Monroe Doctrine

In 1904 President Theodore Roosevelt claimed, in what became known as the Roosevelt Corollary, that the United States could intervene in any Latin American nation guilty of internal or external misconduct. Roosevelt's statement was precipitated by Germany, Britain, and Italy, which were trying to force Venezuela to repay debts to those countries. Roosevelt involved the United States in settling the matter. The corollary was part of President Roosevelt's address to Congress that year. Roosevelt's corollary to the Monroe Doctrine set a precedent and therefore justified subsequent U.S. intervention in Caribbean states during the administrations of Presidents William Taft and Woodrow Wilson. By the 1920s Latin American countries were protesting U.S. involvement.

In the 1920s and the 1930s, the United States reduced the doctrine's scope by favoring action in concert with the other American republics. The Platt Amendment, which was part of the U.S. treaty with Cuba in 1903 and which provided for U.S. involvement in the rule of Cuba, was revoked in 1934. This emphasis on acting with other nations, or Pan-Americanism, continued during and after World War II with the Act of Chapultepec (1945) and the Rio Pact (1947), which declared that an attack on one American nation was an attack on all. The formation of the Organization of American States in 1948 was designed to achieve the aims of the Monroe Doctrine through Pan-Americanism. Subsequently, however, fear of Communism in Latin America prompted the United States to return to unilateral actions against Guatemala (1954), Cuba (1961), and the Dominican Republic (1965), without consulting its Latin American allies.

The administration of U.S. President Ronald Reagan (1981-1989) openly espoused the Monroe Doctrine once again as it resisted Communism in the Americas. This reaffirmed the original intent of the Monroe Doctrine to prevent European expansion in the Americas. Despite this position, Reagan supported Britain's claim to the Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas) off the coast of Argentina in 1982.

As a component of foreign policy, the Monroe Doctrine has had considerable effect and has had strong support in the United States, in part because it has promoted U.S. interests. The doctrine has served other American nations, too, particularly because it asserts their right to independence. Because the doctrine as originally formulated made no clear distinction between the interests of the United States and those of its neighbors, however, the United States has used it to justify intervention in the internal affairs of other American nations. Given growing U.S. anxiety about the unstable politics of Latin American countries, intervention has been especially prevalent and controversial in the 20th century.