A Preventable Strategic Error:

 

A Preventable Strategic Error:

By Germanico Vaca

How Current U.S. Policy Toward Venezuela Risks Ecuador, Accelerates BRICS, and Weakens the United States**

Introduction

The United States and Ecuador stand at a dangerous crossroads. What is being presented as a pragmatic trade and security alignment risks becoming a strategic blunder with long-term consequences for Ecuadorian sovereignty, regional stability, and U.S. global influence.

This is not an ideological critique, nor an anti-American argument. On the contrary, it is written from the conviction that both the United States and Ecuador lose if current policies continue unchecked—while alternative paths exist that would strengthen hemispheric stability, preserve peace, and sustain U.S. leadership.

The core danger is simple:
coercive economic pressure and militarized alignment toward Venezuela are accelerating the consolidation of BRICS as the preferred alternative for South America, while exposing Ecuador to disproportionate retaliation and long-term dependency.

This outcome is neither inevitable nor desirable. But it is rapidly becoming likely.

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1. Venezuela Is No Longer a Regional Issue

For decades, U.S. policy toward Venezuela operated under the assumption that pressure could be applied in isolation. That assumption is now obsolete.

Venezuela today is:

• Deeply integrated into Chinese energy, infrastructure, and financing networks
• Strategically aligned with Russia in security and energy coordination
• A candidate—formal or informal—for BRICS integration
• A critical supplier of energy and mineral resources relevant to advanced industrial supply chains

Any attempt to further destabilize or forcibly restructure Venezuela cannot remain regional. It automatically implicates China, Russia, and increasingly the broader Global South.

This is not ideology; it is multipolar reality.

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2. Ecuador’s Disproportionate Risk Exposure

Ecuador is being positioned—intentionally or not—as a frontline alignment state without receiving commensurate benefits or protections.

The proposed trade and security framework:

• Opens Ecuador’s market broadly to U.S. industrial, agricultural, digital, and service exports
• Requires Ecuador to dismantle tariffs, regulatory barriers, and policy tools
• Offers Ecuador only conditional, limited tariff relief for exports the U.S. does not produce or does not need in volume
• Contains no binding commitments for U.S. market access, industrial development, or technology transfer

In practical terms, Ecuador absorbs:

• Market exposure
• Regulatory surrender
• Geopolitical alignment risk

While receiving:

• Aspirational language
• Non-binding cooperation promises
• No guaranteed investment or protection

This is not reciprocal trade. It is asymmetric alignment.

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3. The Manta Base Question: A Strategic Red Flag

One question must be asked plainly:

Why is Ecuador being drawn into expanded military cooperation now—specifically through Manta—when the United States already maintains nine military facilities in Colombia?

Equally important:

• Why were those facilities not effectively used to assist Ecuador during years of escalating narcotrafficking violence?
• Why does military urgency suddenly appear now, coinciding with heightened pressure on Venezuela?

From a strategic perspective, the use of Ecuadorian territory introduces plausible deniability and proxy exposure—not security.

If conflict escalates, Ecuador bears consequences the United States does not:

• Economic retaliation
• Trade exclusion
• Diplomatic isolation
• Investment withdrawal
• Potential sanctions from BRICS-aligned economies

This is a classic asymmetry in great-power competition.

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4. BRICS Is Not a Threat—But It Is Becoming an Alternative

U.S. policy appears to assume that pressure deters alignment with BRICS. The opposite is happening.

Each coercive action:

• Pushes South American states to seek currency diversification
• Encourages non-dollar trade settlement
• Accelerates parallel financial infrastructure
• Normalizes BRICS as a defensive option, not an ideological choice

Countries are not joining BRICS out of hostility toward the United States.
They are doing so to reduce vulnerability.

Venezuela, Brazil, potentially Argentina, and possibly Colombia under sufficient pressure are all responding rationally to perceived risk.

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5. Colombia and the Petro Factor

President Gustavo Petro’s position is especially revealing.

Despite Colombia hosting extensive U.S. military infrastructure, Petro has shown reluctance to allow Colombian territory to be used for escalation against Venezuela.

This is not ideological sympathy—it is risk management.

Petro understands that:

• Colombia would bear retaliation
• Internal stability would suffer
• Long-term sovereignty would erode

If pressure intensifies, Colombia itself may seek strategic hedging, including deeper engagement with BRICS-aligned frameworks—not as alignment against the U.S., but as insurance.

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6. A Missed Opportunity: Development Over Coercion

The tragedy of this moment is not that the United States lacks better options—but that it is ignoring them.

A genuine Inter-American Development Strategy—focused on:

• Continental infrastructure (e.g., a North–South rail and logistics corridor)
• Industrial integration
• Energy interconnection
• Long-term bond-financed development
• Shared prosperity rather than extraction

would create:

• Mutual dependency
• Dollar demand through real economic growth
• Stable political alignment
• Reduced incentive for BRICS alternatives

War, pressure, and asymmetry do the opposite.

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7. Ecuador at the Crossroads

Ecuador’s leadership must understand this plainly:

• Alignment without leverage is not partnership
• Exposure without protection is not security
• Market opening without industrial policy is not development

Ecuador risks becoming:

• A staging ground
• A buffer
• A scapegoat
• An economic casualty

None of which serves Ecuador—or the United States.

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Conclusion: This Can Still Be Prevented

This essay is not a condemnation. It is a warning.

The United States is not losing influence because it is weak—but because it is choosing coercion where cooperation would win.

Ecuador is not gaining opportunity—but risking sovereignty by mistaking alignment for security.

A war over Venezuela would not contain BRICS.
It would complete its consolidation.

A wiser path remains open—but only if leaders recognize that multipolar reality cannot be bullied away.

History will not judge intentions.
It will judge outcomes.