In
Professor Stark’s part of the class, we discussed United States intervention in
Latin American nations. One of the main topics of discussion was in regards to
which foreign country would build a canal throughout Central America. After the
election of President James Polk, the United States began their interest in
Latin America. At this point, US intervention in countries such as Cuba and
Haiti became more prominent, and the countries usually didn’t like it. In
Haiti, for example, the United States ruled through a series of puppet
presidents and even rewrote the Haitian constitution. Obviously, the Haitians
were not happy with this. I wondered if perhaps this encounter was the
beginning of the rocky relationship the United States has with other countries
today? I’m sure there are other events that led to the unstable relationship we
have now, but perhaps this resentment towards the United States began when we
were trying to “help” the weak Latin American nations.
This topic
of foreign intervention also leads me to wonder how the next few years will be
in response to our new president. Political views aside, it is no secret that
Trump will not be one of the best communicators when it comes to foreign
policy. I imagine that his conversations with Mexican President Enrique Nieto,
would be hostile ones considering a large part of his campaign was about
building a wall. I’m curious to see if
our relationship with Latin American nations will ever improve, perhaps in the
upcoming years after the election of a new president?
I find your connection between history and the present to be very thought provoking. The United States’ actions in the past most definitely affect the way people view us today. I agree that The United States’ attempts to “help” other Latin American countries have occasionally led to more harm than good for some countries. Do you think there was ever an instance where our help was welcomed? For example, the Monroe Doctrine was enacted in attempts to keep European powers out of Latin America. While this wasn’t entirely successful, do you think our attempts were appreciated? It’s also interesting to see how our foreign relations will progress into the future with a new president.
ReplyDeleteI agree that the role the United States played in past foreign intervention probably pays a large role in how other countries view the United States today. While it is true that the United States has certainly help out foreign countries in times of need, it has also overstepped its boundaries on multiple occasions. With Trump being elected president it will be interesting to see how foreign affairs changes in the next couple of years. Trump has talked a lot about building a wall between the United States and Mexico, which I'm sure does give Mexico the greatest impression of the United States. Relations between the United States and Mexico may become more tense in the next few years. However, Trump supposedly has a decent relation with Putin, the leader of Russia. Relations between Russia and the United States could possibly improve over the next few years. That is something that has not happened in a long time and it will be interesting to see what that could mean for the United States.
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