Honestly, I’m turning this into an informative post because I am tired of people writing off Latin America’s history as if their struggles were cultivated by themselves and as if they can’t recover because they’re not advanced enough.
United States Interventions in Latin America, World War II-Present:
1. 1947 - Truman Doctrine: During the presidency of Truman in the U.S., the Truman doctrine was officially implemented as a policy to counter communism during the Cold War. This policy allowed the U.S. to help aid any regimes, regardless of how corrupt and repressive, to overthrow communism. Many Latin American countries had elected Communist officials, and the United States overthrew those governments, typically by arming and aiding corrupt military coupes.
2. 1954 - United Fruit Company: Amidst the Guatemalan revolution for democracy, U.S. President Eisenhower created a Right-wing military coup to fight the democratically-elected government of Jacobo Árbenz in Guatemala.
Árbenz implemented popular land reforms that gave property to landless peasants with unused U.S. United Fruit Company lands. The United States government did not like the Guatemalan revolution because it portrayed communism. The U.S. military opposition was armed, trained, and organized by the U.S. The United Fruit Company persuaded the U.S. government to overthrow the Guatemalan government.
Árbenz was overthrown and replaced by the military dictatorship under Carlos Castillo Armas, a U.S.-supported authoritarian ruler.
3. 1960 - Anti-Communism in Ecuador: The U.S. wanted Ecuadorian President José Maria Velasco Ibarra to break relations with Cuba and promote anti-communism. President Velasco didn’t want to, so the U.S. infiltrated political groups. Eventually, president Velasco was overthrown, and replaced by Carlos Julio Arosemana, who was a paid employee of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. Then, Arosemana was replaced with a military junta that outlawed communism, suspended civil liberties, and cancelled the 1964 elections.
4. 1960 - The Cuban Revolution and the Missile Crisis: The Cuban Revolution lead by Fidel Castro was a huge defeat of U.S. Foreign policy in Latam. Cuba became part of the Non-Aligned Movement (neutral during the Cold War), and as a result, the U.S. increased trade restrictions on Cuba, primarily importation of Cuban sugar, Cuba’s largest economic dependency. The U.S. also stopped exporting oil to Cuba which devastated Cuba’s economy.
Under the U.S. presidency of Dwight D. Eisenhower, the CIA trained and armed Cuban refugees to create a guerrilla force with the intention of overthrowing Castro (which ultimately failed). This later resulted in the U.S. prohibiting all exports to Cuba, damaging their economy; and when Cuba began trade relations with Russia, the U.S. ended all official relations with Cuba. Ultimately, the U.S. began formulating “The Cuban Project” which was an operation meant to destabilize the Cuban government by burning crops and blowing up ships. Relationships between the Soviet Union and Cuba strengthened, the U.S. got paranoid and threatened Nuclear War because they thought that Russia was going to equip Cuba with nuclear missiles to fight the U.S.
5. 1962 - Government Overthrow in Brazil: The United States CIA started an operation to prevent João Goulart from taking control of Congress. They gave millions of dollars to opposing candidates of Goulart, simply because the U.S. feared a drift to the Left under Goulart’s leadership. Then, the military coup created by the CIA overthrew Goulart’s elected government and replaced him with General Castelo Branco who, along with the CIA, created Latin America’s first death squads (Esquadrão da Morte).
6. 1965 - Anti-Communism in the Dominican Republic: The fourth intervention by the U.S. in the Dominican Republic in 60 years: to “prevent another Cuba”. On April 28, approx. 20,000 troops invaded to overthrow revolutionary forces that were “seemingly” under communist control. Most of the white people in the country were evacuated, and the popular revolt of poor people was overthrown.
7. 1966 - Communist Victims in Guatemala: A few years after U.S. President Kennedy replaced an elected politician with Enrique Peralta Azurdia, the U.S. intervenes again with a new replacement, Julio Cesar Méndez Montenegro, who granted the U.S. free reign of Guatemala. There was an increase of American military equipment/weaponry being shipped to Guatemala, with intentions to end communism there. United States military organizations began a major operation to expand and militarize the Guatemalan police force, and by 1970, more than 30,000 Guatemalan police received training in torture techniques and disappearances. A State Department official said, “murder, torture, and mutilation are alright if our side is doing it and the victims are communists.”
