Texas congressman Ron Paul and former Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum debate Latin American policy during a Republican Party presidential debate in Jacksonville, Florida, January 26 (CNN)

Rick Santorum, a Republican Party presidential contender, accused Barack Obama of pursuing “a consistent policy of siding with the leftists, siding with the Marxists” in Latin America.

The former Pennsylvania senator, who appears to have little chance of securing the Republican nomination to challenge the incumbent in November’s election, participated in a televised debate sponsored by CNN in Jacksonville, Florida on Thursday night. Conservatives in the southeastern state vote in a primary on Tuesday to elect a presidential candidate.

Santorum referenced Colombia in particular which “is out there on the frontlines working with us against the narco-terrorists, standing up to Chávez in South America and what did we do?” he asked.

For domestic political purposes, the president of the United States sided with organized labor and the environmental groups and held Colombia out to dry for three years.

Colombia successfully crushed the drug and FARC insurgency with military and financial support from the United States.

A free trade agreement between the two countries, which the government in Bogotá ratified in 2007, was held up for nearly three years by the Obama Administration over union concerns about the safety of labor leaders in Latin America—even if the murder rate among union members has steeply declined in recent years. A unionized laborer in Colombia today is one sixth as likely to be a victim of homicide as a fellow citizen who does not belong to a trade union.

Colombia accounts for just 1 percent of America’s trade volume but 40 percent of Colombian exports are to the United States. A third of the products it imports are American.

The country sells mainly coal, coffee, cut flowers and petroleum. As the security situation has stabilized, the Colombian economy is performing strongly. 4.3 percent growth is expected this year.

Despite a long standing economic and military relationship with the United States, Colombia’s second largest trading partner is neighboring Venezuela where the president, Hugo Chávez, works to build an anti-American league in the region.

Bogotá suspects Venezuela of supporting the left wing revolutionaries of the FARC but seeks to normalize relations with the Chávez regime nonetheless. Conservatives in the United States blame President Obama’s three years of inaction on the Colombian free trade agreement for this apparent alienation. “We cannot do that to our friends in South America,” was how Santorum put it Thursday night.

He also rejected calls to normalize relations with Cuba which he described as “the heart of the cancer that is in Central and South America.” He alleged that the president intended to reward a behavior of thuggery. “This is the exact wrong message at the exact wrong time.”

Texas congressman Ron Paul, who advocates a noninterventionist foreign policy, challenged Santorum’s call for a more activist American presence across the Western Hemisphere. “You’re talking about force,” he said. “The Cold War is over. They’re not going to invade us.”

I don’t think the nations in South America and Central America necessarily want us to come down there and dictate what government they should have.

Rather he championed freer trade before pointing out that economic sanctions, well intended as he said they may be, “almost inevitably backfire and help the dictators and hurt the people.”

During the Cold War, the United States regularly intervened in the political affairs of Latin American nations to prevent leftist regimes from coming to power there. Santorum said he didn’t necessarily favor military intervention but suggested that an economic union should be erected across the Americas.

Port facilities near Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, March 2, 2008 (Jim Skea)

Growing demand for oil and other natural resources in Asia is fueling an export boom in Latin America where even Venezuela, otherwise hostile to freer trade, is witnessing economic expansion thanks to globalization.

The region’s foremost oil exporter has averaged 4.6 percent economic growth since 2005 compared to 4 percent in Chile, the world’s leader in copper and economically the freest nation in South America.

Even in Argentina, where business confidence is fading and enterprise increasingly squeezed between regulations and populist spending measures, growth averaged 7 percent during the same period as record soy and other farm exports helped offset Buenos Aires’ inflationary monetary policy and persecution of international energy companies and investors.

Commodity demand will likely slacken in 2012 as a result of economic woes elsewhere, meaning countries as Chile, Colombia, Peru and Uruguay, which are generally open to foreign business and investment, will do better than Venezuela and even Brazil which is struggling to escape the legacy of decades of corruption and nepotism.

