State Department Video on the Monroe Doctrine

A book that's been always interesting for me over many years is Samuel Flagg Bemis' The Latin American Policy of the United States: An Historical Interpretation, published in 1943. As I contemplated writing my own textbook, I found a used copy and was fascinated by its perspective.

It's a great window into an era where professors had no doubts about how U.S. policy served to civilize others and spread our aura. The U.S. wielded power when it needed to in order to guide Latin American nations toward their own destinies. Introspection or a critical approach is nowhere to be found. Indeed, Bemis uses the word "imperialism" in an entirely positive way. The administration of Theodore Roosevely, he writes, "ushered in a new era in the Latin American policy of the United States, an era of protective imperialism" (p. 140). Even if you might allow a little bit of criticism for U.S. intervention in Nicaragua in the early 20th century, "that intervention was an honest intent, at least, to stabilize and strength the international relations of Central America" (p. 165).

Bemis had no way of knowing at the time that U.S. control of Cuba and Nicaragua would end up disastrous, fostering violent civil wars that eventually led to dictatorships that still exist and bedevil the U.S. in 2026. U.S. policy toward the two countries has been a failure in virtually every respect. What the U.S. sees as protective imperialism is viewed as noxious control within the country itself.

Which brings us to the video the State Department recently posted, narrated by Kevin Marino Cabrera, U.S. Ambassador to Panama. It is a celebration of the Monroe Doctrine that could've been written by Bemis but, unlike in 1943, we know that much of the outcomes were terrible for the U.S. Somehow occupation of Cuba was great but so was getting missiles out of Cuba, not understanding that the first led to the second. Daniel Ortega is powerful now because he led a group of Nicaraguans fighting a dictatorship the U.S. had installed decades ago.

We know this, it's not obscure history, and pretending it didn't happen will inevitably lead to other foreign policy disasters.