China and Brazil deal a blow to bullying backed by the US dollar

China and Brazil have reached an agreement to trade with each other in their own currencies instead of using the US dollar as a middleman.

The agreement between the two BRICS countries, which trade $150 billion worth of goods each year, probably would have been signed in Beijing this week if Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva hadn't been sick and had to cancel his trip. Around the same time, China made its first trade in liquefied natural gas with France's TotalEnergies. This trade was paid for entirely in yuan.

Brazil's and China's decision to trade in currencies other than the dollar is a big deal in geopolitics. It shows that countries want to stop using the dollar, which is a direct response to the US's use of the global reserve currency for its own hegemonic goals. Even though the dollar will always be an important part of international trade and economics, the U.S. is becoming less able to use it to bully and control other countries.

The dollar's dominance
Since the end of World War II, the US dollar has been the world's reserve currency and a standard for international trade. This is because, in 1944, the US and its allies set up the Bretton Woods system for managing money. Prices for goods around the world are set by the US dollar, and Washington has set itself up as the centre of the world's financial system, where most capital is gathered. As a result, banks borrow and lend in dollars, making the greenback the lifeblood of the world's interconnected economy.

Since the US has so much control over the global financial system, it has been able to use the dollar as an overt geopolitical weapon to get its way with other countries, both directly and indirectly. This has been done by cutting off people, groups, or even countries at will or by threatening to do so. These steps really work because a serious business can lose everything if it is banned from the US dollar market, not just the American market. This can have such a significant influence that third-party entities, including those not even based in the US, may choose to avoid dealing with sanctioned entities due to the risks it brings.

To be fair, these kinds of actions can do good things. For example, US sanctions can stop terrorist groups from getting money and help fight organised crime, which is a real security benefit. However, US sanctions in recent years have increasingly become a means of unilaterally attempting to impose America’s will on third-party countries, with the intention to serve geopolitical ends. Washington has become obsessed with sanctions and has put out thousands of them, often with the goal of cutting off Syria, North Korea, and Iran from the rest of the world and making them poor. Even though the US says it doesn't stop food or humanitarian aid from going to these countries, the sanctions are often so wide and deep that there are no legal ways to do business with the target country.

many different currencies
Since Washington uses sanctions as a political weapon on an industrial scale, it's not surprising that other countries are pushing back more and more, seeing the dollar as arbitrary and unreliable. So, political support for alternative payment systems is growing. This is seen as a way to protect national sovereignty in an uncertain world where geopolitical competition is becoming more important. China is a huge trading nation, and the US is getting more and more hostile towards it. This is becoming a bigger priority for China as it faces the possibility of a war over the US-backed island of Taiwan.

If this kind of war broke out, the US would probably do what it did with Russia and try to ban thousands of Chinese companies from using the US dollar. This would be done to hurt China's economy. So, making money and financial systems that don't use the dollar and aren't controlled by the US is a top priority, especially with countries that share the same ideas and want multipolarity (which is pretty much anyone outside of the collective West). In this way, these are not just countries that Washington has called "enemies." President Joko Widodo of Indonesia told the press, "Be very careful. We must remember the sanctions that the US put on Russia. He called for the development of domestic payment methods, saying that "offshore settlements and reliance on foreign payment networks like US Visa or Mastercard will no longer be necessary."

In conclusion, the growing interest in alternative currencies and payment systems is a political response to the fact that the US dollar is being used more and more as a political tool and weapon to control other countries. The US Federal Reserve may also make economic decisions that help the US at the expense of the rest of the world, such as raising interest rates. Because of this, more and more countries see the US dollar as a threat to their economic independence and growth. This is why countries like those in BRICS are taking steps right now to de-dollarize their economies. The dollar will always have a lot of weight, but as multipolarity grows, it will be used less and less to hurt other people and make them poor.