The overall pace of Brazil’s regulatory reform has slowed but President Dilma Rousseff is leading an effort to root out corruption at great political peril to her ruling Workers’ Party. In her battle for transparency, political allies have abandoned Rousseff’s administration and her aloof leadership style threatens to alienate local machines and left wing voters.

2012 may be Rousseff’s test year. If she manages to ramrod her transparency agenda through Congress and continues the free trade policies of her predecessor, Brazil could eventually outperform the region in economic growth.

In the long term, the largest and most powerful country in South America is well positioned for a future of enduring prosperity. Commodity exports, despite their expected downturn this year, are critical to Brazil’s success.

Asian demand for corn is expected to increase by roughly 25 percent this decade which will be a huge boon to exporters in the Americas, including Argentina, Brazil and the United States which between them constitute almost a third of global corn production.

International beef, pork and soybean trade will probably expand by similar factors, again benefiting Latin American producers. Brazil currently provides 40 percent of global beef and 15 percent of pork exports and it dominates the sugar market, accounting for 60 percent of the market. With the elimination of sugar tariffs in the United States earlier this year, which were designed to protect the ethanol industry there, Brazil will be able to export north as well.

The country’s ability to turn this export advantage into a broader economic success that sees industries and services flourish hinges on Rousseff’s willingness to reform.

Brazil has seen some progress but starting or closing a business remains costly and time consuming while organizing new investment is inhibited by regulations that make it especially difficult for foreign companies to compete. Tariffs and antidumping measures are barriers to trade and excessive labor laws stifle employment and expansion. There’s a risk of “Dutch disease” if growth is taken for granted and politicians refuse to challenge vested interests to improve market conditions. The president appears committed to the task but is her party?

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran arrives at Caracas airport, Venezuela, January 8

With his nation under pressure from international sanctions and facing a European oil embargo, Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad turns to a small and shrinking group of Latin American allies this week.

Ahmadinejad arrived in Caracas on Sunday to team up with Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez in denouncing America’s attempts at isolating Iran. He travels to Nicaragua on Monday to attend Daniel Ortega’s inauguration ceremony. The socialist leader won a third presidential term in November and has intensified relations with Iran and other anticapitalist regimes in recent years.

The Iranian president will also visit Cuba and Ecuador. Like Nicaragua, these nations belong to Hugo Chávez’ Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas, an organization that rejects the expansion of free trade and efforts at liberalization that have defined South America’s other economies for the last two decades.

Outside of these pariah states, the Iranian leader hasn’t a huge fan base in Latin America. Despite her nation’s previous attempts at diplomacy with Iran, Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff has shown little interest in deepening ties with the Islamic republic and isn’t scheduled to meet Ahmadinejad. The Iranian did come to Brazil in 2009 when he last visited the region but promises made then have yet to be fulfilled—among them, pledges to build an oil refinery in Ecuador and a port in Nicaragua.

After it brokered a nuclear fuel exchange agreement with Iran in conjunction with the Turks almost two years ago and failed to convince Western nations of Tehran’s sincerity, the Brazilian Government appears to have started moving away from its ideological commitment to nonalignment and conducted a pragmatic foreign policy with its own interests in mind foremost.

Brazilian trade with Iran has doubled in the last six years but the country is no ally of Iran’s. Rousseff even criticized her predecessor, the extremely popular Lula da Silva, for abstaining from voting on a United Nations resolution that condemned the Iranian regime for human rights abuses in the country.

Colombia, Chile and Mexico, economically and militarily among the strongest nations in Latin America, are allied to the United States while Argentina, in 2006, issued an arrest warrant for Iran’s former president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani in relation to the 1994 bombing of a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires which killed eighty-five people and was likely carried out by Hezbollah. There is little sympathy for Iran’s confrontational foreign policy in these quarters.

Outside of a few poor and decaying leftists regimes, Iran’s transatlantic support is limited indeed. It is doubtful moreover whether this supports extends beyond these nations’ eccentric leaders who talk a lot of challenging American “imperialism” in Latin America but amount to little more than a nuisance to the United States’ position on the continent. With Rousseff signaling a more pro-American policy and expressing no interest in expanding relations with the Islamic state, Ahmadinejad’s visit is actually a rather sad one this week.

