As any high school kid can tell you, for 180 years the Monroe Doctrine has played a large part in making the United States the economic and political powerhouse we all enjoy. Then the Roosevelt Corollary (added by Teddy Roosevelt) gave the United States the right to intervene militarily in the Americas to stop any foreign power from gaining influence we didn’t like.
Fifty years ago all this led to the Organization of American States (OAS) with the United States as the chief protector of all the Central, South and North American states.
There are three ways to get rid of the Monroe Doctrine and the OAS:
• Allow someone to bully us out of it, like Khrushchev tried in the Cuban Missile Crisis.
• Change our mind and decide we no longer want to be a superpower and get Congress to repeal the act.
• Or so alienate those countries the Monroe Doctrine covers that they decide they no longer want anything to do with us as a protecting power.
Looks like Washington has chosen option three.
The new buzzword in Washington, since Bush came into office and carried forward into this presidency, is that the United States is and should remain the “economic superpower of the 21st century.� That’s a subtle change from plain old superpower. Why the switch? Because India and China are not playing the old arms game, they are playing a financial game and, shortly, they may take all the marbles, leaving us on the outside of the inner circle if we’re not careful.
So, money becomes more important than might.
Over the past eight years we have so ignored and alienated our South and Central American neighbors that they have thought of a way to sideline our economic power.
This last week, at a meeting in Cancun, Mexico, the OAS thought up a way to leave the United States holding the expensive military option of protection while they break away economically. What they proposed was setting up an economic bloc of countries, excluding the United States and Canada but made up of everyone else. Why? Because they claim we have used them, abused their cheap labor, consume tons of drugs which destabilize their impoverished countries and always we have chosen our economic interests over theirs.
Who are they? They are thirty-two countries, unanimous countries, angry at the good ’ol United States of America. There was not one dissenting vote from countries we have historically supported like Mexico, Chile, Ecuador, Panama and Haiti.
Mexican President Calderon, citing the United State’s false promises in 2001 and total failure since then to implement the much-ballyhooed NAFTA for their benefit, said, they “must as a priority push for regional integration... and promote the regional agenda....�
For regional read anything south of the border. Of course, Cuban President Raul Castro and Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez expressed their support for the proposal, Chavez citing it as a move away from the United States “colonizing� of the region.
Putting the political implications aside, the impact of a sub-set of the OAS, one that would act economically autonomously, one in which the United States would have no say, is troubling. Thirty-five percent of our mineral and other natural products for American industry comes from those countries; materials China would love to get their hands on.
The OAS are, in turn, serious trading partners for American goods. And yet, some dolt at the State Department claimed this week that the new body would not negatively impact on the OAS or American interests. Yeah, sure. So, soon they’ll be playing a different game, with different players, different marbles, and we still think we have a hand in the game?
To make all this worse is a serious problem. The Falklands War in 1982 was Britain versus Argentina, right? Well, yes and no.
The Argentineans asked that the Monroe Doctrine be invoked and for the United States to help repel the British invaders. We declined, citing neutrality. And after the British won, we leaked that we had not stood idly by, but had provided all the satellite and secret intel to help them win (and kill Argentineans) – win against a member of the OAS we had a treaty to assist.
Why is this coming up again? Because some bright spark company greased the wheels in London and got a permit to start drilling for oil off the Falklands, claiming to be in British Territorial Waters, waters the Argentineans still have a claim against in the UN and the World Trade Organization (that is our WTO, we run that organization).
It is quite possible there will be a war in the Falklands again, shortly, and the Argentineans know, this time, where we stand, making us the treaty-breakers and potential foe. Oh, good, another conflict for our over-stretched military to handle. But I guess we can rest easy, pretending we believe in a strong Monroe Doctrine, right? Perhaps, but would somebody please wake up the State Department before we’re caught in another mess?
The writer once lived in Amenia Union but now calls Gila, N.M., home.
Cella’s paintings are tucked in almost every available space thoughout Little Store Antiques. L. Tomaino
