George A. Lopez

For the past month world headlines have continued to focus on whether the US has fully lost the peace in Iraq. But lurking beneath that dominant story was one of another shaky testing ground for US foreign policy, one that may have at least as much significance as Iraq for US security in the years ahead.

At the foreign ministers meeting of the Organization of American States held in Florida during the first week of June, the US met with more political distain than it has for the past three decades. A consistent concern and condemnation about US interventionism was echoed by the ministers. The imperial theme indicated what a lost continent Latin American has become under the Bush Administration.

This situation is a tragic irony. The steady optimism of the nineties about the resurgence of democracy in Latin America and confidence in the emergence of free trade areas to stimulate jobs and export growth has ended. Even as President Bush praised a Central American- Dominican Republic free trade agreement, it is clear that Bolivia, Haiti and other states face massive economic and social problems that neither free trade nor democracy can adequately address.

The US call for aggressive fostering of democracy has too much of a Cold War ring to it for most Latin Americans. Many sense that in the post 9-11 world Washington has other priorities that trump full scale socio-political progress in the Americas. Or, as in the case of promoting its ‘global democracy agenda’, Latin’s believe that the US has decided to define what constitutes a quality democracy through the lens of its own national interest.

This divergence of views, considered in the Washington as ‘refining’ our position, has eroded the respect for US leadership that was held in most Latin capitals, where the term ‘hypocrisy’ is more frequently heard. The Bush team flunked the credibility test on democratic initiatives early on. When the attempted coup against President Chavez of Venezuela occurred, it sparked an outcry for the restoration of the elected democratic leader throughout the continent. Only the Bush Administration failed to condemn the action immediately. And then US officials were dismayed when Chavez and others claimed potential US involvement or blessing of the criminal intervention.

This change in style and substance has led to confrontations and missteps by the Bush Administration by which they have turned anthills into mountain-like obstacles to improved US-Latin relations. There is no better example than the tough case of Cuba.

While most observers acknowledged that the best policy for the US was to await Castro’s demise by building linkages with Cuban civil society groups, the Bush team chose 1960s style punishment and ostracism. We might expect that in order to please conservative supporters, especially the Cuban diaspora community in Florida, that Mr. Bush would rachet-up the rhetoric, if not the real hostility, toward the isle and its aging leader. But Bush chose to roll back travel, trade and other programs that were benefitting average Cubans. Then he threatened secondary sanctions on non-US actors who had been doing business with Cuba for years. What sent most open-minded Latin Americans over the edge in assessing US intentions regarding Cuba was the 2002 claim made by John Bolton that Cuba was developing a secret biological weapons program.

Maybe the most disturbing feature of the US-Latin American relationship can be seen in the downward slide of US-Mexican relations. What began as a mutual problem-solving relationship between two former governors turned sour soon after 9-11. Mr. Bush used part of the first meeting with Mexico’s President Fox to announce at a press conference a wider set of initiatives related to the US war on terror. No wonder that much of relations between the two nations have been reduced to homeland security concerns seen from the US perspective.

The ticking time bomb that escapes Washington’s consciousness is the very tentative financial underpinnings of the Latin economies. While George Bush has put all of its emphasis on expanding trade zones, Latin American analysts note how Bill Clinton responded with a US bailout to the collapse of the Mexican peso. As the financial crisis of Argentina mounted, George Bush’s White House sat idly by. The inaction and its meaning did not escape the continent’s bankers and money managers.

Even with this fractured state of relations the Bush Administration can still take steps to remake its image and revamp unhelpful policies. First, the Administration’s policy pronouncements about democratic reform must exhibit more historical and regional sensitivity, as well as consistency. To pursue democracy only in Cuba and Venezuela, but neglect Haiti, Ecuador and Bolivia simply will not garner support. To avoid charges of hypocrisy, US engagement of civil society groups continent-wide would be in order.

The relationship between democratic futures and the war on terror need to be articulated and reconciled in the Latin case. This puts Washington face to face with the dilemma of their own policy choices with Colombia. Since 2000, the US has supplied more than $US 3 billion to Bogota in military aid. The US chose to wage a drug war in the 1990s which after 2001 they re-labeled as a new front in the war on terror. This has now boxed the US into only bad choices, as President Uribe seeks to employ amnesty and re-writing laws, in the hope of demobilizing right wing ‘terrorist’ groups in exchange for their immunity.

Regarding Mexico maybe the President should not be faulted. No politician on either side of the border is yet willing to proclaim out loud what the citizens of the region know to be true: that between Monterrey and Missouri and looking west, the US and Mexico have spawned a Hispanic ‘nation’ with distinct economic and social character whose politics straddle two countries. As Texas governor, Bush surely dealt with this reality first-hand. But as President his eyes have glossed over this reality. Nothing could be more damaging and short-sighted to a secure and prosperous America.

As with other foreign policy arenas – as in Europe, with Russia and in the Middle East - where events ‘on the ground’ have overwhelmed the capacity and vision of the Bush Administration, US policy toward Latin America is now a set of mixed messages in search of real meaning for the politics and economics of Latin societies. As it had to learn the hard way in Europe, the Bush team needs more time listening to Latin’s and more effort in talking with them, rather than at them. And they need to take seriously what they hear, and to act creatively to the fading opportunity to recover lost ground – and a continent. ----

George A. Lopez is senior fellow at the Joan B. Kroc Institute of International Peace Studies at the University of Notre Dame.

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