Why do you think it's "years ago"? It's scarcely a year since USA left Afghanistan ending a 20-year occupation. Trump refused to leave Iraq despite its government unaniously voting for USA to leave: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/iraq-asks-u...
Yes, it's true that USA seems to have stopped overthrowing governments in South America (if you don't count the coup in Honduras, or our upcoming invasion of Haiti). But countries across south America remember the decades of overthrowing governments and installing our puppets there. And countries across Africa are seeing it today.
Collectively, the "global south" and the "middle east" doesn't have a great view of the USA. So it's not surprising that many of them are joining BRICS as a way to have some allies against US aggression and hegemony, or at least counter its financial dominance with the dollar, world bank and IMF. It's not unlike the governments of countries that experienced USSR's aggression and hegemony seeking to join NATO, in order to have some allies against USSR, and now against Russia. It's not necessary for all their interests to align, in order for some of them to align. "The enemy of their enemy is their friend", is very much in play here.
But you can go further, beyond governments and politicians (as I like to do) and look at polls of regular people around the world. It's not very favorable to USA. Not just "years ago", but let's just look at the last 20 years. The public in our allied countries in Europe named USA as the greatest threat to world peace:
So what? India and China aren't going to work together to counter the financial dominance of the US dollar, World Bank, and IMF. They can't agree on anything. The rest of the BRICS are too poor and weak to matter.
There are plenty of legitimate criticisms of US interventionist foreign policy, but that is largely irrelevant to the global trading system. Money talks, and most of the countries with money (or goods worth trading) are at zero risk of a US invasion.
They already are. And calling the rest of BRICS poor and weak is just overt trolling, but also a probably an indicator of a more genuine misunderstanding of how trade and 'globalism' more generally actually works. For instance Niger most certainly is not a wealthy country, but the 'West' in general is having a fit about the coup there (and getting ready to start yet another war over it) is because in spite of being a small, deeply impoverished nation - they supply something like 25% of all of the EU's uranium needs, at rock bottom costs - in an echo of colonial times.
The only BRICS members with both large and growing economies and militaries are India and China. Calling the others poor and weak isn't trolling, it's just an objective statement of reality.
As for Niger, it's not a member of that bloc nor has it even been invited to join. Regardless of how much uranium they export, they will never have any influence over the international financial and trade settlement system. So, I don't know why you would even bring that up.
I mention Niger both because of your apparent belief that the things we're talking about only happened in the past, and because they're a perfect example of the goal of BRICS. Right now most countries in the world have limited sovereignty. They can do whatever they feel like, right up to the point that it runs contrary to Western interests. But as soon as they cross that line it's time for the old tired playbook of death and destruction: coups, color revolutions, weaponizing "international" organizations, sanctions, outright invasion, funding/training 'moderate radicals', and so on.
BRICS is not about cooperation, but rather about allowing each independent country to fully pursue their own self interest. Right now that's not really possible when relying on economic systems controlled by the US. So we're seeing a gradual shift on the currencies countries hold, US debt holdings, the development of e.g. SWIFT alternatives like SPFS, and so on. The development of a common currency will be the next logical step.
In Yemen, the US-led airstrikes have bombed hospitals, markets, etc. as recently as a couple years ago, leading to the largest humanitarian disaster in the world: https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/interactive/20...
In multiple countries across Africa, US-trained officers have led numerous coups: https://theintercept.com/2022/03/09/intercepted-podcast-afri...
Yes, it's true that USA seems to have stopped overthrowing governments in South America (if you don't count the coup in Honduras, or our upcoming invasion of Haiti). But countries across south America remember the decades of overthrowing governments and installing our puppets there. And countries across Africa are seeing it today.
Collectively, the "global south" and the "middle east" doesn't have a great view of the USA. So it's not surprising that many of them are joining BRICS as a way to have some allies against US aggression and hegemony, or at least counter its financial dominance with the dollar, world bank and IMF. It's not unlike the governments of countries that experienced USSR's aggression and hegemony seeking to join NATO, in order to have some allies against USSR, and now against Russia. It's not necessary for all their interests to align, in order for some of them to align. "The enemy of their enemy is their friend", is very much in play here.
But you can go further, beyond governments and politicians (as I like to do) and look at polls of regular people around the world. It's not very favorable to USA. Not just "years ago", but let's just look at the last 20 years. The public in our allied countries in Europe named USA as the greatest threat to world peace:
2002: https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2003/12/10/anti-america...
2007: https://www.ft.com/content/70046760-27f0-11dc-80da-000b5df10...
Across the rest of the world:
2014: https://nypost.com/2014/01/05/us-is-the-greatest-threat-to-w...
2021: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/may/05/us-threat-demo...
2022: https://thewire.in/world/more-indians-hold-us-nato-responsib...
2007: https://www.ft.com/content/70046760-27f0-11dc-80da-000b5df10...