Cold War Developments in Latin America

1

• Cold War Developments in Latin America
• 1960-1979

totalitarian.regimes were happily tolerated
throughout Latin America by the US, so long as
they were reliably anti-Communist Walker (160)
2
Overview

• Key Places
• Cuba
• El Salvador
• Chile
• Argentina
• Dominican Republic
• Nicaragua
• Bolivia

3
Overview (cont.)

• Key Terms
• Brinkmanship
• OAS Organization of American States
• Containment
• Arms Race
• Arms Control
• Missile Gap
• Alliance for Progress
• MAD Mutually Assured Destruction
• Domino Theory
• Flexible Response
• CIA/Covert Ops

VS.
4
CUBA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

• January 8, 1959 Castro and his Communist forces
  take Cuban Capital from Cuban dictator Batista
• Castro elected president of Cuba 1959
• Cold War Conflict US does not want communist
  ties in L. America
• Domino theory if one L. American country falls
  to communism, they all will
• April 15, 1961 Bay of Pigs Invasion
• Originally planned under President Eisenhower to
  have the CIA aid anti-communist Cubans in their
  overthrowing of Castro
• President Kennedy takes over operation. CIA
  trains anti-Castro Cubans, hope was that
  anti-Castro Cubans would attack the government
  and the peasants would follow, and the US would
  help with an air raid
• Day of Invasion Peasants dont follow, Kennedy
  pulls US support, Cuban militia moves in and
  anti-Castroists are defeated

During this time, JFK introduces the idea of
flexible response which calls for mutual
deterrence at strategic, tactical, and
conventional levels, giving the United States the
capability to respond to aggression across the
spectrum of warfare, not limited only to nuclear
arms.
5
CUBA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
CUBA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

• August 17th, 1961 As a result of the Bay of Pigs
  incident, the US institutes the Alliance for
  Progress
• Purpose was to establish economic cooperation
  between North and South America. The aid was
  intended to counter the perceived emerging
  communist threat from Cuba to US interests
  dominance in the region.
• a commitment to 20 billion in US aid over the
  next ten yearsthis was strategically an
  indispensable investment if it could buy off the
  seductions of Cuba, the first socialist outpost
  in the western hemisphere Walker 150
• Also establishes the Inter-American Development
  Bank- links economic assistance to reforms,
  provides L. American countries with aid

Soviet propaganda will find it easy to convince
world opinion, starting with the peoples of Latin
America, Africa and Asia, that the vaunted
anti-colonialism of the USA is no more than a
façade which shelters a hypocritical idealism-
Le Monde (a French Newspaper) April 19, 1961

• Bay of Pigs
• Testified to the strength of Castros popular
  support
• Castro initially neutral in Cold War, however he
  sees the Bay of Pigs invasion as a direct on him
  by the US, so he seeks USSR protection
• USSR decides to put missiles in Cuba in order to
• Protect Cuba against American invasion
• Bridge the missile gap
• Use threat as a bargaining chip to remove the US
  from Turkey
• US sends U2 spy planes over Cuba which take
  pictures of the USSR unloading the missiles in
  Cuba which leads to...

6
THE CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS!!!
To halt this offensive buildup, a strict
quarantine on all offensive military equipment
under shipment to Cuba is being initiated...We
are not at this time, however, denying the
necessities of life as the Soviets attempted to
do in their Berlin blockade of 1948-President
Kennedy, Oct 22, 1962

• October 15, 1962- US reconnaissance photographs
  taken by an American U2 spy plane revealed
  missile bases being built in Cuba by the USSR
• For the next 6 days news of the American
  discovery was kept from all but a small group of
  some 14 senior US officials known as ExComm
• ExComm comes up with several different plans,
  such as
• bomb the missile bases
• appeal to the UN
• a full scale invasion of Cuba
• They ultimately decide to quarantine Cuba with a
  naval blockade

7
MORE CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS
Historiography

• October 26th and 27th USSR sends 2 incompatible
  messages to the US
• 1st message says that if the US did not invade
  Cuba, then the USSR will remove its military
  specialists from Cuba
• 2nd message contrasts, says that the USSR will
  only remove its weapons from Cuba if the US
  removes its weapons from Turkey
• BRINKMANSHIP!!!!!!!!
• USSR ships approach US naval blockade, turn back
  only moments before the US would have fired on
  them
• Had the US attacked, MAD most likely would have
  ensued
• October 28th- Khrushchev promises to dismantle
  and remove missiles, after Kennedy privately
  agrees to remove US missiles from Turkey
• Kennedy also gives public address, says he will
  not attack Cuba.
• Aftermath leads to first efforts at nuclear
  disarmament and improving US/USSR relations

Orthodox Historians blame the USSR entirely for
the crisis, say it was all due to USSR aggressive
tactics Revisionist Historians say some blame is
also on the US for responding aggressively
8
THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC!!!!!!!