Enrique Peña Nieto, presidential candidate for Mexico's Institutional Revolutionary Party, October 24, 2011

Polls suggest that Mexico’s once dominant Institutional Revolutionary Party will again claim the presidency in July. The party’s candidate, Enrique Peña Nieto, has a comfortable lead of roughly 20 percent over his closest competitors. Several hiccups and gaffs haven’t significantly damaged his reputation. A possible scandal involving his family could have a negative impact on his popularity yet however.

Last month, the candidate’s daughter took to Twitter to denounce her father’s critics as “a bunch of morons from the proletariat.” He had been made fun of on social media when he apparently failed to remember any books beyond the Bible that had shaped his thinking and couldn’t mention the prices of basic commodities like tortillas nor the country’s minimum wage.

If there is a drop in Peña’s approval rating, it will likely recover in the upcoming months as the incidents are forgotten and the elections move closer. Mass online criticism of the candidate has already winded down. So long as Peña and his family refrain from committing more public mistakes, the next polls, which will be conducted in February, could be encouraging for him.

The media exposure that Peña and his family enjoy, and have helped him propel to frontrunner status, could ultimately work against him if the people grow weary of what the French call the peoplisation of politics. President Nicolas Sarkozy and his celebrity wife Carla Bruni have avoided the spotlights in more recent years after French voters came to perceive their leader’s presence in the headlines and tabloids as unpresidential.

Peña could suffer the same fate before there are even elections, especially if Mexico’s other political parties exploit this vulnerability and manage to portray him as an unserious candidate who may seem glamorous but lacks the intellectual depth to lead.

For the conservative National Action Party to mount an effective campaign against Peña, it will soon have to nominate a candidate to succeed incumbent president Felipe Calderón. Former businesswoman Josefina Vázquez Mota is the party’s best option according the polls but it is losing precious time to challenge Peña as long as it fails to nominate her.

Another potential obstacle to PAN winning the presidency again is the socialist Party of the Democratic Revolution which may be tempted to focus its attacks on the incumbent party, thus splitting the non-PRI vote. If rather they prioritize undermining Peña’s popularity, they may regain competitiveness in the polls ahead of the vote this summer but given PDR’s history of battling the right, a coordinated anti-Peña campaign seems unlikely.

HMS Vanguard arrives back at Naval Base Clyde, Faslane, Scotland following a patrol, November 29, 2010

The British Government on Wednesday warned that there should be no doubt about its commitment to supporting the Falklands Islands after Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay banned ships that fly the islands’ “illegal” flag from their ports.

Admiral Alan William John West, a former Royal Navy chief and security minister in the last cabinet, suggested that Britain dispatch a nuclear submarine to the South Atlantic and stage military exercises there to express its displeasure at the “outrageous behavior” of Argentina and its neighbors.

“Far from trying to settle in a grownup way and having better and better relationships with the Falkland islanders, they are upping the ante and becoming very confrontational,” he told the London Evening Standard.

Britain has claimed sovereignty over the Falklands since the eighteenth century and asserted its control over the archipelago in 1833 and 1982. On both occasions, it was challenged by the Argentinians. Admiral West commanded a frigate that was sunk by Argentine forces during the latter conflict. Twenty-two of his crew died in the attack.

The island dispute has escalated in recent years after British companies began exploring for oil in waters surrounding the Falklands which lie four hundred nautical miles off the Argentine coast. President Cristina Kirchner accused Britain of plundering her country’s resources this week.

“Malvinas is not an Argentine cause, it is a global cause, because in the Malvinas they are taking our oil and fishing resources,” she told a summit of Latin American leaders in Montevideo, the Uruguayan capital. She’s previously labeled Britain a “crude colonial power in decline” and vowed to “reclaim” the Falklands.

There appears to be little chance of Argentina staging another invasion attempt however. Its naval capacity, for one thing, has barely improved since the 1980s when the South American country most recently tried to conquer the islands. Fearful of a military coup, Argentina’s civilian government has consistently underfunded the armed forces.

