In the past 200 years, the United States has consolidated its dominance over Latin America through direct military invasions or indirect interventions, annexing territories, overthrowing governments and securing the rights to use canals.
BEIJING, Jan. 22 (Xinhua) -- In April 2009, during the Fifth Summit of the Americas, then president of Venezuela Hugo Chavez gave his U.S. counterpart Barack Obama a book titled "The Open Veins of Latin America," which eloquently argues that the West has long plundered the region's natural resources to bankroll its own progress.
What the author Eduardo Galeano referred to as the "underground gold and silver veins" had been exploited for centuries and the mineral wealth exported to other lands. "The underdevelopment of Latin America derives from the development of others and it continues to feed it," he wrote.
After more than 300 years of European colonial rule, Latin America no sooner saw the dawn of national independence in the early 19th century than Uncle Sam broke in, vying for its rich resources.
In December 1823, James Monroe, the fifth American president, delivered a speech to Congress proclaiming "America for Americans." And the United States has since been obsessed with the Monroe Doctrine to hold sway over Latin American countries, unscrupulously launching coups, invasions and sanctions whenever necessary.
Today, the Monroe Doctrine persists, bleeding dry the "veins" of Latin Americans, undermining their national security and stymieing their social development.
In the early morning of Dec. 20, 1989, in Panama City, a violent explosion startled Trinidad Ayola. She started to worry about her husband, who was stationed at Paitilla Airport in the Panamanian capital to protect the facility.
Her worst fears turned reality. "When they went to identify him, I couldn't, I didn't have the strength to identify him, his entire back was full of holes," she said.
That very day, the United States launched a military operation, codenamed "Just Cause," to invade Panama and overthrow the government of Manuel Noriega. During the invasion, a large number of houses and buildings were destroyed. The Pentagon put the number of those killed Panamanian soldiers and civilians at 500, but the actual number remains a mystery until today.
As president of the Association of Relatives and Friends of the Fallen on December 20, Ayola has worked for years to bring the truth to light. She believes the invasion left a scar on many Panamanians that has yet to heal.
"'Just Cause' was them looking after their interests, not looking after us. What we experienced was a great injustice," she said.
The 1992 Oscar-winning documentary, "The Panama Hoax," revealed the ulterior motive for the incursion: to deploy the U.S. military there for the long term, install a new government to defend Washington's interests and those of U.S. corporations, and control the Panama Canal.
In the past 200 years, the United States has consolidated its dominance over Latin America through direct military invasions or indirect interventions, annexing territories, overthrowing governments and securing the rights to use canals. It launched a war with Mexico and seized about 55 percent of its territory, militarily occupied Haiti and plundered its national wealth, invaded Granada and overthrew the government, and sent warships to "monitor" elections in the Dominican Republic, just to name a few.
According to a study by Tufts University, the United States has launched nearly 400 military interventions around the world since its independence in 1776, and up to 2019, 34 percent of these operations were directed against Latin American and the Caribbean countries.
"From the start, the Monroe Doctrine was based on the idea that the United States would have the exceptionalism of being the country chosen to lead others, even if this meant military interventions, coups d'etat and colonialism," says Lucas Leite, associate professor of international relations at Brazilian academic institution FAAP.
Euclides Tapia, professor of international relations at the University of Panama, said that the crux of the Monroe Doctrine is for Washington to wield sole control over the Americas.
"What are called the corollaries of the Monroe Doctrine mean the instances in which it mutates to adapt to the circumstances of the moment, but its essence is the same throughout history, domination over the American Continent," said Tapia.■
