Few people realize that beneath many of the major geopolitical events of the past half-century lies a single, unspoken priority: preserving the U.S. dollar’s dominance in global energy trade.
In late 2000, Saddam Hussein declared that Iraq would begin pricing its oil exports in euros instead of dollars. It was a direct challenge to the post-1970s arrangement that made the dollar the exclusive currency for oil transactions.
Three years later, in 2003, the U.S.-led coalition invaded Iraq. No stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction were discovered—the official justification at the time. Yet almost immediately after the regime fell, Iraq’s oil sales quietly reverted to being denominated in U.S. dollars.
Many dismiss this sequence as unrelated. History suggests otherwise. Fast-forward to 2009. Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi began advocating for a pan-African gold-backed currency called the gold dinar. The vision was ambitious: African nations could trade oil and commodities among themselves and with others without relying on the dollar.
In 2011, NATO launched a military intervention in Libya, citing humanitarian concerns. Gaddafi was overthrown and killed. The gold dinar project vanished. Libya’s vast oil reserves returned to dollar pricing.
Two leaders. Two attempts to bypass the dollar for energy trade. Two violent ends.
In 1971, Richard Nixon severed the last link between the dollar and gold, ending the Bretton Woods framework. By traditional economic logic, a fiat currency no longer backed by anything tangible should have rapidly lost value. It didn’t.
Why? Because in 1974, Secretary of State Henry Kissinger negotiated a pivotal agreement with Saudi Arabia: the kingdom would price all its oil in dollars and recycle petrodollars into U.S. assets, and in exchange, America would provide military security for the House of Saud.
This “petrodollar” pact spread across OPEC. Suddenly, every nation needing energy had to accumulate dollars, creating perpetual demand for U.S. currency regardless of domestic economic performance.
It wasn’t pure market forces. It was monetary dominance enforced by military power. When countries step outside that arrangement, consequences tend to follow.
- Russia, after 2022, began requiring payment in rubles for its natural gas exports to certain buyers → unprecedented sanctions and asset freezes.
- Iran has spent years developing non-dollar oil trade mechanisms → relentless economic isolation.
- Syria explored pipeline routes that could have bypassed dollar-based energy flows → prolonged conflict and regime change efforts.
The politics of these nations vary widely. The response to their energy-currency moves does not.
Even the global financial plumbing serves the same goal. The SWIFT network, often described as a neutral messaging system for international payments, functions as a powerful lever. Exclusion from SWIFT effectively cuts a country off from modern trade. Russia, Iran, Venezuela, and others have felt this weapon firsthand.
This dynamic isn’t new in imperial history.
The British pound sterling held reserve currency status for nearly two centuries. After World War II, as Britain’s military reach contracted and debts mounted, the pound lost its privileged position. The empire unraveled soon after.
The Dutch guilder followed a similar arc centuries earlier.
Today, observers like Ray Dalio point to familiar late-stage symptoms in the American cycle: massive debt burdens, persistent military commitments abroad, gradual currency erosion, and the emergence of alternatives.
China’s Belt and Road Initiative isn’t altruism—it’s strategic lending, often in yuan, designed to foster long-term financial dependence on Beijing.
The expanding BRICS coalition isn’t just about friendship. It’s about constructing parallel systems—trade settlements, payment networks, and commodity pricing—that reduce exposure to dollar volatility.
When—not if—the dollar eventually cedes its reserve throne, the United States will lose the ability to finance deficits painlessly. Military spending will face real constraints. Living standards will adjust downward. The era of unquestioned primacy will close.
This isn’t cynicism. It’s the recurring pattern of financial history. Every major conflict in recent decades carries a currency subtext, even if the public rationale emphasizes democracy or human rights. Declassified policy papers often speak more plainly about “preserving dollar hegemony in energy markets” than evening news broadcasts ever do.
BRICS as Africa’s Shield Against Dollar Hegemony
Zoom in on South Africa—the gateway to the continent in the BRICS alliance. As the only African founding member since 2010, Pretoria isn’t just along for the ride; it’s steering Africa’s push toward financial independence, echoing the very challenges to petrodollar dominance that have toppled regimes elsewhere.
Remember Gaddafi’s gold dinar dream?
South Africa hosted the 2023 BRICS summit in Johannesburg, where the bloc expanded to include Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE—bringing in key energy players and African voices. This positioned Africa, rich in minerals like gold, platinum, and rare earths, as a counterweight to dollar-dependent resource extraction.
South Africa’s role as the advocate for de-dollarization without the fireworks has not gone unnoticed in the US. Officials however have publicly downplayed a full-blown BRICS currency, calling hype around it “false” and focusing instead on practical alternatives: settling trades in local currencies like the rand, yuan, or ruble. By 2024, BRICS had shifted 65% of intra-bloc trade away from the dollar and euro, proving the model works without a dramatic overthrow. The US response was a laughable mudslinging that centered on white farmers bing persecuted and asylum being granted in the US, the intent here being to undermine the breadbsket that feeds South Africa. The thinly veiled headline grabbing attention was met with a diplomatic visit to the US to address the longstanding trade issues that had placed South Africa on the back foot during apartheid but that continue to strangle the economy to this day. The visit was a diplomatic disaster as the US president Donald Trump took it upon himsef to publically insult the South African president Cyril Ramaphosa on a number of issues, completely missing the opportunity to restore common ground with South Africa.
Africa’s economies have long suffered under dollar hegemony, forcing SA into volatile exchange rates, debt traps from IMF loans, and sanctions that hit hard when challenging the system. South Africa, with its New Development Bank stake, is building parallels: blockchain-based payment systems and commodity-backed trades that sidestep SWIFT. Imagine African oil, gas, and minerals priced in a petroyuan or gold-linked mechanism—echoing Gaddafi, but with collective BRICS muscle.
Tied to Western markets, it avoids outright confrontation, emphasizing “diversification” over dethroning the dollar. Yet the pattern emerges: BRICS expansion under South African leadership isn’t charity; it’s an exit strategy for the Global South.37ddef As debt rises and rivals like China offer yuan-denominated loans, the bloc chips away at the protection racket.
If South Africa succeeds in mainstreaming non-dollar trades continent-wide, it could accelerate the empire’s late-stage slide—military overreach meets currency rivals, just as Dalio predicts. That is not a small thing. That is an empire collapse thing.
Once you notice the pattern, it becomes impossible to unsee. The dollar’s throne rests not just on trust, but on power. And power, as history repeatedly shows, is never permanent.
