Latin America and the Middle East

Mid 20th Century Latin America

• Main concern for America - pro-Communist nationalistic uprisings in Latin America during the 1950s

  • Guatemala and Costa Rica - democratically elected left-wing governments

  • reducing US imports to boost their local industries and businesses

• Any Soviet interference would come as a breaking of the 1823 Monroe Doctrine and response was dictated by that

Guatemala

• dominated by agricultural industry

  • often foreign owned

• population had limited resources

  • Little access to education

• 1930s/1940s → run by a military right wing dictatorship

  • Supported by the USA - kept communism at bay

• 1944 - Jose Arevalo elected president

  • new constitution similar to that of the USA introduced

  • suspicion in USA aroused by Arevalo’s socialist tendencies

Guatemalan Left Wing politics

• Arevalo/successor Guzman → pushing through social reforms to improve day to day life/reduce inequalities

• Planned to nationalise held but not used by United Fruit company

  • Dulles brothers on the board of united fruit

• Seen by Eisenhower administration as creeping communism due to Guzman’s acceptance of Communists in his government

  • Refused US demands to remove the communists

  • US responded with trade embargoes and covert CIA operations to overthrow him

• Guzman → turned to Eastern European countries for help

• US coup in 1954 to overthrow the democratically elected government

  • Canada warned it was an overreaction

  • Policy pursued anyway to warn USSR of lack of tolerance

Kennedy’s approach to Latin America

• Boost regional economies

  • Wanted them to support US ambitions

  • deter them from communism by making them friends

• $500 million in assistance → Alliance for Progress

• Under Kennedy and Johnson, aid to Latin America totalled $22.3 billion

  • Did not have the intended effect

  • not a strong enough middle class to spend the money in the way it was intended

• Increase in money going to corrupt governments instead

  • 1964 - new pro-US anti-communist Brazilian government got $1.5 billion

  • 1965, 22,000 USS troops sent to support the dictatorship in Dominican Republic

Similarities to previous policy between US and Latin America

• dollar diplomacy

• help to Venezuela against the British and the French

• Troops to Filipino uprising

• Pay of Pigs

• Not recognising Mexican president after Mexican revolution, flexing diplomatic power → Puerta

Latin America in the 1970s/1980s

• Spent $10 million on supporting opposition to the Chilean regime

  • feared their assets would be nationalised

  • Potential new Domino Effect in Latin America

• 1983 - US troops sent to Grenada

  • protect the US backed dictatorship during civil unrest and threat of being overthrown

• Reagan used the CIA to destabilise Nicaragua

  • Had a friendly relationship with the Panama dictator as he helped in these covert operations

Importance of the Middle East

• Contained significant proportion of the world’s oil supply

  • Threatening because oil supply becoming increasingly vital to the US economy

• Region volatile

  • since the fall of the Ottoman Empire and the creation of new states, Palestine, Israel and new states like Jordan all unstable

  • conflicts continuity

• UN supposed to take over rule of Palestine since 1948 but Jewish settlers declared the state of Israel instead

  • Proxy war: US giving support to Israel and the Soviet Union giving support to Palestine

First Arab-Israeli War 1948

• 1947-48, USA spending millions on helping set up the Jewish state of Israel

• Jewish community strong in USA - Truman running for re-election, needed their votes

  • Issue of hundreds of thousands of Palestinian Arabs hoping to either stay in Israel or seeking asylum

• Palestinian nationalistic Arabs looking to the Soviet Union for support in returning Israel to the state of Palestine

The Suez Crisis 1956

• Egyptians take control of the Suez Canal 1956 from the British and French using Soviet weapons

• Britain and France tried to respond with conventional troops but USA threatened sanctions if they didn’t withdraw

• USA emphasised friendly relations with Arab states to keep oil trade flowing

• 1957 Eisenhower Doctrine

  • prevent Soviet Union spreading in the Middle East

  • Many Arabs began to believe that they could only really trust the Soviet Union

6-day war 1967

• Israel attacked Egypt, Jordan, Syria

  • Using US weapons

• Captured Sinai Peninsula and Gaza Strip from Egypt, Golan Heights from Syria, West Bank from Jordan

