BORDERS: Jungles and mountains largely insulate Brazil from its neighbors, few of which pose any significant military threat. Brazil’s real barrier is a break in elevation between its interior and its own coast, which separates Brazil’s production zones from its primary population centers and ports.
RESOURCES: Minerals, coal, offshore oil and natural gas, and, with enough investment, huge agricultural lands.
DEMOGRAPHY: Brazil’s is the second-largest population in the Western Hemisphere, but it’s aging several times faster than that of the United States, Europe, or even East Asia.
MILITARY MIGHT: Brazil makes its own mid-grade fighter jets, but the Brazilian army has had more experience storming drug dens and running local police forces than waging wars.
ECONOMY: With the second-largest economy in the Western Hemisphere, Brazil is a major agricultural exporter that also produces aircraft, automobiles, textiles, steel, and a swathe of low- to medium-value value-added goods.
OUTLOOK: Brazil owes its modern existence to globalization and the Order. Without the foreign capital to fuel its infrastructure and agricultural sector, without safe transport to send its beef and soy to customers around the world, Brazil will struggle to maintain its economy on its own.
IN A WORD: Nuts.