After World War II, fears of spreading communism took
America’s Cold War battle to every corner of the globe.
-It must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples who
are resisting attempted subjugation.
If we falter in our leadership,
we may endanger the peace of the world.
U.S. economic interests long drove American
foreign policy in Latin America.
But the success of the Cuban revolution in 1959 focused
attention on the dangers of the Soviet Union’s ideological
expansion so close to home.
-In less than four years, Fidel Castro, who came to power on a
wave of personal popularity, has allowed himself to become
dominated by Russia.
Her support now constitutes a threat to Western security.
In response, the U.S. supported coups against leftist governments in
Brazil, Ecuador and Chile, and even sent U.S. troops
to the Dominican Republic.
Then, in 1979, Nicaragua’s U.S.-backed
dictatorship fell, sending new alarm bells off in Washington.
-Nicaragua has become the first Soviet foothold on the continent of
the Americas.
A military buildup unprecedented for Central America,
aided by nearly 2,000 military and security advisers from Cuba.
-American foreign policy makers feared that it was creeping
communism, that it was going to be Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala,
all the way up to the soft underbelly of Kansas.
U.S. officials turned their attention to El Salvador, where military
repression of popular dissent had fueled a growing leftist insurgency.
The tiny country soon became America’s line in the sand.
-It was said here today the decisive battle for Central America is
underway in El Salvador.
-If we do not act promptly and decisively in defense of freedom,
new Cubas will arise from the ruins of today’s conflicts.
-We’re not talking about an effort that is focused on a single country,
Salvador.
We are talking about an effort that affects an area of
enormous geopolitical importance to us, the United States.
-If I recall correctly, Secretary of State Haig went to President Reagan
and said, Mr. President, this is one you can win – quote, unquote.
Military and economic aid poured into the country, as did
American military advisers.
And Reagan threatened to go further.
-The White House today refused to rule out the eventual use of
American combat troops to help prevent the overthrow of the
government in El Salvador.
But the strategy emboldened El Salvador’s right-wing government,
which had already shown itself adept at political violence.
-For U.S. policymakers, the case of El Salvador fits the classic
definition of diplomacy: choosing between the undesirable and the
unacceptable.
The question remains, how far is the U.S. prepared to go to
prevent the unacceptable?
-President Reagan gave almost a green light to fighting this war any
way the Salvadoran military wanted to fight it.
The way they wanted to fight it was a strategy of massacres.
And that strategy meant that the chief victims in El Salvador in this
civil war were always civilians, always unarmed people.
In the end, more than 75,000 Salvadorans were killed.
And there was no quick victory.
-Ten years later, they were still fighting.
And our main contribution was to destroy El Salvador over the
next ten years.
The, a whole generation was, was wiped out.
The productive capacity of El Salvador
was terribly damaged, and it was a – simply a case where our reaction
lacked all proportionality.
We tried to defeat an authentic revolutionary movement,
and it proved impossible even in a postage-stamp country the
size of El Salvador.
And El Salvador was far from alone.
-For Latin Americans, always we have had the problems that we had
the government of the United States looking to us and seeing as a devil
any social change.
American foreign policy had supported autocratic rulers
throughout Latin America.
-The Reagan administration extended the official hand of
friendship to another military or authoritarian government today, this
time to the government of Chile.
The U.S. was responsible for the evolution of Latin America in the
hands of dictators and – and civil wars.
It was a desert of dictators, the whole region in the south and
then the whole civil wars in the Cent – in Central America.
America’s complex legacy in the region continues to play out today.
-It’s hard to, to realize, but the U.S. government is still dealing with the
consequences of what the U.S. government in the 80s did.
Of all the unstabilization, that their policies
cost in Central America and Guatemala and Honduras,
in El Salvador, in Panama even, in Nicaragua — that failed foreign
policy will affect the, the, the, the U.S. for, for decades.
-Part one of the consequences is the crisis we see on the border today
with immigration.
-If you pursue endless war as a government policy, you will get
immigrants.
You will get refugees.
Looking back, America's actions often had the opposite effect of
what they were supposed to achieve.
-National security had become the justification for actions that actually
jeopardized our national security and did not reinforce it.
-I mean it’s an old cliché, you know, “Those who forget history are
doomed to repeat it” but we need to look at it and say, be careful about
who you support, who you get in bed with.
We need to learn our lessons.