The country is gathering international support to open the issue up to negotiation, not just from its neighbors but from the Americans as well.

This summer, the United States voted in favor of a “draft declaration on the question of the Malvinas Islands” that was subsequently adopted by the Organization of American States by unanimous consent. Rather than siding with its Atlantic ally, the Obama Administration implicitly legitimized efforts to Argentinize the islands, urging the United Kingdom to enter into negotiations with Buenos Aires.

Prime Minister David Cameron rejected calls to negotiate, telling parliament this summer, “as long as the Falkland Islands want to be sovereign British territory, they should remain sovereign British territory. Full stop, end of story.”

No matter Argentine pretensions, the Falklanders appear to have no desire to be part of their eastern neighbor, rather they are steadfast in their willingness to remain subjects of the British Crown. Of the three thousand islanders, some 20 percent are British.

President Dilma Rousseff participates in a high level meeting on nuclear security at the United Nations in New York, September 22

When President Dilma Rousseff addressed the United Nations General Assembly this month, she confirmed what many analysts of Brazilian foreign policy had expected since she assumed office in January of this year—that she would soldier on in the pragmatic fashion of her predecessor to see to it that Brazil is recognized as a world power.

Although recent actions on the part of her government, including UN votes regarding Iran and Libya, may suggest that Rousseff is more assertive abroad than Lula da Silva was, in fact, Brazil’s foreign policy is likely to remain the same.

Like Lula, the extremely popular Workers’ Party president who propelled Rousseff to national prominence, the incumbent Brazilian leader stresses the need for the international community to change the way in which it runs its affairs.

As the world becomes more globalized the need for international organizations will continue to grow. This is the most effective and secure way for governments to manage their relationships, express their concerns and manifest their interests. Lula recognized this and so does Rousseff. The problem is that the institutional structure does not reflect today’s reality. In the same way as governments have demonstrated to be unable to keep in pace with the developments in the free market, changes in states’ power relations have outpaced the evolution of international institutions.

Rousseff’s personal experience of fighting Brazil’s right wing dictatorship in the 1980s could impact some of her policy choices. The best example may be her harsh criticism of Brazil’s abstentions on human rights resolutions at the UN during Lula’s tenure. Rousseff could emerge as a champion of human rights, at least whenever there is an opportunity for her to assert herself on the international stage without undermining Brazil’s number one foreign policy objective which is to be recognized as a legitimate global power as soon as possible.

It is critical to understand the meaning of “legitimate” and “as soon as possible” in this context. The former implies that Brazil will have to have the support of several countries which recognize its leadership. The latter implies that, in looking for this support, the Itamaraty will not be particularly demanding regarding the quality of the governments it has relationships with.

In a world that is ruled by norms and organizations that were based on Western principles, the way to gain attractiveness vis-à-vis a great part of the international community is to be different. Brazil’s legitimacy will come from strengthening its relationships with as many nations as possible, notwithstanding what the United States think of them. This way, Brazil will be able to legitimately behave like a world power.

Problem is, the rules that were made by Western nations have become the rules of the game. Many countries may criticize them and demand a change but even China and Russia recognize the benefit of having them to structure the interactions between states. Hence Brazil demands an expansion, not the disappearance of the Security Council.

Last year’s controversial nuclear fuel exchange agreement with Iran and Turkey should be understood in this light. By providing a parallel international forum to solve the Iranian nuclear issue, Brazil sent the unmistakable message that it still aspires to be an agenda setter in the world. Rousseff’s decisions to oppose the bombing of Libya and support the creation of a Palestinian state were inspired by a similar motive.

Along with Brazil, India and South Africa, two other major emerging economies and large, multiethnic democracies, voted the same way. China and Russia, the more conservative parts of the “BRICS,” are already part of the international system. Nations like Brazil, which demand not only economic but political reform as well, could increasingly shape the world’s decision making process.

