First published at CADTM.
The dominant narrative of US history is presented as that of a nation born out of a struggle for freedom, which gradually expanded democratic rights. This interpretation is deeply misleading. The history of the United States is, above all, one of armed conquest by European powers and their colonists, which began well before 1776 at the expense of Native American peoples.
From the 17th century onwards, in the territory that would become the United States, European colonists waged a protracted colonial war against Native American nations. This war was neither peripheral nor defensive: its objectives were the appropriation of land, the destruction of indigenous societies and the imposition of a colonial order based on racial hierarchies. Massacres of civilians, the destruction of villages, forced displacement, slavery, and treaties imposed by force were the habitual instruments of this conquest.
After independence in 1776 the United States did not break with this logic but transformed it. Colonial violence became state policy, carried out in the name of the Republic. The wars against Native American populations in the 19th century as part of Indian Removal, policy of confinement in reservations, and the extermination of entire peoples prolonged and amplified earlier colonial practices.
Once the internal conquest was largely complete, this approach was extended beyond the country’s borders during the 19th century. The Western Hemisphere, stretching from Greenland and Canada in the north to Chile and Argentina in the south, emerged as a new space for expansion, interference and domination. The history of the United States in Latin America and the Caribbean is characterised by wars, occupations, coups d’état, economic sanctions, and direct or indirect military interventions.
This expansion originates from capitalism’s inherent tendency to develop by broadening its markets and extending its control over the populations it can exploit and the resources it wants to extract. Since the end of the 19th century, characterised by the rise of large, monopolistic capitalist companies with increasingly international and global ambitions, this tendency has manifested itself in frequent interventions in formally independent countries, as well as in a new period of colonisation (such as the division of the African continent among the European powers at the Berlin Conference in 1885).
It goes without saying that the capitalist system, from its origins to its consolidation, includes not only the displacement of Native American communities, the enslavement of African peoples and imperialist interventions, but also the exploitation of the working class in the United States. We mention it here, but it is a dimension of the process that we will not examine in this article.
The enslavement of people of African descent and racial segregation policies
To complete the picture of structural violence that has marked the history of the United States, it is essential to include the enslavement of Africans and their descendants, which began in the colonial era and was institutionalised after independence.
From the 17th century onwards, and especially in the 18th and 19th centuries, millions of Africans were forcibly deported to North America as part of the transatlantic slave trade.
As slaves, they were considered movable property, deprived of freedom, civil rights and any legal recognition as persons. Their forced labour was one of the economic foundations of the colonies and then the young United States, particularly on the tobacco, cotton, rice and sugar cane plantations of the South. The conditions of their exploitation were extremely harsh: exhausting days of labour, physical violence, family separations, and a total lack of legal protection against abuse. Slavery was based on a hierarchical racial system that linked skin colour to social status and which justified oppression through pseudo-scientific and religious theories.
Of course, there was a significant anti-slavery movement, composed of different tendencies, from the most moderate and institutional to the most radical and insurrectionary, represented by figures such as John Brown. Together with the resistance of the slaves, the anti-slavery movement continually raised the issue of slavery as a central and unavoidable theme in US politics.
The American Civil War (1861-1865) was mainly between the slave-owning states of the South and the states of the North. It led to the adoption of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution in 1865, which officially abolished slavery. However, this abolition did not end discrimination and violence. During the period known as Reconstruction (1865-1877), legal progress was made, notably with the 14th and 15th Amendments, which guaranteed citizenship and voting rights to Black men. Similarly, during the occupation of the former slave-owning South by federal troops, measures were taken to protect freedmen from abuse by moneylenders and former masters, their right to vote was protected, Black officials were elected, and universities were established to accommodate the formerly enslaved Black population. The classic work by African-American sociologist W. E. B. Du Bois, Black Reconstruction in America, traces the history of this period. But these gains were quickly undermined when the capitalist class in the North abandoned these radical policies and accommodated the rise of white supremacist groups in the South, leading to the consolidation of power by the former white ruling classes in the South and the enactment of the so-called “Jim Crow” laws, which enforced racial segregation and discrimination, at the end of the 19th century.