• After Bay of Pigs, Castro decides to try and
  spread Marxism throughout Latin America
• Sends Cubans to teach peasants guerilla warfare
  and the Marxist doctrine
• So, when a coup d etat occurred in early 1965,
  the US assumed it was communist-led
• US worried that the dominoes will fall, so
  President Lyndon Johnson decides to send US
  troops into the DR.
• This is in direct violation of the OAS charter

• It turns out there was very little communist
  activity in the DR to begin with
• Causes a huge outcry among US and DR citizens
• US troops have to pull out only a year later

9
BOLIVIA!!!!!!

• Early 1960s Castro sends his guerilla warfare
  experts to Bolivia.
• Bolivia was originally controlled by communists
  in the 1950s, Castro wants them back in power.
• 1966 Che Guevarra goes to Bolivia to help
  Castros communist revival

• US responds gives the non-communist Bolivian
  government military aid and advisors
• Eventually Guevarra is caught and killed by the
  American CIA and the movement dies down

10
Argentina!!!!!!

• In March, 1976, coup d'état overthrows Isabel
  Martinez de Peron, the third wife and
  vice-president of Juan Perón, the past president
  of Argentina.
• The junta, which dubbed itself "National
  Reorganization Process", systematized the
  repression of all ideological opponents on the
  left.
• The junta's mission was allegedly to defend
  against international communism.
• It instead repressed opposition and leftist
  groups using harsh illegal measures (the "Dirty
  War") and thousands of dissidents "disappeared".

• According to the National Security Archive, the
  junta led by Jorge Videla believed it had United
  States' approval for its assault on the left in
  the name of national security.
• The country's 1982 defeat by the British in the
  Falklands War discredited the Argentine military
  regime and the junta quickly fell out of power.
• Argentina associated with other South American
  dictatorships in Operation Condor.

Look, our basic attitude is that we would like
you to succeed. I have an old-fashioned view that
friends ought to be supported. What is not
understood in the United States is that you have
a civil war. We read about human rights problems
but not the context. The quicker you succeed the
better The human rights problem is a growing
one. Your Ambassador can apprise you. We want a
stable situation. We won't cause you unnecessary
difficulties. If you can finish before Congress
gets back, the better. Whatever freedoms you
could restore would help. -Henry Kissinger
11
Operation Condor

• Operation Condor was a campaign of political
  repression involving assassination and
  intelligence operations officially implemented in
  1975 by the right-wing dictatorships of the
  Southern Cone of South America.
• The program aimed to deter left-wing influence
  and ideas and to control active or potential
  opposition movements against the usually
  conservative governments.
• Due to its clandestine nature, the precise number
  of deaths directly attributable to Operation
  Condor will likely never be known, but it is
  reported to have caused thousands of victims,
  possibly even more.
• Condor's key members were the right-wing military
  governments in Argentina, Chile, Uruguay,
  Paraguay, Bolivia and Brazil, with Ecuador and
  Peru joining later in more peripheral roles.
• The operation was jointly conducted by the
  intelligence and security services of these
  nations during the mid-1970s with some support
  provided by the USA.

12
El Salvador!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

• May 9 1979 Farabundo Marti National Liberation
  Front (FMLN) attacked the US backed El Salvador
  government, the JRG Revolutionary Government
  Junta, with the backing of Cuba and other
  communist countries.
• US provided 7 billion in aid, most of it
  nonmilitary, to the government for ten years
  following.
• US sent military trainers to help the El
  Salvador government.

• A 1974 amendment to the Foreign Assistance Act
  forced President Reagan to assert that conditions
  were improving when they were not so that US
  Congress would continue aid.

13
Nicaragua!!!!!!!!!!!!

• July 17, 1979 Sandinistas drove US backed
  Somoza out and installed a leftist government
• Sandinistas were comprised of Somoza opponents
  ranging from moderates to Marxists and were
  supplied with arms from Cuba.
• President Carter, aware of the charges of
  overreaction in Cuba, Dominican Republic and
  Chile, decided that the Sandinistas were not
  Communist allies of the Soviet Union. He gave
  recognition and aid to the new government.
• This will all lead to further Contra-versy during
  the Reagan administration, when the US government
  sells arms to Iranian rebels in order to fund the
  Sandinistas

14
CHILE!!!!!

• Late 1960s In an effort to combat depression,
  Chile's president, Salvador Allende,
  redistributes land and nationalizes industries,
  including the US's.
• US President Nixon angry.
• Early 1970s The CIA funds anti-Allende media and
  groups to create destabilization.
• Sept 11th, 1973 A US-backed military coup
  overthrows Allende. Allende commits suicide.
• A harsh, military dictatorship under General.
  Augusto Pinochet takes over.
• HISTORIOGRAPHY Debate
• Supporters of the coup assert that the coup
  prevented President Allende from setting up a
  repressive communist regime.
• Opponents of the coup assert that Pinochet's
  dictatorship was more repressive than Allende's
  government ever would have been.

I don't see why we need to stand by and watch a
country go communist due to the irresponsibility
of its own people. The issues are much too
important for the Chilean voters to be left to
decide for themselves." - Henry Kissinger
15
HISTORIOGRAPHY!!!!

• "Since the 1960s, Harrison asserts that U.S.
  scholars - such as GunderFrank, John Coatsworth,
  Susan Jonas, Richard Fagen, Joseph Tulchin -
  andprofessional associations such as the North
  American Congress of LatinAmericanists (NACLA)
  and the Latin American Studies Association
  (LASA),joined the crowd in asserting that the
  United States bears significantresponsibility
  for Latin America's underdevelopment because of
  itseconomic exploitation of the region and
  support of political dictatorshipsthat began
  late in the nineteenth century."
• "Ariel C. Armony adds yet another dimension and,
  in so doing, makes acomparative point to Lars
  Schoultz, who in his Beneath the United
  States,illustrated that domestic considerations
  often influenced Washington'spolicy decisions
  about Latin America."