Argentina is among the least economically free nations in Latin America. Regulations for businesses are burdensome and nontransparent. Tariffs, import and export controls, licensing provisions, restrictions on ports of entry and subsidies significantly distort trade while domestic preference in government procurement predated Kirchner’s administration.

Foreign investment is prohibited in certain sectors. The judiciary is notoriously slow and inefficient, forcing investors to resort to international arbitration. Corruption is endemic.

President Kirchner has only worsened Argentina’s predicament with her autarkic economic policy. Whereas the rest of South America is embracing free trade and prospering because of it, Argentina lacks behind.

Kirchner implemented a one for one trade policy, forcing companies that bring imports to the country to match their value with exports. She enacted specific trade restrictions against Argentina’s biggest trading partner, Brazil. According to the International Monetary Fund, the country “has introduced about one hundred restrictive measures since 2009″—”more than any other individual country” in the world.

Since 2006, Buenos Aires has refused IMF economists to audit its accounts which is otherwise required of Fund members. The government claims that inflation is under 10 percent but private economists estimate it to be running at nearly 25 percent. Kirchner has filed criminal charges against anyone who reports the true inflation rate however and ordered the Argentine central bank to purchase $500 million American dollars in an attempt to stop the appreciation of the peso.

Argentinians have largely accepted the misguided economic policies because they are matched by increasingly nationalistic rhetoric and because there is still growth. Kirchner’s population started to decline in early 2008 however when she tried to impose steep export taxes on soybeans at a time of fragile economic recovery, leading to mass protests in the capital. She also nationalized nearly $30 billion in private retirement savings to help pay for expanding welfare programs.

Kirchner’s ruling party lost its absolute majority in both houses of Congress during the 2009 midterm elections. It maintains a majority with a minor Peronist faction however while the largest opposition party is composed of radicals and socialists. Recent polling has Kirchner in the lead for the 2011 election with over 30 percent of the vote.

King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia and President Barack Obama of the United States meet in Washington, June 29, 2010 (Roger L. Woll)

The advent of new governments in many countries around the world during the first decade of the twenty-first century brought with it strategic indefinition. The reason is found in small systemic revolutions that some of these newcomers represented in terms of geopolitics. In such countries as Brazil, Japan and Turkey, the newcomers had been away from power for decades. Thus the elections that swept them into office were practically regime changes.

The priority given to the worn out promise of “change” made foreign policy departments a prime target. Whereas during the Cold War ideological alternatives were available for different political factions, nowadays the primacy of the free market model and of the Washington Consensus make alternative governance difficult. As a result, the perception of policy making is largely dependent on symbolism instead of substance. Hence, social conservatism and liberalism are being used as a political platform rather than economic policy.

Foreign policy too can be a symbol, especially for the ideological margins that lost their normative platforms with the end of the Cold War. Now devoid of an overarching ideological doctrine, many of these margins are driven by ad hoc causes like altermondialisme and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Another problem is the currently constrained nature of greater power politics. Centrist politics provides ample incentive for political correctness and strategic vagueness. There are virtually no real national security strategies in Western countries because naming a rival or adversary by name would be perceived as tantamount to militarism. There is no investment in defense—quite the opposite—because the armed forces are seen as burden; a polished machine for an outdated era.

In spite of all this, history continues in the making and the advent of a geostrategically multipolar world means that only those who can afford it can actually deprive themselves of their strategic responsibilities. The greater powers seem to have chosen the easy way out of strategic friction by resting comfortably in their politically correct concepts and leaving the initiative of the multipolar realignment to others. Thus while humanitarian interventions and development schemes make the headlines, it is the intelligence and military establishments of the middle players that are forced to bear the brunt—and take the heat—of the necessary hard power decisions.

So while Western Europe was occupied with frivolous pursuits of universal jurisdiction or effective democratic development models for Africa, Eastern Europe has been engaged in a tense competition with Russia, for geopolitical safety.

While America focused on making the world safe for democracy, the Middle East was bridled with new initiatives aiming at regional supremacy.

While South America played with sterile models of regional unity, Africa was invaded by the big Asian powers.

