Transcript Reagan Administration in Central America

U.S. Foreign Policy Towards Latin
America: Current Perspectives
Professor Jacqueline Mazza
Tuesday, March 15
Johns Hopkins University, SAIS
Washington, DC
Today’s Lecture
• Review key principles of U.S. foreign policy
towards region
▫ Historic timeline post WWII
• Focus on:
▫ Post Cold war era
▫ Relations after 9-11
• Discuss foreign policy agenda in 2012:
▫ key unresolved issues
▫ future issues
Fundamental tenets of U.S.-Latin
American Relations: 1776-1945
• Great disproportion in political, economic and
military power between U.S. and Latin
America
• Power utilized principally advance U.S. security
interests
Fundamental tenets of U.S.-Latin
American Relations: 1776-1945
• U.S. understanding of its security needs
defined as keeping out foreign powers from
Latin America
▫ To 1901 – Western Europe (Great Britain, Russia,
Spain) permitting US territorial and economic
expansion
▫ 20th century war years: Germany (WWI and
WWII)
▫ Cold war: Soviet Union – 1945+
Monroe Doctrine - 1823
• The American continents are henceforth not to
be considered subjects for future colonization by
any European power.”
• “U.S. would see “any attempt on their
(European) part to extend their system toany
portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our
peace and safety”
Disproportionate power + emphasis on
security led to…
• Long history of military intervention
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1848 – war with Mexico
W.Wilson 1912-21
Panama Canal intervention - 1903
Bay of Pigs (Cuba)
1954 – Guatemala – (CIA supported coup)
• Economic policy emphasized U.S. investment
interests
• U.S. discomfort with more radical revolutions
(U.S. “revolution” = first anti-colonial war” that wasn’t
revolutionary)
When were relations different?
• “Good Neighbor Policy” - Franklin Delano
Roosevelt 1942-1945
▫ No military intervention pledge (removed Platt
amendment – Cuba)
▫ Unified anti-Nazi coalition
▫ Free trade agreements
▫ Social and cultural exchange
Ends with early Cold war/Korean intervention
When were relations different?
• Alliance for Progress – JF Kennedy
▫ Massive economic and social aid commitment to
region
▫ Ambitious social-political goals
▫ Social and cultural exchange
Mixed results, Cold war security concerns
dominated over the alliance
-U.S. silent to series of coups:
Most conflictive modern period – 1980sReagan Administration in Central America
• U.S. military assistance to Nicaraguan “contra”
rebels fighting Sandinista government
• Massive military assistance to Salvadoran
military and government against FMLN-FDR
rebels
• Covert support to authoritarian governments in
Guatemala, Chile, Brazil, Argentina.
• External threat of Soviet Union coverted to
internal “threat” from left-progressive parties in
Latin America
Most conflictive modern period – 1980sReagan Administration in Central America
• Economic assistance principally for Cold war
purposes;
• Latin America sees US indifference to “lost
decade of the 1980s”
• Latin America embraces economic orthodoxy
(“Washington consensus”)
• Politically organizes to counter U.S. security
policy (e.g. Contadora group, Oscar Arias peace plan
for Central America)
Improvement of relations under George HW
Bush
• George HW Bush (#41) embraces “kinder,
gentler” policy
• U.S. support for
▫ Central American peace processes/Arias Plan
▫ Debt reduction (Brady Plan)
▫ Negotiates NAFTA
• 1989 Berlin Wall falls, shift in Cold War
Bush onward -- emergence of a post
Cold War U.S. Foreign Policy
• Keeping out Soviet Union no longer prevailing
“obsession”
• Early focus on free trade (NAFTA) and
potentially a WHFTA (Western Hemisphere
FTA)
• Attention to debt issues and macroeconomic
management
Post Cold War U.S. Foreign Policy: Drugs
tops security agenda
• From 1970s, anti-narcotics becomes part of USLatin American security agenda
• But post Cold War – anti-narcotics “substitutes”
for anti-communism as top US security issue
▫ Principal rationale for U.S. military forces in
region
▫ Militarization of U.S. drug policy begins in 1980s
Phases of U.S. Anti-Narcotics Foreign
Policy
#1 - Caribbean supply interdiction (Reagan)
- expensive and ineffective
- drug routes move via Central America-Mexico
Phases of U.S. Anti-Narcotics Foreign
Policy
#2 Andean Source Countries (Bush 41-Clinton-Bush
43)
▫ Andean Initiative (Bush 41) – reducing supply/crop erradication in
Colombia, EU, BO
▫ Plan Colombia – (Clinton and Bush 43)
▫ July 2000, $1.3 billion Colombia, mostly military aid
▫ By 2009 nearly $7 billion, Colombia becomes #3 aid recipient
worldwide
▫ Bush 43-Uribe
- reduction in violence, institution-building,
- supply reduction ineffective, shift to Mexican cartels
Post 9-11 – impacts?
• Greater impact of U.S. foreign policy overall
then relations with Latin America
• Initially search to infuse anti-terrorism in U.S.
policy towards region
• Redefinition of FARC-ELN as terrorist
organizations
• Reduced (temporarily) the scope of US agenda
with the region
Phases of U.S. Anti-Narcotics Foreign
Policy
#3 Mexico/Merida Initiative (Bush 43-Obama)
▫ Supply and transit interdiction
▫ DTOs – criminal enterprises
▫ Dispersion of drug trade
-Continued ineffective LA supply interruption
without U.S. demand reduction
Obama Administration
• change in “tone” of relations
• approval of Free Trade agreements – Colombia
and Panama
• expanded Merida Initiative (Merida II) in light
of increasing drug violence in Mexico
• Aid to Haitian earthquake recovery
• widened range of relations/contacts
2012: Future agenda?
Constraints-New
Dimensions
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Budget/Fiscal Constraints
Global foreign policy – Afganistan, Middle East
Wide ranging LAC agenda
Crime and violence surge
Diversified trade partners for region
2012: Future agenda?
Interamerican
Dialogue Proposal
• 3 Key unfinished issues:
▫ 1. Drugs and Crime
▫ 2. Immigration
 No progress on legal immigration reform
 Increased deportations
▫ 3. Cuba
2012: Future agenda?
Interamerican
Dialogue Proposal
• Key future issues:
▫ 1. Energy
▫ 2. Trade and investment
 Brazil – rising role
 China – leading trade partner – BR, CH, Peru
2012: Future agenda?
Dialogue Proposal
• Key future issues:
▫ (3. Development)
Interamerican