U. S. Military in Latin America, a Brief History Lesson

"America is reducing military and economic aid to Latin American countries," a San Diego Union-Tribune editorial complains. The issue is the refusal of Latin American countries to exempt the United States from the International Criminal Court that prosecutes genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. Given our history, less military aid is a wonderful thing for Latin America.

• 1902 Cuba - Allowed independence on the proviso that the US may intervene militarily at will. Got Gitmo on a perputual lease. Independence lasted until 1906, when a US governor was installed.
  
• 1903 Columbia - Wanting to build the Panama Canal, President Teddy Roosevelt organized a rebellion in the Columbian province of Panama, sending the Navy to assist the coup.
• 1909 Nicaragua - The US supported a coup, invaded with Marines, and occupied the country until 1933. Before leaving, we trained the death squads of the Guardia Nacional and began the long Somoza dictatorships.
• 1915 Haiti - Marine occupation was oppressive, although we did build several roads. It lasted until 1934.
• 1916 Dominican Republic - Again the Marines invaded the country, installing a military dictatorship that lasted until 1924.
• 1930 Dominican Republic - Trained by the Marines, Rafael Trujillo ruled as a brutal dictator until his assasination in 1961. Oddly enough, the Marines put him in power and the CIA killed him. The following five years the CIA had a cottage industry installing various military juntas.
• 1933 Cuba - Army sergeant Batista becomes dictator. Batista lost power in 1944 while the US was preoccupied with World War II. Batista regained power in a bloodless coup in 1952, after which Cuba became a haven for American gangsters.
• 1946 US Army School of the Americas - After World War II, the US founded the School of the Americas. In the following decades they trained thousands of Latin American soldiers in the arts of torture and murder.
  
• 1954 Guatemala - The US ended the Ten Years of Spring, a period of peace and liberty in Guatemala, with a coup codenamed Operation PBSUCCESS. We acted at the behest of the United Fruit Company (the origin of the term "banana republic").
• 1964 Brazil - A US backed military coup takes power and rules for 20 years.
  
• 1973 Chile - A CIA coup installed the butcher Augusto Pinochet. Among his successes were six concentration camps and the Caravan of Death.
• 1974 Argentina - Using skills learned at the School of the Americas, the Argentina military waged the "Dirty War" against their own people.
  
• 1975 Operation Condor - A coalition of secret police from Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Paraguay, and Uruguay with the support of the US. They engaged in kidnapping, torture, and assassination. In 1974, Uruguayan military officials threatened to assassinate US Congressman Edward Koch. The FBI refused requests to protect Koch.
• 1979 El Salvador - (Although I could pick just about any year to illustrate.) The Revolutionary Government Junta overthrew the right-wing dictatorship to try an interesting CIA experiment, sound like leftists while backed by right-wing death squads. It didn't work; civil war ensued.
  
• 1981 Nicaragua - The Contra war against the Nicaraguan people defined the Reagan Administration. Funded, often illegally, by the United States (Iran-Contra) the Contras were world renown for the brutality with which they killed civilians.

Things are not improved. Neo-cons believe the El Salvador death squads were successful. The Pentagon has admitted they are making plans for the invasion of Venezuela. The wisest thing the governments of Latin America can do is keep the United States military far away. They should not exempt the United States from the International Criminal Court because most of the crimes against humanity perpetuated upon their people was backed by the United States. We are nothing but bad news in Latin America.