There has been a virtual blackout of news from this year’s seventh annual Brics (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) summit in Ufa, Russia. As a result, the American people remain largely in the dark about a powerful coalition of nations that are putting in place an alternate system that will greatly reduce US influence.

Let’s cut to the chase: Leaders of the Brics countries realise that global security cannot be entrusted to a country that sees war as an acceptable means of achieving its geopolitical objectives. They also realise that they won’t be able to achieve financial stability as long as Washington dictates the rules, issues the de facto ‘international’ currency and controls the main levers of global financial power.

This is why the Brics have decided to chart a different course. Logically, they have focused on the foundation blocks, which support the current US-led system ­— the dollar, the US treasury market and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

In mid-July, Asia Times, an English newspaper in Thailand, published, ‘Russia’s Putin scores points at Ufa Brics summit’, stating: “Leaders of the Brics… launched the Brics New Development Bank, which has taken three years of negotiations to bring to fruition. With about $50 billion in starting capital, the bank is expected to start issuing debt to fund infrastructure projects next year. They also launched a foreign-exchange currency fund of $100 billion.

The two new endeavours are statements that the five largest emerging markets are both looking out for each other and, simultaneously, moving away from the Western financing institutions of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin, among other presidents, is going to issue his own debt, run his own system, fund his own projects and do it all with his own currency.

So can you see why none of this is appearing on the pages of US newspapers or on US television? I believe Washington would rather you didn’t know how they’ve bungled everything by alienating the fastest growing countries in the world.

The Ufa conference was a watershed moment. The Brics have people who ‘think big’; who want to connect continents with high-speed rail, lift living standards across the board, and transform themselves into manufacturing dynamos. What do America’s leaders dream about? Drone warfare? Balancing the budget? Banning the Confederate flag? It’s a joke.

The Brics have had enough war, enough Wall Street, enough meddling and hypocrisy and austerity and lecturing. Sure, it will take time, but Ufa marks a fundamental change in strategic orientation.

Washington has simply overplayed its hand, worn out its welcome and people are sick of it.

Can you blame them?

- The reader is freelance writer based in Washington, US.