• Soviet Union began to rearm Syria and Egypt in response

• US supported UN resolution 242

  • Demanding Israel returned the land

  • never done and not emphatic compelling from USA to do so

• 1968 - Palestinian Liberation Organisation formed - nationalistic terrorist group calling for the return of Arab land

  • Hijacked US and EU planes, attack on Israeli athletes in the 1972 Munich Olympics

1973 Yom Kippur War

• Egypt and Syria funded by the Soviet Union against Israel funded by the USA

• Israeli army too strong for the Arab countries to win conventionally so they tried to rid Israel of their American allies

  • OPEC embargoes US oil supplies

  • 20% of consumed oil lost to the USA

  • price increased for the consumer by 4x

• No longer rely on Arab oil - USA tried to pacify the Arab nations

• Peace deal signed under Carter in 1978

  • Sinai Peninsula returned to Egypt

1978 Camp David Peace Accords

• Carter, Sadat and Begin

• Went a long way in reducing tensions in the Middle East

• 1974 disengagement agreement

  • in return for the Sinai Peninsula, Egypt would allow Israel use of the Suez Canal and recognise its sovereignty

• 1978 Nobel Peace Prize to the leaders

• 1979 permanent peace agreement build off the Camp David accords

• 1981 - Sadat assassinated but peace continued under Mubarakd

1978 Iranian revolution against the Shah

• Huge chances implemented by the 1963 revolution still not benefitting many workers

  • Discontent with the Shah rising until exile in 1978

• Shah demanded refuge and medical care in the USA

• led to 1979 Iranian hostage crisis in Tehran

  • 66 US citizens held hostage

  • Lost Carter the 1980 presidential election

  • USA refused to release the Shah with terrorist pressure and froze Iranian assets in the USA

• Reagan’s first day of presidency - the hostages are released

  • Growing international pressure on Iran to stop the crisis

Iran-Iraq War 1980

• Brutal war - trench, chemical, air and missile war

• Countries attacking the others’ oil tankers in the Gulf brought all countries with oil interests into the war

• USA selling weapons to Iraq for fear of them otherwise turning to the Soviet Union

  • Highly illegal weapons sales to Iran at the same time - during the hostage crisis

  • Agreements to release the hostages if the demands for weapons were met

• Reagan taking money from these sales and giving them to contra rebels fighting communism in Nicaragua

  • Illegal according to the 1983 Boland Agreement

  • Revealed in 1986 costing Reagan his presidency as he had to go onto national TV to claim ignorance and avoid impeachment

• Both Iraq and Iran where they were at the beginning of the war by ceasefire in 1988

Other Middle Eastern Involvements until 1990

• 1982 - Lebanon invaded by Israel

  • USA sent peacekeeping troops when civil war broke out

  • Bombing of the US embassy in Beirut

  • 1984 - troops withdrawn

• 1986 - action against the Libyan dictator Gaddafi

  • Bombing of the Libyan capital of Tripoli from a base in the UK

  • Libyan terrorists respond with the Lockerbie Bombings in 1988

1990 - Gulf War

• Iraq wanted to annex Kuwait’s oil supply to pay off Iran-Iraq war debt

• Miscalculated thinking the USA would remain passive

  • Didn’t recognise that, by holding 25% of the world’s oil, Iraq threatened US interests

• US supported UN sanctions against Iraq and joined the allied UN army

• Operation Desert Shield 1990 - UN ground forces sent to Saudi Arabia to protect it

• Operation Desert Storm in 1991 - UN air assault using stealth bombers, laser guided bombs and cruise missiles against the Iraqis

• Operation Desert Sabre 1991 - 4 days taken to liberate Kuwait via ground bombing

Results of the Gulf War

• UN stopped short of invading Kuwait themselves

• US ordered a ceasefire to allow Iraqi troops withdrawal

• No overthrowal of Saddam Hussein as Bush thought that would happen naturally

  • Still in power

  • allowed the Taliban to make a base in Iraq, encouraging bases for other anti-US terrorist groups like Al-quaeda