8. 1966 - Capture & Death of Che Guevara: After the Cuban Revolution, Che Guevara went on to become a guerrilla leader in South America. A military action organized by the CIA captured Che, and he was then executed by the Bolivian Army.
9. 1966 - ORDEN, El Salvador: The CIA helped fund and assist General José Alberto Medrano in the organization of the Orden paramilitary force, which ended up being the first of El Salvador’s death squads.
10. 1971 - Bolivia’s Military Coup: The CIA with support from the U.S. Air Force supported a violent military coup in Bolivia, which resulted in the death of 500. The coup overthrew leftist president Juan Torres. He was replaced with General Hugo Banzer, whose regime was known for using brutal tactics to remove leftist principles throughout the country. During his seven years as dictator, 200 of his political opponents were killed and 150,000 people were arrested.
11. 1972 - Tupamaros: A military in Uruguay that was armed and trained by the United States overthrew the Tupamaros, which was the National Liberation Movement of Uruguay. It was replaced with a military government. The U.S. was worried that a Left-wing government would be elected, since the same thing happened in Chile, and didn’t want Latin America to follow their lead. This military dictatorship lasted 11 years, accumulating more than 1,000 political prisoners.
12. 1973 - Death of Salvador Allende: On 11 September in Chile, Socialist president Salvador Allende was killed in a military coup, bringing Augusto Pinochet to power. As a result, economic sabotage and operations were carried out by the CIA, as Pinochet received support from the U.S. despite his role in the torturing, killing, and disappearing of thousands of Chileans.
This ultimately lead to the waging of the “Dirty War” of South America. It was initiated with Operation Condor, an agreement between South American countries to resist and assassinate political opponents and popular revolts, which was supported and aided by the U.S.
13. 1976 - Armed Forces Take Over Argentina: In the midst of the U.S.-supported Dirty War and Operation Condor, Argentina’s military junta overthrew President Isabel Perón. The military junta took power in the form of right-wing death squads. They hunted down and seized anyone who was believed to be associated with the revolt (socialism, Left-wing Peronism, Peronist guerrillas). This caused the disappearance (kidnapping, torturing, and murdering of victims whose bodies were disappeared by the military government) of approx. 30,000 people. Victims included students, trade unionists, journalists, artists, writers, or anyone suspected to be an activist.
Hundreds of thousands of bodies that were disappeared during the Dirty War of Argentina and South America are still not accounted for.
14. 1979 - Contras in Nicaragua: The dictator of Nicaragua who was supported by the U.S., Anastasio Somoza, fell from power and was replaced through election by the people by Marxist [Leftist] Sandinistas. This regime became popular for its support for land reform and solutions to poverty. Somoza’s secret police force (the surviving members of Nicaragua’s National Guard) became the Contra rebels that brutally fought a CIA-supported guerrilla war against the Sandinistas all throughout the 80′s.
15. 1980 - Death Squads in El Salvador: Salvadoran Archbishop Óscar Romero requested that U.S. President Carter stop financing and supporting the Right-wing government military dictator Robert D’Aubuisson. D’Aubuisson then ordered the assassination of Romero, which resulted in El Salvador’s civil war. The CIA and U.S. military gave El Salvador’s government military intelligence, which were fought by rebels mostly made up of poor peasants. Then the military government began training death squads and by 1992, some 63,000 Salvadorans were killed in the civil war.
16. 1980 - Military Aid in Honduras: The U.S. started basing those Nicaraguan Contra rebels from earlier in Honduras as well as utilizing Honduran land for the Salvadoran death squads. Honduras did all of this in exchange for U.S. military aid, and death squads were established to destroy Honduran protesters/dissenters.
17. 1981 - Iran-Contra Affair: The United States CIA began to sell weapons to Iran (via Israel) and using the profits to continue financing the Contra reblels of Nicaragua. During this time the Freedom Fighter’s manual was also issued by the CIA to the Contra rebels. It provided instructions on economic sabotage, propaganda, and insurgency.
In 1984, U.S. President Reagan created an organization to collect donations for the Contra rebels from wealthy American anti-communists. This program also participated in providing the Contras with weapons obtained by illegal arms sales to Iran.
This ultimately lead to the 1986 National Court case Nicaragua v. United States before the International Court of Justice.