These segregationist laws established strict racial segregation in schools, transport, public places and housing. They were upheld in 1896 by the Supreme Court’s “separate but equal” ruling. In reality, services and infrastructure for African Americans were systematically inferior. Added to this was political exclusion through literacy tests and poll taxes, as well as a climate of terror marked by lynchings and racial violence.
This system of legal segregation persisted until the 1950s and 1960s. The civil rights movement, spearheaded by various prominent figures and organisations, led to significant reforms: the 1954 ruling declaring school segregation unconstitutional, followed by the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which prohibited racial discrimination and safeguarded the right to vote. Despite these legal advances, the inequalities inherited from slavery and segregation continue to have lasting effects on the economic, social and territorial levels.
Thus, the history of the United States is marked not only by dispossession and violence against Native American peoples but also by slavery and segregation of African Americans — two distinct systems of oppression both of which had a formative influence on the country’s development.
The Monroe Doctrine
In 1823, the United States government adopted the Monroe Doctrine, named after Republican President James Monroe. This doctrine condemned any European intervention in the affairs of “the Americas.” However, in practice, it masked an increasingly aggressive policy of territorial expansion by the United States, detrimental to the newly independent Latin American states. This expansion began with the annexation of significant portions of Mexico during the 1840s, including Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, and Utah. American troops occupied Mexico City in September 1847 and also seized the strategic port of Veracruz in the same year.
Following the conquest of much of Mexico, the Mexican population and their descendants in the annexed territories joined the other segments of the American population who experienced various forms of displacement, exclusion and denial of rights in the American social and political system.
In 1898, the United States declared war on Spain and, through various means, seized four of its colonies: Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Philippines and Guam.
Notably, in 1902, in a departure from the principles of the Monroe Doctrine, Washington failed to defend Venezuela when it faced armed aggression by Germany, Great Britain, Italy and the Netherlands in order to force it to pay its debts. Subsequently, the United States intervened diplomatically to ensure that Caracas resumed payment of the debt. Washington’s attitude sparked considerable controversy among various Latin American governments, and in particular with the Argentine foreign minister, Luis M. Drago, who stated:
The principle I would like to see recognised is that public debt cannot give rise to armed intervention, let alone the physical occupation of the territory of American nations by a European power.
This later became known as the Drago Doctrine. The debates between governments led to an international conference in The Hague, which resulted, among other things, in the adoption of the Drago-Porter Convention (named after Horace Porter, an American military officer and diplomat) in 1907. This convention stipulated that arbitration should be the first means of resolving conflicts: any State party to the convention had to agree to submit to arbitration proceedings and participate in them in good faith, failing which the State claiming repayment of its debt would regain the right to use armed force to achieve its objectives. Washington repeatedly violated this convention.
In 1903, President Theodore Roosevelt supported and encouraged the secession from Colombia and independence of Panama. His goal was to be able to build and operate the Panama Canal under Washington’s control.
In 1904, the same president announced that the United States considered itself the policeman of America. He stated what is known as the Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine:
Chronic wrongdoing, or an impotence which results in a general loosening of the ties of civilized society, may in America, as elsewhere, ultimately require intervention by some civilized nation, and in the Western Hemisphere the adherence of the United States to the Monroe Doctrine may force the United States, however reluctantly, in flagrant cases of such wrongdoing or impotence, to the exercise of an international police power.
In 1915, the United States invaded Haiti under the pretext of recovering debts and occupied the country until 1934. Uruguayan author Eduardo Galeano wrote:
The United States occupied Haiti for twenty years and, in this black country that had been the scene of the first successful slave revolt, they introduced racial segregation and forced labour, killing 1,500 workers in one of their repressive operations (according to a 1922 US Senate investigation) and, when the local government refused to turn the National Bank into a branch of the National City Bank of New York, they suspended the payment of allowances that were usually paid to the president and his ministers to force them to reconsider.
