After the US military attack that overthrew the Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro on January 3The Trump administration has emphasized its desire for unrestricted access to Venezuela's oil more than conventional foreign policy goals, such as combating drug trafficking or bolstering democracy and regional stability.
During his first press conference after the operation, President Trump stated that oil companies would play an important role and that the Oil revenues would help finance any additional intervention in Venezuela.
Shortly after, the hosts of “Fox & Friends” asked Trump about this prediction.
“We have the largest oil companies in the world.“Trump responded:”the biggest, the biggest, and we will be very involved in it.”
like a historian of relations between the United States and Latin AmericaI am not surprised that oil or any other commodity is playing a role in US policy towards the region. What has surprised me, however, is the Trump administration's candor about how much oil is driving its policies toward Venezuela.
how I have done it recently detailedUS military intervention in Latin America has been largely covert. And when the United States orchestrated the coup that overthrew Guatemala's democratically elected president in 1954, it glossed over the role that economic considerations played in that operation.
By the early 1950s, Guatemala had become one of the main sources of bananas consumed by Americans. as it is today.
The Boston-based United Fruit Company owned more than 550,000 acres of Guatemalan land, largely thanks to its agreements with previous dictatorships. These properties required the intense labor of impoverished agricultural workers who were often forced to abandon their traditional lands. Their salary was rarely stable and they periodically clashed layoffs and salary cuts.
The international corporation networked with dictators and local officials in Central America, many Caribbean islands and parts of South America to acquire immense properties for railroads and banana plantations.
The locals called it the octopus – “octopus” in Spanish – because the company apparently it had something to do with it shaping the region policy, economies and everyday life. The Colombian government brutally crushed a 1928 strike by United Fruit workerskilling hundreds of people.
The company's seemingly limitless influence in the countries where it operated gave rise to the stereotype of Central American nations as “banana republics.”
In Guatemala, a country historically marked by extreme inequality, a broad coalition was formed in 1944 to overthrow its repressive dictatorship through a popular uprising. Inspired by anti-fascist ideals After World War II, the coalition sought to make the nation more democratic and its economy more just.
After decades of repression, the nation democratically elected Juan José Arévalo and then Jacobo Arbenzunder which, in 1952, Guatemala implemented an agrarian reform program which gave landless farm workers their own undeveloped plots. The Guatemalan government claimed that these policies would build a more equitable society for Guatemala's impoverished indigenous majority.
united fruit denounced Guatemala's reforms as the result of a global conspiracy. He alleged that most of Guatemala's unions were controlled by Mexican and Soviet communists and described agrarian reform as a ploy to destroy capitalism.
United Fruit sought to involve the United States government in its fight against the policies of the elected government. While its executives complained that Guatemala's reforms hurt their financial investments and labor costs, they also viewed any interference in their operations as part of a broader communist plot.
He did it through a advertising campaign in the United States and taking advantage of the anti-communist paranoia that prevailed At the moment.
United Fruit executives began meeting with Truman administration officials as early as 1945. Despite the support of sympathetic ambassadorsThe United States government apparently would not intervene directly in Guatemalan affairs.
The company appealed to Congress.
He hired well-connected lobbyists to portray Guatemala's policies as part of a communist plot to destroy capitalism and the United States. In February 1949, several members of Congress denounced Guatemala's labor reforms as communist.
Sen. Claude Pepper called the labor code “obviously intentionally discriminatory against this American company” and “a machine gun pointed at the head of this American company.”
Two days later, Rep. John McCormack echoed that statement.using exactly the same words to denounce the reforms.
Senator Henry Cabot Lodge Jr., Senator Lister Hill and Representative Mike Mansfield He also went on record, reciting talking points outlined in United Fruit memos.
No legislator said a word about bananas.
Seventy-seven years later, we can see many echoes of past interventions, but now the US government has lowered the veil: in its appearance after the attack on Maduro this month, Trump said “oil” 21 times.
Aaron Coy Moulton is an associate professor of Latin American history at Stephen F. Austin State University in Texas and the author of “Caribbean blood pacts“Guatemala and the fight for freedom during the Cold War.” This article was prepared in collaboration with the conversation.