Could it be then, that situations in which the greater powers are “dragged” into conflicts are in fact the result of a devolution of strategic responsibility on the part of their capitals?

It certainly seems to be the case in the Middle East where the Aqaba Axis (a discreet alliance of the Gulf of Aqaba states which used to include Egypt) seems to have been left alone fighting for a pro-Western order in the region.

The same can be said of Eastern Europe which has been left to the political whims of Germany and Russia, or of Africa where the Asian powers have made inroads significantly facilitated by the West’s insistence on normative conformity in its dealings with African polities.

In the Middle East, the temporary “fix” the Saudis found was to expand the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) to Morocco and Jordan and actively start lobbying in Cairo for the possible maintenance of ousted President Hosni Mubarak’s strategic paradigm. While Riyadh’s cash flow is impressive, with problems requiring their attention in Egypt, Iraq and Yemen, their efforts might stretch too thin.

The only consequence of the disaggregation of the GCC+1 (Israel) would be the domination of the region by Iran and Turkey and thus permanent instability. Hence, America’s distraction with Libya is condemnable.

In Eastern Europe, the erosion of the Soviet threat brought with it the disinterest of the Western edge of the continent. If Poland and some of the color revolutions spawned regimes tried to work on a Russophobe initiative (including the GUAM Organization for Democracy and Economic Development and the Vilnius Group), the Obama Administration’s Asian focus and determination to reset relations with Russia as well as France’s cooption by Germany and Russia, have certainly shelved those plans.

At the moment Poland and Serbia among others are attempting to juggle the growing German, Russian and Turkish influences. Serbia seems to have no alternative but to accept Turkish “constructive” mediation in the Western Balkans and Poland is being assuaged through the Kaliningrad Triangle to collaborate with the current status quo—a policy made all the more persuasive after Ukraine’s defection from GUAM and from the Polish sphere. Eastern Europe could risk being transformed into Berlin’s and Moscow’s strategic depth.

Finally an emerging power like Brazil lags far behind its Asian and European rivals in the competition for African markets. Wasn’t South American unity (UNASUR) supposed to propel Brazil into stardom rather than distract it from its interests?

In 1914, it was Russian diplomatic largess toward Serbia that allowed for the assassination of archduke Franz Ferdinand. Unlike Russia then, let’s hope today’s powers don’t wake up at the eleventh hour to reclaim control of events.

Presidents Juan Manuel Santos Calderón and Barack Obama of Colombia and the United States in the Oval Office of the White House, Washington DC, April 7 (AP/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)

Colombia is one of America’s staunchest allies in Latin America. Decades of joint counterterrorism operations in the name of the War on Drugs have forged a strong relationship that made Colombia the stable and prosperous nation it is today. Yet José R. Cárdenas, a former Bush Administration official, believes that there is reason for concern. Writing for Foreign Policy, he notes that “the US-Colombia strategic partnership is fraying under the Obama Administration.”

Colombia successfully crushed a narco-terrorist insurgency in recent years with military and financial support from the United States. The FARC still exists but its leadership and territorial control have been diminished. Colombian cities are now safe,” according to Cárdenas, “and stability has been restored in a strategically located South American country.”

The Obama Administration is damaging the relationship however by failing to move forward on a free trade agreement that was negotiated by the previous, Republican government.

Colombia ratified the treaty in 2007 to eliminate tariffs and other trade barriers. President Obama is holding up congressional approval, supposedly over concerns about the safety of labor leaders in Colombia. Yet the overall murder rate in the country has declined dramatically in the past decade while the murder rate among union members has declined even more rapidly. A union member in Colombia today is one sixth as likely to be a victim of homicide as a fellow citizen who does not belong to a union. The Colombian Government has increased convictions for homicides against union members by eight fold in the past three years.

Ratification of the agreement is certainly far more in Colombia’s interest than it is in the United States’. America is the country’s leading trading partner. Nearly 40 percent of its exports head for the United States while almost a third of its imports come from it. By contrast, Colombia accounts for just 1 percent of America’s trade volume.

