The US bombardment of Venezuela and the capture of its president, Nicolás Maduro, follow a long history of interventions in South and Central America and the Caribbean over the past two centuries. But they also mark an unprecedented moment as the first direct US military attack on a South American country.
At a press conference after Maduro’s capture, Donald Trump said that “American dominance in the western hemisphere will never be questioned again”.
But since the mid-19th century, the US has intervened in its continental neighbours not only through economic pressure but also militarily, with a long list of invasions, occupations and, in the case most closely resembling the current situation, the capture of Panama’s dictator Manuel Noriega in 1989.
Covert actions helped topple democratically elected governments and usher in military dictatorships in countries such as Brazil, Chile and Argentina, but overt US military operations have historically been confined to closer neighbours in Central America and the Caribbean.
The first direct US military attack on a South American country “signals a major shift in foreign and defence policy – one that is made explicit in the new national security strategy published by the Trump administration a few weeks ago”, said Maurício Santoro, a professor of international relations at the State University of Rio de Janeiro.
That strategy called for an “expansion” of the US military presence in the region in what it describes as a “Trump corollary” to the Monroe doctrine – the “America for Americans” foreign policy set out in 1823 by President James Monroe and later used to justify US-backed military coups in South and Central America.
While Saturday’s action was “in line” with many past operations, it is “shocking because nothing like this has happened since 1989”, said Alan McPherson, a history professor at Temple University and author of A Short History of US Interventions in Latin America and the Caribbean.
“One might have thought that this era of naked imperialism – of the US getting the political outcomes it wants in Latin America through sheer military force – would be over in the 21st century, but clearly it is not,” he added.
Almost every country in the region has experienced some form of US intervention, overt or covert, in the past decades. Below are a few examples.
Mexico
The annexation of Texas, a former Mexican territory, sparked border disputes that led to a US invasion of Mexico, with American troops occupying the capital, Mexico City, in 1847. The war ended only with the signing of a treaty in 1848 that forced Mexico to cede 55% of its territory – an area encompassing what are now the states of California, Nevada and Utah, as well as parts of Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado and Wyoming.
Cuba
In 1898, the US helped Cuba in its war of independence against Spain. After the victory, the US received control of Puerto Rico and occupied Cuba until 1902, when an agreement granted the US navy perpetual control of Guantánamo Bay. US troops later occupied the island in from 1906 to 1909 and again from 1917 to 1922. After Fidel Castro’s 1959 revolution, the CIA backed the failed Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961 in an attempt to trigger an uprising.
Haiti
Under the pretext of “stabilising” the country and protecting US business interests after domestic unrest that led to the repeated overthrow of Haitian leaders, the US invaded Haiti in 1915, taking control of customs, the treasury and the national bank until 1934. When an attempted rebellion threatened the dictator François “Papa Doc” Duvalier in 1959, the CIA worked behind the scenes to secure his survival, viewing him as an ally in containing the influence of Fidel Castro’s Cuban revolution.
Brazil
Although it ultimately never intervened, a US naval taskforce was positioned off Brazil’s coast to intervene in case there was resistance to the military coup that overthrew the democratically elected leftwing president João Goulart in 1964. In the 1970s, the CIA and the FBI directly advised the repressive apparatus of dictatorships in countries such as Brazil, Chile and Argentina in the persecution and assassination of dissidents under what became known as Operation Condor.
Panama
The US militarily backed the separatist movement that led to Panama’s break from Colombia in 1903 and, after independence, Washington retained significant influence over the Central American country. In 1989, President George HW Bush ordered Panama’s invasion by about 27,000 US troops to capture the dictator Noriega – a former CIA ally who had been indicted on drug-trafficking charges in US courts.
Hours after the strikes, in which an estimated 200-500 civilians were killed, along with about 300 Panamanian soldiers, the US installed the declared winner of the election, Guillermo Endara, as president.
It remains unclear whether a similar outcome will follow in Venezuela, which Trump has said would be “run” by the US until a “proper transition can take place”.
McPherson said it is “very rare” for US interventions in the region to be followed by “peace, tranquillity, stability and democracy”.
“US interventions almost always create long-term problems of succession,” he added.
