Anti-americanism in Latin America and the Caribbean

Alan McPherson, Alan McPherson

• Publisher: Berghahn Books
• Year: 2006
• ISBN:
  9780857456953
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Geschichte
• Subtopic: Lateinamerikanische & karibische Geschichte

Whether rising up from fiery leaders such as Venezuela's Hugo Chavez and Cuba's Fidel Castro or from angry masses of Brazilian workers and Mexican peasants, anti U.S. sentiment in Latin America and the Caribbean today is arguably stronger than ever. It is also a threat to U.S. leadership in the hemisphere and the world. Where has this resentment come from? Has it arisen naturally from imperialism and globalization, from economic and social frustrations? Has it served opportunistic politicians? Does Latin America have its own style of anti Americanism? What about national variations? How does cultural anti Americanism affect politics, and vice versa? What roles have religion, literature, or cartoons played in whipping up sentiment against 'el yanqui'? Finally, how has the United States reacted to all this?

This book brings leaders in the field of U.S. Latin American relations together with the most promising young scholars to shed historical light on the present implications of hostility to the United States in Latin America and the Caribbean. In essays that carry the reader from Revolutionary Mexico to Peronist Argentina, from Panama in the nineteenth century to the West Indies' mid century independence movement, and from Colombian drug runners to liberation theologists, the authors unearth little known campaigns of resistance and probe deeper into episodes we thought we knew well. They argue that, for well over a century, identifying the United States as the enemy has rung true to Latin Americans and has translated into compelling political strategies. Combining history with political and cultural analysis, this collection breaks the mold of traditional diplomatic history by seeing anti Americanism through the eyes of those who expressed it. It makes clear that anti Americanism, far from being a post 9/11 buzzword, is rather a real force that casts a long shadow over U.S. Latin American relations.

Part I

NATIONAL NARRATIVES

Chapter 1

REDEFINING INTERVENTION

Mexico's Contribution to Anti-Americanism

John A. Britton

Anti-Americanism has a prominent place in Mexican history. The relatively harmonious relationship between the two nations in the 1990s and early years of the twenty-first century tended to obscure that fact that Mexicans have often been critical of the United States, especially concerning government and business policies that posed threats to the interests of Mexico. Anti-Americanism in Mexico, therefore, often manifested itself in arguments against specific policies and actions more so than the broad cultural and philosophical critiques of the United States typical of European anti-Americanism.¹ One purpose of this essay is to examine this theme in Mexican anti-Americanism in one of the most turbulent periods in Mexican history—the quarter century following 1917 when the epic Revolution followed its irregular and often unexpected trajectory that generated conflict with its powerful neighbor to the north.

A second major characteristic of Mexican anti-Americanism was its tendency, until recently, to appear mainly in the writing and speeches of the nation's political and intellectual leaders rather than in popular demonstrations and other forms of mass expression. Of course, there were cases of anti-American acts during the Mexican-US War of 1846–1848 and along the Mexican-US border in the 1910s, and moments when political statements aroused resounding public support, as in the case of President Lázaro Cárdenas's decision in 1938 to expropriate US and other foreign-owned oil properties. However, both calculation and spontaneity played their parts in the 1938 demonstrations. Historian Alan Knight has concluded that Mexican anti-Americanism in this era was closely connected to politics and political leaders, and “that its popular roots were shallow” when compared to similar movements in other countries.² In this sense, anti-Americanism drew heavily on the ideas of politicians, political commentators, university professors, and other public figures who were often, directly or indirectly, employed by the national government. In the 1920s and 1930s, according to historian Enrique Florescano, such diverse groups “played an important role in the consciousness raising of the Mexican people, and this role has been undervalued in the past.”³

President Vicente Fox's tenuous rapport with US President George Bush in the first few years of the new millennium testified to the importance of anti-Americanism in Mexican history. Fox initially chose to cultivate close relationships with his counterpart in the United States. He played host to the recently inaugurated US president in mid-February 2001 on his ranch in Guanajuato, where the two vowed to continue their open discussions of immigration, the drug trade, and other important issues. Mexican-US relations were so harmonious that both arch-conservative US Senator Jesse Helms and leftist Mexican Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda found much to praise in this new spirit of friendship.⁴

