Trump's only interests in Latin America are migration, drugs, energy and technology
Spectators on the beach view an aerial demonstration during the National Salute to Americas Heroes Air and Sea Show May 28, 2017 in Miami Beach, Florida. (Credit Image: © Brandon Kalloo Sanes/Planet Pix via ZUMA Wire) PA Images. All rights reserved.
In the
middle of December 2017, the Trump administration announced a new National
Security Strategy (NSS). It is a series of premises and objectives based on the
doctrine of political realism (as explicitly assumed in the document), oriented
towards “reestablishing America’s position of power in the world”. It
summarizes the goals to follow in order to protect “American interests” – which
are the interests of a privileged and influential decision-making minority,
though they seem to be presented as “the interests of the American people”.
It is
important to note that one of the characteristics of the Trump administration
in terms of foreign policy is the gap between incendiary discourse, full of
threats and vehement rhetoric, and its decision-making, which on occasion tends
to minimize such positions – from the supposed punishment it was to inflict
upon the Chinese, to the threat to immediately leave the North American
Free
Trade Agreement and its apparently “total” opposition to free trade – such that
the NSS must also be read within the framework of this distance between
statements and facts that has come to mold an uncertain and unpredictable foreign
policy.
The new Strategy represents a change in priorities, granting a greater leading role to the realist principles of power and peace through strength rather than favoring influence, in contrast to the Obama administration and its soft power diplomacy.
In
general terms, the pillars of the NSS (protecting America’s “homeland”, people
and way of life; promoting prosperity; preserving peace through strength; and
promoting U.S. influence in the world) appear to pick up from previous
governments (including part of the liberal creed associated with American
values), but with a change in priorities, granting a greater leading role to
the realist principles of power and peace through strength rather than favoring
influence, in contrast to the Obama administration and its soft power diplomacy – which in practice stemmed from multiple
interventions and military solutions.
In the
case of Latin America, the NSS outlines a few relevant points. The pillar
referred to as homeland protection includes the urgent need for immigration
reform in order to “strengthen border control and reestablish sovereignty”,
while at the same time proposing to fight “transnational criminal organizations
that weaken our allies and corrupt democratic institutions” in their country of
origin in order to prevent them from reaching U.S. borders.
The latter alludes
to migration and drug trafficking, problems that can be resolved from the
perspective of the Trump administration through, for example, enlarging the
border wall with Mexico, but which in reality completely exceed border
“control”: they are the result of an asymmetrical dynamic of subordination and
criminality that stems from and is sustained by the alliances between the
government and the private sector in the United States and the governments of
Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador, which has been going on for
decades and, in recent years, under the Merida Initiative and the Central
American Regional Security Initiative (CARSI).
Within
the framework of the same pillar, but on a “less tangible” plan and in the
vanguard of “new threats”, the Trump administration contemplates “redoubling
efforts to protect our critical infrastructure and digital networks, given that
new technologies and new adversaries create new vulnerabilities”. It should be
noted that this has been a hot topic throughout 2017 in the region, as
evidenced by the relationship between the Israeli State’s military industrial
complex and that of the United States, and the enticing business propositions
presented by Latin America in this regard, especially in countries like
Argentina, Brazil, Colombia and Mexico.
As for
U.S. prosperity (which basically refers to achieving a stable national
economy), the document assures that “America will no longer tolerate chronic
business abuses and will work towards economic relationships that are free,
just and reciprocal”. This may be read superficially as an “antiglobalization”
or “anti-neoliberalism” position, but decisions made by the Trump
administration during 2017 do not support this reading.
What is happening is
that the U.S. continues to promote free trade and neoliberalism when it favors
its “interests”, as demonstrated by the Free Trade Agreements (FTA)
characterized by asymmetrical and abusive conditions. But in the Trump
administration, this dynamic is more clearly visible as an essential component
of “America First”.
Energy is clearly at the forefront of U.S. security and economic policy when one considers the pressure it exerts to liberalize the Latin American hydrocarbon market.
On the
one hand, the U.S. anticipates that it “will use its position of authority in
the energy sector to guarantee that international markets remain open, and that
the benefits of diversification and energy access encourage economic and
national security”. So, in terms of energy resources, the U.S. government
will continue to seek open markets in apparent contradiction to its anti-FTA
position. It is worth noting here that energy resources (together with
strategic materials) have been a part of U.S. security strategy, especially
since the Cold War, structuring both the development and the reach of the
military industrial complex in order to guarantee access to these resources.
On the
other hand, energy is clearly at the forefront of U.S. security and economic
policy when one considers the pressure it exerts to liberalize the Latin
American hydrocarbon market: from its permanent war against Venezuela, to its
pressure for energy reform and dismantling PEMEX in Mexico, to the role played
by the U.S. public/private sector in Brazil’s Car Wash (Lava Jato) scandal and
the consequent breakdown of Brazil’s state enterprises, including Petrobras.
Along these lines, the SSN insists that countries such as Cuba and Venezuela
should implement economic reforms that guarantee “economic opportunities for
all and improve governability” – which is to say, promote State privatization
and the shrinking of the economic and social services, a key neoliberal premise
(which the Trump administration supposedly wants to distance itself from).
By virtue
of the SSN’s myriad inconsistencies, which are in continuity with the
decision-making style that has taken place throughout 2017, uncertainty is
further entrenched with respect to possible scenarios in the regions. What can
be clearly seen is the continued impulse for economic and political policies to
be anchored by an asymmetric and dependent dynamic which will, as it has until
now, be maintained or reconfigured in accordance with the interests of
multinational corporations and the military industrial complex, which by
definition appropriate the power to define “American interests”, and by
extension those of Latin America.
Translated from a Spanish original by Danica Jorden.
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This
article was previously published by CELAG. Please find the original here.