Tensions in Latin America

Cold War Conflicts HIST 1301 | History Tensions in Latin America The United States had adopted a "Good Neighbour Policy" in the 1930s and 1940s, abstaining from meddling in the internal affairs of other Western Hemisphere countries. But in the 1950s and 1960s, Washington adopted a far more active stance in Latin America and the Caribbean in an effort to restrain the spread of communism. The Guatemalan military ruler Jorge Ubico, in charge since 1931, was overthrown by a rebellion in 1944. In 1945, Juan José Arévalo, a philosophy professor, was chosen as the nation's first democratic president. In 1951, Jacobo Árbenz took over as president and initiated a land reform programme in the impoverished nation. Additionally, Árbenz legalised the communist labour union, the Guatemalan Party of Labour. From the American perspective, Guatemala appeared to be heading towards communism. The United Fruit Company, an American corporation that owned plantations all throughout Central America and raised bananas for the American market, supported this point of view. United Fruit resisted any influences that would restrict its access to property since it was the largest landowner in Guatemala. Thus, the company's interests were challenged by Árbenz's intentions to redistribute land, and his backing of the Guatemalan Party of Labour also promised to erode the company's authority over its workforce. United Fruit successfully persuaded the Truman and Eisenhower administrations to remove Árbenz from office. Along with John Foster Dulles, his brother and the head of the CIA, Allen Dulles was a staunch opponent of communism, as was Eisenhower. The United Fruit Company has a tight relationship with the Dulles brothers as well. Árbenz was overthrown in 1954 by a military commanded by Colonel Carlos Castillo Armas, but outfitted and trained by the CIA. After coming to power, Armas banned political opposition, imposed a military dictatorship, and started undermining union authority. Árbenz probably never intended to include Guatemala in the Eastern Bloc. Nonetheless, Soviet influence persisted in other parts of Latin America. Through a military takeover, Fulgencio Batista took control of Cuba in 1952. Financially backed by the United States government, Batista maintained strict control over the island country and employed secret police to stifle his opponents, frequently by torturing and killing them. He used his political influence to defend the rights of rich Cubans and powerful landowners, many of whom were American businessmen in charge of the island nation's sugar sector. Fidel Castro, a young lawyer and activist, and his brother Raul spearheaded the opposition to Batista. Following his unsuccessful attempt to overthrow Batista through legal means by contesting the legitimacy of Batista's takeover, Fidel Castro and his sibling started organising members of the angry working class in Cuba. On July 26, 1953, ineffective attacks on military bases in Santiago and Bayamo marked the beginning of the revolution against Batista, which resulted in the brothers Castro's imprisonment. After being freed from jail two years later, they fled to Mexico, where they trained and made plans to return to Cuba with the help of fellow exiles from Cuba and a young Argentine known as Ernesto "Che" Guevara. After making their first unsuccessful effort to overthrow Batista's regime, Fidel Castro and his supporters returned to Cuba in 1956 and launched an assault on the Cuban government under the banner of the 26th of July Movement. Following a two-year battle, Castro's rebels emerged victorious, and Fulgencio Batista fled to the Dominican Republic on December 31, 1958. When the military commander stationed in Havana gave the order for his forces to lay down their guns on January 2, 1959, the revolutionaries triumphantly stormed the capital. Initially, the US acknowledged the newly elected government in Cuba. A few days after his troops were victorious, Fidel Castro was featured on the well-known American television show The Ed Sullivan Show. Castro then travelled to the US to ask for assistance in establishing his nation. He classified Cuba as non-aligned in a speech to the UN, although he asserted he was not a communist when questioned. Castro's assertions disturbed the U.S. administration despite them. He banned foreign land ownership and started a land reform programme. He put communists in key positions in the administration, such as Che Guevara. He started nationalising foreign businesses in Cuba in August 1960, including a large number that were owned by Americans. A significant portion of the affluent and middle-class Cubans departed the nation, moving to the United States, which was just ninety miles away. Now that it was certain Castro had communist sympathies, the US placed economic restrictions on Cuba. Washington believed that if communism were allowed to take hold on the island, it would spread throughout Latin America. When the United States refused to aid Castro, he looked to the Soviet Union. Due to concerns that Castro would become more allied with the Soviet Union, the US was hesitant to pursue strong measures against Cuba. Nonetheless, the Democratic Revolutionary Front was founded by Cuban exiles in Florida with training provided by the CIA. Their intention was to invade Cuba in the hopes of inciting a popular insurrection and the fall of the Castro regime. The United States aimed to overthrow Castro without using American forces by supporting the Democratic Revolutionary Front. The eagerly anticipated Bay of Pigs invasion, so named because it is where the invaders were supposed to land, started on the evening of April 17, 1961. It was a disastrous conclusion. The invaders rapidly defeated a local militia force, but they were unable to hold out against the Cuban Army. Three days later, they surrendered since the expected air help from the United States did not show