War is like Janus: it has more than one face. In addition to military warfare, there are also diplomatic, economic, political, and cultural wars. Cultural warfare consists of imposing the dominant group’s version of reality on the dominated. This is what the entertainment industries of Disney and Hollywood have always done.
Now, Trump has declared economic war on Brazil by promising that, starting August 1, he will impose 50% tariffs on Brazilian products imported by the United States if the case against Bolsonaro, which he considers a “witch hunt,” is not immediately dismissed.
This imperialist interference in the Brazilian judiciary (eight Supreme Court judges have been banned from entering the United States) has only one serious precedent in more than 200 years of relations between the two countries: the 1964 coup that overthrew the constitutionally elected president, João Goulart, and imposed a military dictatorship that lasted 21 years.
As Lula told CNN on July 17, Trump “was not elected to be emperor of the world.” But that is how he feels when governing the greatest economic, military, and industrial power in history.
On June 25, NATO leaders, meeting in The Hague with Trump in attendance, bowed to U.S. demands that Europe increase its military spending to pay for Washington’s protective shield over the entire continent.
NATO countries, which currently invest $2.7 trillion in war, formally agreed to increase their military spending to 5% of their gross domestic product by 2035. With the increase to 5% of GDP, the value of the war cornucopia will rise to $3.8 trillion.
In 2024, total global military spending amounted to $3.7 trillion. The UN budget, including that allocated to preserving peace on the planet, is $3.72 billion, representing only 0.1% of the global budget for arms procurement.
Another target of Trump’s attack on Brazil is Pix, the world’s most advanced financial transaction system, which is free for individuals. Why is the “emperor of the world” so angry about this app?
Pix competes directly with powerful U.S. companies: large credit card firms, payment services such as PayPal, and remittance companies, which fear the eventual global integration of systems similar to Brazil’s Pix (something much more viable than the “BRICS currency”).
Pix does the same thing as these companies, only without charging individuals (it only charges legal entities, through contracts). And what Trump, lobbyist for the owners of the market, wants to do is replace the free Pix with companies “made in the USA” that will take part of Brazilians’ money through fees and annual charges. In addition to controlling our finances.
After the fall of the Berlin Wall and the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the United States once again embraced with heart and soul the doctrine that had always motivated its imperialist stance: “manifest destiny.”
The expression was coined by journalist John L. O’Sullivan in 1845, when he argued that the country had the right—and even the “divine duty”—to expand its territory in order to instill democracy, progress, and Christian values in other peoples.
In short, to civilize the American continent, an idea that later came to encompass all countries and today means making the planet revolve around the dictates of the White House.
Within this imperialist idea, the belief was cultivated that white Anglo-Saxons are superior and therefore have the right to dominate indigenous peoples, Latin Americans, Africans, and Asians.
One of the most iconic images of “manifest destiny” is John Gast’s 1872 painting, American Progress, on display at the Autry Museum of the American West in Los Angeles.
The central figure, Columbia (the female personification of the United States), carries a book and telegraph wires symbolizing knowledge and technology. On the left, darkness: indigenous people, buffalo, and wild landscapes. On the right, light: settlers, railroad tracks, ships, “progress.” It signifies the march of civilization toward the west, sweeping away everything “barbaric.”
The proof that Trump is the embodiment of Columbia (the female version of Columbus, the “discoverer” of the New World) is that in the midst of his interventionist maneuvering in the Brazilian economy and judiciary, on the 23rd, he dared to send his chargé d’affaires in Brazil, Ambassador Gabriel Escobar, to tell the authorities that the United States is interested in Brazil’s critical minerals and rare earths.
Critical minerals include niobium, graphite, nickel, cobalt, lithium, and copper.
Rare earths are a group of 17 chemical elements on the periodic table that include 15 lanthanides, as well as scandium and yttrium. They are not actually “earths,” but complex minerals, such as bastnasite, monazite, xenotime, and yttrium-rich laterites, which are used in modern technology.
The term “rare” is used because they are difficult to separate and purify, as they often occur together in complex minerals. In short, the name “rare earths” reflects the difficulty of extracting and purifying these elements, not their scarcity.
“Rare earths” are essential for manufacturing the high-powered permanent magnets used in wind turbines, electric vehicles, electronic products, and military equipment. They are also used in catalysts, batteries, lamps, polishes, special glasses, fiber optics, and medical applications.
In short, Trump is running on the slogan “Make America Great Again,” which means returning to the most ferocious imperialism to ensure U.S. supremacy in all areas and punish any “troublesome country” that refuses to adopt the policies of globalization, neocolonialism, and U.S. tutelage.
Just as the genocide of the Palestinians being carried out by the current Israeli government in Gaza is multiplying the rejection of Zionism around the world, the imperialist character of the Trump administration is reinforcing the critical view of the United States and capitalism. Every cloud has a silver lining.
Source: Cubadebate translation Resumen Latinoamericano—English
Frei Betto is an internationally renowned liberation theologian and Dominican friar from Brazil. Author of 60 books in various literary genres, including novels, essays, detective stories, memoirs, children’s and young adult books, and religious works. In 1985 and 2005, he was awarded the Jabuti, the country’s most important literary prize. In 1986, he was named Intellectual of the Year by the Brazilian Writers’ Union. An advisor to social movements, and the Landless Rural Workers’ Movement, he has been actively involved in Brazilian politics for the past 50 years. He is the author of the book Fidel and Religion.