to face NATO's UK and its Malvinas naval base. The feeling is that the Scorpenes are not up to the task wrt the Royal Navy. Following AUKUS, the British are getting the best of US nuclear sub technology. And last but not least, both France and the UK are active NATO members and the latter may resort to Article 5 in case it is attacked.

American defense ministers did not "sharply condemn" the events in Ukraine. 29.07.2022.

(Three of the leading Latin American countries) Argentina, Brazil and Mexico did not support the position of the American countries on the situation in Ukraine.

MEXICO CITY, July 29 - RIA Novosti. The participants in the Conference of American Defense Ministers published a joint declaration in which the majority - 13 out of 21 - refused to strongly condemn Russia's actions in Ukraine, and Argentina, Brazil and Mexico even made a reservation that this could not be the subject of discussion of the forum.

"Conflicts around the world, such as the invasion of Ukraine and acts of violence carried out by armed groups terrorizing the population of Haiti, are not legitimate means of resolving disputes, therefore, member states of the Conference of the Ministers of Defense of the Americas look forward to an early peaceful solution," the final declarations of the participants of the conference of 21 countries of the continent, which takes place in Brasilia.

Three participating countries - Argentina , Brazil and Mexico - made a reservation that this issue, in principle, falls within the competence of the United Nations and cannot be the subject of discussion of the forum.

At the same time, eight defense ministers representing Canada , Colombia , Ecuador , the United States, Guatemala , Haiti , Paraguay and the Dominican Republic insisted on the inclusion of a footnote in which they separately stated "their strong disapproval" of the events in Ukraine.

https://ria.ru/20220729/amerika-1805744465.html