up. The US was embarrassed, and instead of making Castro weaker, its aggressive measures could have made the Cuban people more patriotic and supportive of the revolution. Castro turned to the Soviet Union for security as a result of the invasion's failure. The Soviet Union has not shown any interest in Cuba until recently. However, the Soviet Union stood to gain more influence in the area and hinder its Cold War competitor by shielding it from American threats. Khrushchev was afraid that if the Soviets failed to defend Cuba, it would be seen as an indication to other revolutionaries in Latin America that they might also be left vulnerable to American attack. As a result, the Soviet Union equipped Cuba with nuclear missiles in 1962, and that summer, work on building missile launch sites on the island started. The U-2 spy plane's photos informed the U.S. authorities that the missiles were present and were headed directly for the country. President Kennedy considered his options in October 1962 after calling a meeting of the National Security Council. He was afraid that if the U.S. military invaded Cuba, the Soviet Union would strike Berlin in reprisal. But he could not allow the Soviet action to continue unopposed, since that would reflect poorly on both the US and Kennedy himself. Kennedy gave the navy the order to erect a blockade around Cuba on October 22 in order to stop Soviet ships carrying more missiles. He told everyone about this "quarantine," without using the term "blockade," since that may be interpreted as an act of war in accordance with international law. The only means of removing the missiles if the Soviets would not back down was for American troops all around the world to be put on high alert, and American planes were flying low over Cuba in preparation for a possible invasion. Soviet technicians carried on installing the missiles on the island below. Everybody in the globe held their breath. The event that became known as the Cuban Missile Crisis continued for 10 days, during which time many considered the danger of nuclear war. Kennedy and Khrushchev declined to back down. There were several occurrences that may have started a nuclear war. Kennedy chose not to intervene after a U-2 spy plane was shot down and its pilot killed while monitoring the missile installation over Cuba. When another U-2 inadvertently passed over the east coast of the Soviet Union, Soviet fighters launched an offensive to intercept it, prompting the United States to launch its own fighters. A depth charge was thrown on a Soviet submarine by the U.S. Navy. The submarine was not aware of what was happening on the surface since it had been keeping radio silence. Two of the three officers on board believed that the war had begun and wanted to fire a nuclear warhead; the third officer, whose approval was required, would not allow them to do so. The US had stationed missiles in Turkey earlier that year. Furious, Khrushchev now presented Kennedy with a solution to break the impasse in Cuba: the missiles in Cuba would be evacuated together with those in Turkey. Kennedy agreed to take the offer. Kennedy notified the world of Soviet compliance on November 2, 1962, as the disassembly of the Cuban missiles got underway. The embargo lifted on November 20. The United States withdrew its missiles from Turkey in April 1963, over the government of Turkey's objections. A direct phone hotline was set up between Washington and Moscow after the standoff to allow for immediate contact between the leaders of the two adversarial countries. But the risks of nuclear war did not necessarily go down. After their plan to station nuclear weapons in Cuba was foiled, the Soviets concentrated on creating intercontinental ballistic missiles that could attack the US from Europe. Additionally, the US kept developing its armaments. Mao Zedong had chastised the Soviet Union in China for not doing enough to promote socialist revolution globally. Therefore, Khrushchev's readiness to concede when the United States challenged him and to appear to be abandoning Cuba supported Mao's assertions. Mao's standing inside the Chinese Communist Party was also enhanced by it. Due to the economic and technological know-how that the Soviet Union could offer, he had found himself embroiled in a conflict with other CCP members. The position of those members, including Deng Xiaoping and Liu Shaoqi, was now undermined by the Soviet humiliation. On the other hand, the Cuban Missile Crisis severely undermined Khrushchev's authority, and two years later he was removed from office. Castro's regime persisted in power even after the US succeeded in its mission to remove Soviet missiles from Cuba. In other countries of Latin America, communist parties were also powerful. The Dominican Republic's anti-communist dictator Rafael Trujillo was slain in 1961, and his liberal reformer successor Juan Bosch was toppled by the country's army in 1963. To put Bosch back in charge, a group of liberal Dominican army officers revolted on April 24, 1965. President Lyndon Johnson stated that twenty-two thousand American forces entered four days later to stop a communist takeover. They installed a conservative-led administration. In 1958, 1964, and 1970, Salvador Allende, the nominee of the socialist-communist coalition party Popular Unity, won three straight presidential elections in Chile. Allende and hundreds of his followers were assassinated in September 1973 as a result of a coup orchestrated by the CIA in collaboration with the Chilean army. General Agosto Pinochet, the mastermind of the coup, took over as president of Chile and governed as a despot until 1990. In addition, the CIA supplied and trained the right-wing Contras to combat the Sandinista National Liberation Front, which took control of Nicaragua following the toppling of Anastasio Somoza Debayle, the country's despotic leader. Cuba and the Soviet Union gave the Sandinistas backing.