V o L u m e I : a d

characterize inter-American economic policy or—as some Latin American

leaders urged—whether individual nations should exert some control over

foreign economic activity within their borders. This conflict would remain a

fixture of inter-American relations until the 1980s, when economic liberal-

ization (neoliberalism) helped to foster friendlier North-South relations in

the Western Hemisphere.

As Latin American nations moved toward democracy in the 1980s, rela-

tions between North America and Latin America warmed. Yet the road to

harmonious inter-American relations in the 1980s encountered two very seri-

ous roadblocks: crises in Central America, the Caribbean, and Panama and the

ongoing drug war. As civil wars erupted throughout Central America in the

1970s and 1980s, U.S. leaders feared that Cuban and Soviet aid was sup-

porting the efforts of the leftist guerrillas, who by 1979 had seized control in

Nicaragua. The leftist guerrillas in Nicaragua, the Sandinistas, had broad sup-

port, at least at first, among many Nicaraguans. The United States attempted

to destabilize Nicaragua through overt means (economic embargoes and anti-

Sandinista rhetoric) and covert means (assistance to Nicaraguan rebel groups

who wanted to overthrow the government). Washington’s actions toward

Nicaragua frayed relations with other nations in the hemisphere that opposed

U.S. policy, including Canada, the first significant example of Canadian crit-

icism of Washington’s inter-American policy. Finally, the Sandinistas lost a

critical election in 1990, defusing the crisis.

In 1983 President Ronald Reagan’s administration was especially suspi-

cious of Cuban assistance to rebel groups in the Caribbean. In 1983, Reagan

therefore sent troops into tiny Grenada to forestall a communist insurgency

there. The invasion offered a low-risk way for the Reagan administration to

display its credentials as a hard-line anticommunist government.

Just as communism crumbled nonviolently in the autumn of 1989 in

Eastern Europe, Washington invaded Panama in December 1989, capturing

its unpopular leader General Manuel Noriega. American policymakers in-

sisted that military intervention was the only way to remove the autocratic

leader—who was also accused of heavy involvement in the drug trade—so

that democracy could take firmer root in the Isthmian nation. To some

observers, the U.S. invasion of Panama, coming at the end of the Cold War,

showed that the diminishing communist threat would not necessarily mean

the end of U.S. intervention in the Americas.

As the international narcotics trade grew and as U.S. imports of illicit

drugs from Latin America increased, American leaders searched for ways to

crush the drug trade. In this endeavor, U.S. law enforcement officials worked

with Mexican government officers in particular. Many Mexicans, however,

saw such efforts as an intrusion on their sovereignty. Even more controver-

sially, U.S. military personnel trained members of some of the South Ameri-

can militaries in techniques used for destroying the plants that produced the

raw materials for certain drugs (coca leaves in the Andes, in particular). In

addition, the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) stepped up interdiction ef-

forts, trying to reduce the flow of coca leaves from farms to processing plants.

Both eradication and interdiction resulted in casualties among Andean coca

122

Americas

The invasion offered

a low-risk way 

for the Reagan

administration 

to display its

credentials as a hard-

line anticommunist

government.

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growers and their supporters. As a result, U.S.–Latin American relations

deteriorated. The drug war waxed and waned but still proved a bone of con-

tention among some Latin American nations and the United States into the

twenty-first century.

With the end of the Cold War, two important new topics dominated

inter-American relations: economic interaction and immigration. In 1994 the

United States, Canada, and Mexico signed the North American Free Trade

Agreement (NAFTA). U.S. leaders also pursued the plan for a free trade area

to embrace South America as well as North America.

Latin American immigration to North America, especially from Mexico,

began to change the complexion of U.S. and Canadian society, introducing

new food, music, and other aspects of Hispanic popular culture. As Latin

American immigration to the United States swelled, some Latinos in the

United States, in particular the well-organized Cuban lobby in Florida, man-

aged to influence U.S. foreign policy. In the early twenty-first century, ris-

ing numbers of immigrants, particularly Mexican immigrants, spurred some

observers, such as Samuel Huntington in 2004, to fear that immigrants from

south of the Rio Grande would not assimilate into U.S. society. Moving into

the twenty-first century, immigration appeared as increasingly important in

shaping the contours of U.S.–Latin American relations.

James F. Siekmeier

Americas

123

U.S. Army M-113 armored personnel carrier guards a street near the destroyed Panamanian Defense Force headquarters

building during Operation 

JUST CAUSE

, 21 December 1989. (U.S. Department of Defense)

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See also

Allende Gossens, Salvador; Alliance for Progress; Arbenz, Jacobo Guzmán; Argentina;

Balaguer Ricart, Joaquín Antonio; Bay of Pigs; Betancourt, Rómulo; Bolivia;

Bosch Gaviño, Juan; Brazil; Castro, Fidel; Central Intelligence Agency; Cha-

pultepec Conference; Chile; Colombia; Contadora Group; Costa Rica; Cuba;

Cuban Missile Crisis; Dominican Republic; Dominican Republic, U.S. Inter-

ventions in; Duvalier, François; Ecuador; El Salvador; Figueres Ferrer, José;

Frei Montalva, Eduardo; Guatemala; Guevara de la Serna, Ernesto; Guyana;

Haiti; Honduras; Latin America, Communist Parties in; Latin America, Popular

Liberation Movements in; Mann, Thomas C.; Mexico; Nicaragua; Organization

of American States; Panama; Panama, U.S. Invasion of; Panama Canal Treaties;

Paraguay; Peru; Pinochet Ugarte, Augusto; Rio Pact; Sandinistas; Somoza De-

bayle, Anastasio; Somoza García, Anastasio; United States; Uruguay; Venezuela

References

Blasier, Cole. The Hovering Giant: U.S. Responses to Revolutionary Change in Latin Amer-

ica, 1910–1985. 2nd ed. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 1985.

Fernandez-Armesto, Felipe. The Americas: A Hemispheric History. New York: Random

House, 2003.

Gilderhus, Mark. The Second Century—U.S. Latin American Relations since 1889. Wilm-

ington, DE: Scholarly Resources, 2000.

Holden, Robert, and Eric Zolof, eds. Latin America and the United States: A Documen-

tary History. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000.

Huntington, Samuel P. “The Hispanic Challenge.” Foreign Policy (March–April 2004):

31–45.

McPherson, Alan. Yankee No! Anti-Americanism in U.S.–Latin American Relations. Cam-

bridge: Harvard University Press, 2003.

Smith, Peter H. Talons of the Eagle: Dynamics of U.S.–Latin American Relations. 2nd ed.

New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.

Ugandan politician and military leader. Idi Amin Dada Oumee was born to a

Muslim family in either 1924 or 1925 in the Kalwa tribe in Koboko, British

Uganda. In 1961 he became one of Uganda’s first commissioned army offi-

cers. Following Ugandan independence on 9 October 1962, he held the rank

of major and worked closely with Prime Minister Milton Obote, who sent him

abroad to oversee training programs. By 1970 Amin was head of the army.

After several years of strained relations with Obote, Amin launched a

successful military coup on 25 January 1971, with widespread public support.

Following several token gestures to make his rule seem more democratic

than that of Obote, Amin moved to eliminate political and tribal rivals, many

of whom fled to Tanzania. In September 1972 the Tanzanian exiles unsuc-

cessfully attempted to overthrow Amin.

In 1972 Amin expelled all Asians and nationalized British-owned busi-

nesses, damaging the Ugandan economy. His policies caused tense relations

124

Amin, Idi

Amin, Idi

(1924?–2003)

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