Other US military interventions took place during the same period: the dispatch of occupation troops to Nicaragua in 1909 and between 1912 and 1933; the occupation of the port of Veracruz in Mexico in 1914 during the revolution; the occupation of the Dominican Republic from 1916 to 1924; the expedition to northern Mexico against the revolution and, in particular, against Pancho Villa’s troops. This list is not exhaustive.
It should be remembered that, in several cases, US interventions have been the prelude to the establishment of long-lasting and bloody dictatorships after the withdrawal of American troops. This was the case in the Dominican Republic and Nicaragua: the dictatorships of Somoza and Trujillo were led by figures who had risen through the ranks as officers in military corps created and trained by the American occupation.
The United States and the debt issue
This brief summary of US intervention and policy in America in the 19th and early 20th centuries helps to understand Washington’s real motivations for rejecting the debts claimed from Cuba in 1898 (read: The USA’s repudiation of the debt demanded by Spain from Cuba in 1898: What about Greece, Cyprus, Portugal, etc.? ) and Costa Rica in the 1920s (read : What other countries can learn from Costa Rica’s debt repudiation). After defeating the Spanish imperial army off the coast of Santiago de Cuba in June 1898, the United States refused to take on the debts that the creditors of the Spanish colony were claiming from Cuba. Washington declared this odious debt null and void, citing its use to maintain colonial rule against the Cubans’ aspirations for independence. Washington used this argument in a perfectly opportunistic manner, as the United States wanted to dominate the island de facto without having to assume payment of the debt. They did the same after the invasion of Iraq in 2003 (read: The Odious Iraqi Debt ). Regarding the cancellation of Costa Rica’s debt to a major British bank after the First World War, the United States again defended Costa Rica opportunistically, aiming to weaken the influence of Britain — still the world’s leading imperialist power at that time — in the Western Hemisphere. It was in the United States’ best interest to appear as the protector of Costa Rica under the Monroe Doctrine, which is a U.S. policy that opposes European colonialism in the Americas.
The testimony of Major General Smedley D. Butler
In 1935, Major General Smedley D. Butler — who took part in many US expeditions in the Americas — , writing during his retirement, described Washington’s policies as follows:
I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903.
It should be noted that by the time he wrote this, Butler had become a fervent critic of the US military interventions and policies in which he had previously participated.
Direct US military interventions in the Western Hemisphere from the end of World War II to 2026
Since 1945, the United States has carried out a series of military interventions in the Western Hemisphere, alternating between clandestine operations, proxy wars and conventional invasions. I will only discuss the most well-known direct armed interventions here.
The first major post-war operation took place in Guatemala in 1954. The Eisenhower administration orchestrated, through the CIA, the overthrow of President Jacobo Árbenz (Operation PBSUCCESS). This effort did not involve a massive landing of American troops: the generals’ coup against the constitutional president benefited from the intervention of several hundred fighters trained and armed by the CIA, supported by psychological warfare and logistical support. The aim was to prevent the continuation of agrarian reform and the nationalisation of American companies in the agro-industrial sector.
In 1961, attention turned to Cuba. The Bay of Pigs operation, designed to overthrow the revolutionary government, mobilised some 1,400 Cuban exiles (Brigade 2506), trained and equipped by Washington. Although the United States entirely planned and supported the operation, no regular American division officially fought on the ground. The failure was swift and costly in political terms. The Cuban people mobilised to defend the revolutionary process.
The qualitative leap occurred in 1965 in the Dominican Republic. Juan Bosch, a progressive intellectual, was the first democratically elected president after the fall of the dictator Trujillo. Seven months after his inauguration, he was overthrown by a military coup supported by the conservative elite, who accused him of being “too left-wing” or pro-Communist. Faced with resistance to the coup, Washington launched Operation Power Pack. Some 22,000 American soldiers were deployed (more than 40,000 would serve on the island during the operation). American losses amounted to several dozen. On the Dominican side, generally accepted estimates put the death toll at between 2,000 and 4,000, including both civilians and combatants.
