From the first decades of their existence as an independent state, they were constantly expanding westward and southward. In 1823, President Monroe with the doctrine of the same name laid the foundations for the opposition to European colonialism, and while the victorious war with Mexico in 1848 was a milestone in American territorial expansion. Half a century later, Venezuela would become a field of projection for the emerging American superpower, with the aim of economic and political control of its neighborhood. while today the Trump administration’s intervention in the same country sends the message that the US will not tolerate competitors on the American continent.
The first operations in Venezuela
American interventions in it date back to the early 20th century, when President Theodore Roosevelt (who had fought against the Spanish in Cuba in 1898) “expanded” the Monroe Doctrine by claiming for the US a role as a regional sentinel against the appetites of European colonialism. The expanded doctrine in the era of gunboat diplomacy involved “stabilizing” countries to prevent further interventions by European powers in Latin America while opening up the “game” for Americans to the rest of the world.
The reason for the first American intervention in Venezuela was the naval blockade imposed on it in 1903 by European powers (Britain, Germany, Holland) claiming the repayment of loans and the compensation of their nationals, who were involved in the rebellion against the then dictator Cipriano Castro. By mobilizing their fleet, the Americans claimed and achieved the lifting of the naval blockade while at some stage they represented Venezuela. Castro was finally overthrown in 1908 by a US-backed coup by his vice president Juan Gomez. During the Gómez regime, until his death in 1935, the oil sector developed and the lion’s share of exploitation agreements were made by the Americans.
The “communist threat”
After World War II, Central and South America became battlegrounds for the US against the “communist threat” and the Soviet Union, particularly after Fidel Castro’s rise to power in Cuba. The CIA’s operation to overthrow Castro resulted in the Bay of Pigs fiasco in 1961, while the following year the Soviets’ attempt to install nuclear-tipped missiles on the island nearly led to world war.
In Guatemala, elected President Guzmán was overthrown in 1954 by mercenaries trained and funded by Washington. To reduce social inequalities Guzmán had attempted agrarian reform that threatened the banana plantations of the American United Fruit Company as well as other companies. The dominance of corporations, the corruption of local elites and poverty combined with Washington’s interventions have given countries such as Guatemala, Honduras and Ecuador the designation “banana republic”. US Marines landed in the Dominican Republic in 1963 to quell a rebellion against the junta that had overthrown the elected, left-wing president Juan Bosch two years earlier.
In Nicaragua, after the leftist Sandinistas came to power in 1979 and the dictator Somoza was overthrown, Washington supported the Contras but suffered a serious blow after it was revealed that the CIA was financing the operation through illegal arms sales to Iran. The involvement of the USA in the twelve-year civil war of El Salvador was also immediate by sending military advisers to fight the leftist rebels of the Farabuto Marti Front. The action of the “death squads” caused an international outcry.
Support for six dictatorships
In South America the US supported dictatorships in six countries (Argentina, Chile, Bolivia, Brazil, Uruguay and Paraguay) during the 1970s and 1980s as part of Operation Condor. In Chile the CIA played a key role in the overthrow of the elected leftist president Allende, who was shot dead by General Pinochet’s coup plotters. With Washington’s blessings, the Argentine junta “disappeared” thousands of political prisoners.
In one of the last acts of the Cold War, US Marines landed on the small Caribbean island nation of Grenada (population 110,000) in 1983 to overthrow leftist coup d’états collaborating with Cuba, protect US citizens and restore democracy.
In 1989, the US invaded Panama with 25,000 troops to arrest the country’s strongman and former CIA operative, Manuel Noriega, for drug trafficking. Noriega fled to the Vatican embassy but eventually surrendered to the Americans, spent two decades in an American prison, was extradited to France, and from there returned to Panama where he died of cancer in 2017.
The Noriega case has some similarities but also major differences with that of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, who was brought before a New York court yesterday accused of narco-terrorism. Meanwhile, leftist and center-left governments in Latin America, in Cuba, Colombia, Nicaragua and Mexico, feel Trump’s breath on their necks.
