Ladies and gentlemen, have you noticed how Russia is always well-positioned when some critical events take place in Brazil? Could it be a coincidence? He can. But the chance has been repeated a lot. In June 2013, when Edward Snowden, a former National Security Agency (NSA) service provider, revealed the massive spying that the United States carried out on its allies, Brazil was possibly the country that most he reacted harshly to the revelations. Then-President Dilma Rousseff did not accept Barack Obama’s explanations and retaliated. He canceled a state visit he would make to the United States and threw away a $4 billion contract that was ready to be signed on the visit, marking the resurgence of relations with the Americans with the acquisition of 36 F-18 fighter jets.
Rousseff’s reaction not only aborted the deal with the Americans. The immediate effect of Snowden’s revelations was to pave the runway for the Russians to attempt to land their Sukhoi-35 fighter jets in Brazil. Few people paid any attention to this, but at the same time as giving shelter to Snowden, Putin assigned his staff to convince the Brazilian president and buy his fighter jets. After signing agreements worth R$ 2 billion for the import of Russian anti-aircraft batteries, Defense Minister Celso Amorim bought the idea and worked hard to get Brazil to do a leasing operation with Moscow to bring the russian fighter aircraft to Brazil.
Putin’s emissaries failed to deceive the Brazilian military, who already knew of the terrible reputation of Russian aftermarket. The aircraft they sell are poorly maintained and are almost always anchored to the ground, unable to fly. The disastrous example of the Venezuelans who equipped themselves with Russian helicopters and planes was indisputable. In addition to those that fell due to lack of repairs, several other equipment were prevented from flying due to lack of spare parts. And despite the efforts of Putin and his ministers, the sale of the Sukhoi-35s has come close.
And today, eight years later, the outcome of the story is already known: the Americans were truly punished and did not win the deal and Brazil closed with the Swedes. The first Gripen fighters have already been delivered and one of them is already in Brazil.
It would be interesting for someone to ask former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva what was the content of his conversation with Putin a few hours before turning himself in to the Federal Police in April 2018. ABC, the PT was responding to a call from the Russian president – who, some say, would have recommended Lula not to give himself up. Try to push the case further forward, as it could be disassembled. You cannot trust reports by PT members, who always attribute superpowers to Lula. But one day, who knows, the president decides to tell how the conversation went.
The following year, in June 2019, former president Dilma Rousseff and federal deputy Gleisi Hoffman landed in Moscow on a trip surrounded by discretion. The duo’s tour preceded by a week the leaks of messages exchanged by Sergio Moro and Lava-Jato prosecutors in a Russian application, Telegram.
Those messages posted by the site The Intercept they were not only the beginning of Operation Lava-Jato’s downfall, but also the basis for its implosion and for almost all the condemnatory sentences already handed down as a result of those investigations.
The same PT members who love to say that former minister Sergio Moro is an agent trained by the CIA also tell mirabolous things about their passage through Russia. A senior PT member who orbits Rousseff’s life has spread in the legal world the version that, by welcoming Dilma with open arms, Putin would have anticipated the storm that was to come. The story of the hackers in Araraquara was never convincing. But believing in the story, as they say in the land of the gossipy PT, is a bit too much. But supposing it to be true (just supposing), Lava-Jato would have been the target of massive and state espionage. Something that seems to have come out of the work of Ian Fleming.
Let there be imagination, isn’t it?
Russia has been fueling the bonfire that keeps the crisis hot in Belarus. Putin needs a chaotic Europe to more easily create spaces of power vacuum or illegitimacy so that he can operate his interests without local, legal, moral or military ties.
By reaching out to dictator Alexander Lukashenko, Putin reproduced and perfected the recipe used in Maduro’s Venezuela. The chaos was such that the impacts are felt in Brazil. Responsible for sending more than 20% of the potash used to fertilize crops in Brazil, Belarus was banned from exporting under sanctions.
Dependent and strangled, Brazil received an offer of help. Russia’s ambassador knocked on the right doors and offered his country to remedy the crisis. The superactive Minister of Agriculture, Teresa Cristina, went to Moscow to seek answers to the crisis of inputs for the sector. She returned from there enchanted and with the promise of saving the farm. In addition to committing to fertilizer shipments to Brazil, the Russians promised to increase. In addition, they vowed to resume negotiations to buy a fertilizer production unit in Mato Grosso do Sul.
Russia does not do what it does for love. Jair Bolsonaro’s recently announced visit to Vladimir Putin will not be just a courtesy. The agreements that will be announced or signed there will give the dimension of the invoice size.
#Russia #love #Column #Leonardo #Coutinho
source https://pledgetimes.com/from-russia-with-love-column-leonardo-coutinho/
Disqus comments