The temporary nature of the Fox-Bush accord became obvious in February 2003 when the issue of intervention became the focal point in the relationship between the two leaders as the United States pursued a more aggressive policy in the Middle East. The distance between Fox and Bush was not apparent until the United States began to press for Mexico's vote in the United Nations Security Council in favor of a resolution to endorse the use of force in the removal of Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq. The Mexican public was decidedly opposed to military intervention in general and the US invasion of Iraq in particular, and the Fox administration followed this line.⁵ Polls in Mexico cited a level of opposition to this war between 70 and 83 percent, and street demonstrations confirmed these results.⁶

The Fox-Bush discord touched historically based differences between Mexico and the United States on the issue of intervention. Among the nations with frequent and close interactions with the United States, Mexico underwent some of the most injurious experiences. In the War of 1846–1848, US military interventions resulted in Mexico's losing half of its national territory to its expanding neighbor to the north. The Mexican Revolution of 1910 spawned conditions that led to the US military occupation of Veracruz in 1914, a large incursion by the US Army into northern Mexico in 1916, and the threat of similar interventions for several years thereafter. These experiences and the “consciousness raising” of the Mexican proponents of anti-Americanism in the 1920s and 1930s contributed to the Mexican public's development of a sensitivity to the aggressive, intrusive exercise of power by the United States. A 1983 Gallup poll revealed that 74 percent of Mexicans believed that “a strong American presence around the world” increased the chance for war. The same poll asked 500 Mexicans to select “the characteristics most often associated with Americans.” Those polled selected the following: “industrious,” “intelligent,” “decisive,” and “greedy.” The poll revealed a public wary of the neighboring nation that was quite willing to use its power for its own purposes.⁷ Twenty years later, therefore, President Fox yielded to a citizenry whose historical conscience had been awakened.

Mexico's opposition to Bush's invasion of Iraq drew from important episodes in the history of Mexican-US relations. This chapter will examine the circumstances in which Mexico's political and intellectual leaders identified issues that, in their view, justified anti-American protests.

Military Interventions and Threats of Interventions

Anti-Americanism is rooted in Mexico's unfortunate relationship with the United States, first in the devastating war of 1846–1848, then in the interventions of 1914 and 1916. The 1846–1848 conflict began as a dispute along the Mexican-Texas border but expanded into a war of territorial aggression for the United States. Mexico suffered a major military defeat, the invasion of its capital, and a costly peace settlement. The 1914 intervention involved the occupation of Veracruz on the orders of President Woodrow Wilson. The 1916 intervention, directed by the same president, consisted of a so-called punitive expedition to track down Pancho Villa in response to his raid on Columbus, New Mexico. These events, spanning nearly three-quarters of a century, had a lasting impact in Mexico. US territorial aggrandizement in the 1840s and unilateral interventions in 1914 and 1916 inspired both resentment about the past and trepidation about the future. Mexico was the first country to face the dramatic reality that the US president, in command of one of the world's most powerful armed forces, could deploy naval and military contingents and then entice or manufacture public support for these operations in a polity and culture known for interventionist proclivities.⁸

The 1846–1848 war and the heavy-handed interventions of 1914 and 1916 were central to the anxious calculations of Mexico's leaders; but from 1917 to 1940 these leaders encountered new threats from north of the Rio Grande. While the threat of military intervention turned out to be only rumblings and bluster, the new assertions of power contained political and economic dimensions that, in their own ways, also menaced Mexico's independence as a nation. Venustiano Carranza, the head of state who faced these new perils after 1916, also attempted to lead a large, diverse revolutionary movement that stretched across the complex political and social landscape of Mexico. Although there remains some debate about the nature of Carranza's government, a fair amount of consensus exists for the view that he was a moderate among domestic revolutionaries and a nationalist vis-à-vis foreign powers. He fully recognized that Mexico's internal reforms, including the distribution of land to peasants and the promotion of labor organizations, often aggravated and even alarmed foreigners who owned property in Mexico. The United States in particular, with its record of aggressive action and its numerous citizens with investments in Mexico, was the subject of much concern in the Carranza administration.