Colombia’s second largest trading partner is neighboring Venezuela and its leader, Hugo Chávez, is having “a field day,” according to Cárdenas, “telling anyone who will listen that this is where you will wind up when you put your trust in the yanquis: alone at the altar.”

Since the Obama Administration won’t move on trade, Colombia is turning elsewhere. President Juan Manuel Santos Calderón seems willing to normalize relations with his eastern neighbor despite its suspected support for the FARC. “That Santos is willing to take the chance on seeking an accommodation with Chávez speaks volumes about his lack of faith in the current US administration to stand behind him.”

With all that’s been accomplished in defeating in the FARC and reining in the drug trade, “watching the current drift in bilateral relations is painful,” writes Cárdenas.

Santos’ political centrism compared to his predecessor may be less detrimental than Cárdenas fears. If the FARC is to removed as a credible actor from Colombian politics, its sympathizers on the left have to be made part of the consensus. The president’s appeals to “national unity” aren’t necessarily worrisome nor is his willingness to boost regional cooperation. There is no reason for this to coincide with a further erosion in American-Colombian relations however.

Presidents Dilma Rousseff and Barack Obama of Brazil and the United States in Brasilia, March 19

President Barack Obama visited Brazil and Chile in recent days. The two South American powers have emerged as robust democratic partners of America’s in recent decades and increasingly, they share major trade relationships with the United States as well.

“Trade between the United States and Latin America has surged,” the president said in Santiago on Monday.

We buy more of your products, more of your goods than any other country, and we invest more in this region than any other country.

A day earlier, in Rio de Janeiro, the president professed that “the United States and Brazil should expand trade, expand investment, so that we create new jobs and new opportunities in both of our nations.”

To advance that aim, Obama and newly elected Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff agreed to create a United States-Brazil Commission on Economic and Trade Relations that will meet at least once a year to “identify opportunities for expanding bilateral trade and investment flows” and “promote the removal of unnecessary bilateral trade and investment obstacles, particularly in the regulatory field.”

Significant impediments to free trade remain in the form of barriers against major Brazilian exports including ethanol, orange juice, steel and sugar. The United States Government subsidizes cotton and soybean production moreover at the disadvantage of Brazilian farmers.

In a statement, Presidents Obama and Rousseff noted that regulatory cooperation could improve competitiveness and the economic well being of both their nations. They also reaffirmed their “strong commitment” to bringing the World Trade Organization’s Doha Round to “a successful, ambitious, comprehensive and balanced conclusion.”

For years, Brazil has stalled further liberalization of global trade as long as the West insisted on protecting its agricultural market with tariffs and subsidies.

President Rousseff was particularly critical of more cloaked methods of protectionism on the part of the United States: its expansionary monetary policy that weakens the US dollar but makes American exports more competitive.

As the Brazilians see it, the many hundreds of billions of dollars the American central bank is pumping into the economy is causing “distortions in currency markets” and “pushing countries toward protectionist and defensive measures.” Brazil has now one of the most overvalued currencies in the world which hurts its manufacturers.

Chile and the United States have enjoyed strong trade relations for many years. America is Chile’s second largest goods trading partners and its largest foreign investor, account for nearly a quarter of foreign direct investment in Chile between 1974 and 2010.

Last year, Chile was the first South American nation to join the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

Bilateral trade has more than doubled since Chile and the United States entered a free trade agreement in 2004. The countries have agreed to eliminate tariffs on 134 products this year. Already, both nations’ agriculture departments reached agreement to permit the import of certain cuts of US beef into Chile.

Despite the nuclear crisis in Japan and his country’s earthquake prone geography, Chilean President Sebastián Piñera wanted to reach an agreement on deepening civilian nuclear cooperation with the United States.

The leaders reaffirmed their commitment to work together in the realm of atomic energy during the visit while the United States will supply low enriched uranium to Chile to support the continued operation of its two research reactors. “This agreement will encourage the development of nuclear expertise and professionals in Chile and advance bilateral cooperation on nuclear safety, security, and safeguards in line with the highest international standards,” according to a statement released by the two leaders.