Brazil mobilizes military might

Eduardo Simoes, Reuters
Published: Saturday, September 13, 2008
Brazil deployed warships, fighter jets and thousands of troops off its southern coast Friday, starting two weeks of military manoeuvres aimed at showing the world it can defend vast new oil reserves.

The exercise, dubbed Operation Atlantic, will simulate an attack by a fictitious enemy on oil platforms and pipelines both on and off shore along the coastline of the states of Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo and Espirito Santo.

The maneuvers are the latest in a national debate over how to manage a slew of recent deep-sea oil finds that could thrust Brazil, which still occasionally imports crude to meet domestic demand, into the top 10 of the world's oil producers.



Brazilian marines prepare for war games designed to show the world Brazil can defend its oil riches.
Sergio Moraes, Reuters

This is an exercise that is intended to dissuade, a show of force," said Admiral Edlander Santos, the commander of the operation.

Over the next two weeks, 10,000 troops, as many as 50 fighter jets, 17 ships and at least one submarine will be mobilized for the exercise, which will cost about $11.2 million to stage.

The operation is also intended to take stock of the growing list of military hardware that Brazil covets to defend its offshore resources, which are becoming one of its top defense priorities along with a porous border in the Amazon jungle.

Brazil began imagining itself as an oil superpower when state-run energy giant Petrobras announced in November it had found five to eight billion barrels of light crude deep beneath the ocean floor in the Santos basin, the world's second-biggest oil find in the last 20 years.

Just this week, Petrobras estimated that another nearby deep-sea field holds between three and four billion barrels of oil and natural gas. Together, the two finds could lift Brazil's proven reserves by 85 per cent, and that may be just the tip of the iceberg.

Some analysts estimate that 50 to 80 billion barrels of oil may lie deep below a thick layer of salt under the seabed along an 800 kilometre stretch off Brazil's southern coast.

As part of the strategic defense plan, Brazil is negotiating a military alliance with France that would include the construction of a nuclear-powered submarine. It is also seeking closer military ties with Russia.

© The Calgary Herald 2008