These concerns intensified when the Constitutional Convention of 1917 adopted Article 27 of the new constitution, which placed restrictions on private property. Pastor Rouaix, an engineer with an interest in the petroleum industry, led in the drafting of the article, the content of which was disturbing for the US oil industry. Article 27 set the legal basis for several government policies from taxation to regulation to nationalization. The oil companies objected strenuously to the Mexican government and also turned to the US Department of State for protection. When neither of these agencies responded to their satisfaction, the oil representatives took their case directly to the US public in a well-financed propaganda campaign. For example, oil executive Edward L. Doheny announced that the “new constitution of Mexico is intended to confiscate or attack many vested rights of foreigners.” Doheny hired several journalists and academics, who quickly added fuel to the propaganda campaign with their accusations that Bolshevism was emanating from south of the border.⁹

Faced with rising pressures from peasants and workers within Mexico and hostile corporate critics from outside, Carranza and his advisors expended much effort and energy to persuade other Latin American nations to join with Mexico in opposing what they believed to be an economic intervention that constituted a threat to the nation's sovereignty. Given the historical experience of the 1840s and contemporary US military actions in the Caribbean as well as Mexico, armed intervention was also a distinct possibility. Antonio Manero and Hermila Galindo were among the activists who promoted the “Carranza Doctrine,” which, in essence, asserted Mexico's right to implement Article 27 and denied the United States the option to use the defense of foreign-owned private property as a justification for military intervention.¹⁰

An insightful young diplomat named Isidro Fabela went beyond their glancing blows against the power bases in Washington and New York to produce a more penetrating critique. Fabela, entrusted with being Carranza's “confidential agent” in Europe during these troubled times, focused his analytical skills on the political leaders in Washington.¹¹ He employed an indirect but persuasive analytical device to make his case against the Wilson administration, one that has long been a standard in the repertoire of anti-US rhetoric. Instead of attacking by broad condemnation, he carefully drew a line between the US public and the nation's leaders in Washington. The people of the United States did not agitate for intervention and conquest, but chief executives and their high-ranking advisors who spoke so piously of democratic institutions at home could, at the same time, justify arbitrary, heavy-handed limitations on self-government abroad.¹² Fabela turned to recent Cuban history for evidence: US participation in the Spanish-American War in the name of “Cuba Libre” was followed soon thereafter by the imposition of the Platt Amendment on the nascent Cuban government. US intervention thereby became institutionalized in Cuba's internal affairs.¹³ Fabela ranged through the recent history of Panama, the role of the United States in fomenting its break from Colombia, and the Hay-Bunau Varilla Treaty that guaranteed Washington's control over the fledgling nation's most valuable resource—the narrow isthmus between the Caribbean and the Pacific. More recent US interventions underscored how Washington's transparent idealism could not mask its thirst for imperial domination. Fabela drove home his point by citing the examples of recent US interventions in Haiti and the Dominican Republic: “Mr. Wilson, during the Great War, stated numerous times that he was a champion of law and justice, protector of the weaker nations…and that for him the liberty of a small nation was as sacred as that of the largest nation…. And yet what has Mr. Wilson done but abruptly eliminate the independence of Haiti and the Dominican Republic?”¹⁴

Fabela's sharp delineation of this gap between verbiage that sounded respectful of the rights of smaller nations and intrusive, unilateral actions that violated their sovereignty resonated well with carrancistas and other Mexicans across the political spectrum. But the downfall and defeat of Carranza in 1920 brought a new group to power, led by Alvaro Obregón. Fabela, like most carrancistas, left the center stage of politics, but his critique of US policy and its potential for harm in Mexico continued to have relevance. The new government's assertion of control over petroleum resources under Article 27 and also the division of large estates into small farms and communal lands (ejidos) as provided for in the same article created serious differences between the two nations. From 1921 to 1923, the administration of President Obregón wrestled with US President Warren Harding over the latter's refusal to extend normal diplomatic recognition, in part because of the uncertain status of US property. In the summer of 1923, the two nations finally signed the informal Bucareli agreements, which resulted in US recognition. Obregón faced sharp criticism from many Mexicans who insisted that he had “sold out” Article 27 and the national interest to open normal diplomatic relations with the United States. The public response to this perceived weakness in the face of pressure from Washington hurt Obregón's image at home and encouraged the abortive but disruptive de la Huerta rebellion in the fall of 1923.¹⁵

The new government of President Plutarco Elias Calles (1924–1928) was also caught in a difficult situation because Mexican agrarian and labor groups, aroused by the promises of the Revolution, demanded immediate reforms on a scale suffici...