18. 1982 - Failed Democracy in Guatemala: Former student of the School of the Americas General Efraín Ríos Montt gained control of Guatemala with U.S. support. U.S. weaponry and military equipment shipment to Guatemala increased. Ríos Montt suspended the rule of law in a state of emergency and within 6 months, 2,600 Indians had been massacred. During his 17 months of power, 400 Indian villages were destroyed.
19. 1985 - “Baby Doc” Duvalier: Haitian dictator “Baby Doc” Duvalier was evacuated from Haiti on a U.S Air Force jet to France after a Haitian revolt, leaving behind the poorest country in the world. The U.S. CIA worked to install another new dictator, but popular political unrest and revolts against more U.S. meddling created more instability for the next four years. As a result, the CIA created/trained/supplied the National Intelligence Service (NIS) to strengthen the military against the people. It was supposedly created to fight the cocaine trade, but it suppressed popular revolt and free expression through means of torture and assassination. Within the 21 months after Duvalier’s flee, more people were killed by the NIS-strong government than in Duvalier’s previous 15-year regime.
20. 1988 - Panama’s General Noriega: An increase of calls for the resignation of Panamanian leader General Manuel Noriega resulted in the U.S. to send 1,000 troops to Panama, supplementing the 10,000 U.S. troops already there. Noriega’s criminal acts as leader were overlooked by the U.S. in exchange for allowing the U.S. to let Contra rebels train in Panama and to aid pro-U.S. forces in El Salvador and Nicaragua. Finally the U.S. indicted Noriega on federal drug charges in his connection with the Medellín Cartel, even though his drug-smuggling was known to the U.S. from 1972. By the end, more than 2,000 people were killed.
21. 2002 - Hugo Chávez: Chávez’s leftist views on globalization, his criticism of the War on Terror and his friendship with Fidel Castro caused him to be suspicious to the U.S, and it became worse when Chávez renewed state control of Venezuela’s oil industry (the U.S.’s third-largest oil importer). The head of the Venezuelan business federation was brought to the U.S. to discuss overthrowing Chávez. He was overthrown in 2002 and the U.S. gave support to the military coup, but an uprising by the Venezuela’s poor population resulted in Chávez’s return to power. Years following, more details of the U.S.’s involvement in the coup were revealed.
23. 2004 - Removal of Aristide: Democratically-elected Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide was known in Haiti as a populist, associating with Cuba and resisting neo-liberal economics. The U.S. claimed he was corrupt, removing him from power and occupying the country with thousands of U.S. troops.
22. 2009 - José Manuel Zelaya: The United States supported a military coup that overthrew José Manuel Zelaya,
Honduras’s democratically elected president.
Please realize that this list is only of documented U.S. military interventions in Latin America. It doesn’t include interventions remaining in secrecy, and it doesn’t include U.S. interventions that aren’t military, such as economic interventions that still happen in Latin America today and are the current cause of economic displacement for many Latines. It also doesn’t include the indirect consequences of these military interventions, which include political persecution, government corruption, and gang/drug violence.
Latin America has cultivated such a negative spotlight but no one wants to understand (or admit) that the majority of the social, economic, and political downfalls that happen in Latin America are a direct result of U.S. intervention (and sometimes intervention from other countries too). If you look at most of these military interventions, they come from “the U.S. was worried about communism” or “the U.S was worried about Latin America becoming too socialist/leftist” even. though. these. leaders. were. democratically. and. fairly. elected. by. its. PEOPLE.
The United States’ reasoning was always “if we can’t benefit politically, economically, or socially from this Latin American country, then we’re going to overthrow its government and any of the people who get in our way.” EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. This is NOT what Latine people wanted for their countries. It’s what the U.S. wanted for them, based on the needs of the U.S.
Guys. These things are long-term and everlasting. One does not simply recover as a nation from these types of crises in a year. Or in 5 years. Or in 30 years. Sometimes it’s impossible to recover, like when it comes to the disappearances of hundreds of thousands of people. When you criticize a Latin American country or government for not being able to recover and move on from these types of crises, then you’re underestimating the long-term damage that these types of crises cause. And you’re definitely underestimating the United States’ ability to keep intervening even when a nation is trying to recover.
With all of that said, regardless of some of the struggles that Latin America is currently going through today, Latin America is flourishing with some of the greatest places and the greatest people in the world. Don’t doubt that.
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