In the 1980s, a more indirect strategy was implemented in Nicaragua. The Reagan administration did not carry out a conventional invasion but instead supported, financed and trained the “Contras” against the Sandinista government. This campaign was a proxy war: without a massive deployment of American troops, but with advisers, clandestine supervision and significant structured logistical support. Not to mention the laying of underwater mines in Nicaragua’s main ports (Corinto, Puerto Sandino and El Bluff) between late 1983 and early 1984. The CIA directly supervised the operation. Following a complaint filed by Nicaragua, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) issued a famous ruling severely condemning the United States for the unlawful use of force. The court found that the mining of ports and attacks on oil installations constituted a violation of the obligation not to use force against another state. As the proceedings progressed, the United States withdrew its recognition of the ICJ’s compulsory jurisdiction. Washington then used its veto power in the UN Security Council to block enforcement of the ruling (which required payment of compensation estimated at several billion dollars). Nevertheless, this ICJ ruling remains the fundamental reference in international law for the prohibition of the use of force and the principle of non-intervention.
In El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras, the CIA and American military experts systematically intervened during this period to support repressive anti-communist regimes.
In 1983, the United States invaded Grenada (Operation Urgent Fury). Some 7,000 American soldiers landed to overthrow a severely weakened left-wing government after one of its factions deposed and executed Maurice Bishop and other leaders of the New Jewel Movement, which was a political organization in Grenada advocating for socialist policies. The Grenadian government had only an army of about 1,000 combatants. The operation was brief and marked the return of direct and open military intervention.
In December 1989, the intervention in Panama was the most massive since the one in the Dominican Republic. Operation Just Cause mobilised some 27,000 American troops to overthrow General Manuel Noriega and, above all, secure control of the Panama Canal. American casualties numbered in the dozens. The number of Panamanian casualties remains controversial: estimates vary between 500 and 3,000 deaths, including both military and civilian personnel, with fighting concentrated in the urban districts of Panama City, particularly El Chorrillo.
In 1994, Washington intervened in Haiti (Operation Uphold Democracy). Nearly 25,000 American soldiers were deployed.
As for the military aggression against Venezuela on 3 January 2026, approximately 150 aircraft took part in the offensive. Among them were F-35A stealth fighters (from the former Roosevelt Roads naval base in Puerto Rico) deployed to destroy S-300 anti-aircraft batteries and radars, as well as a dozen transport and attack helicopters from the 160th SOAR (Special Operations Aviation Regiment). The raid was carried out by elite Delta Force units, transported by helicopter directly to the Miraflores presidential complex and Fort Tiuna. It is estimated that several hundred commandos took part in the direct assault, while thousands of marines remained on alert on the ships. In addition to the presidential complex, the attacks destroyed research centres, medical supply warehouses in La Guaira and communication antennas in order to paralyse the Venezuelan command. At sea, the amphibious assault group of USS Iwo Jima (LHD-7) served as the logistical centre for the operation. It was supported by a fleet of destroyers and the aircraft carrier USS Gerald R. Ford. President Nicolás Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores were captured at their residence, immediately transferred by force to New York via the Guantánamo military base, and detained in a Brooklyn prison pending a trial scheduled to begin in 2027. The US intervention resulted in the deaths of more than 80 Venezuelan and Cuban fighters who were attempting to protect the presidential couple.
In this list, which is not exhaustive, I have only included attacks in which a significant number of American military personnel or mercenaries trained and directed by them were used. A large number of coups d’état carried out in the Western Hemisphere at the request and/or with the support of the United States should be added, including the following:
- Colombia (1953): coup d’état by Gustavo Rojas Pinilla.
- Brazil (1964): military coup against João Goulart with logistical support from Operation Brother Sam.
- Bolivia (1964): Overthrow of Víctor Paz Estenssoro by General René Barrientos.
- Bolivia (1971): coup d’état by General Hugo Banzer against Juan José Torres.
- Chile (1973): Overthrow (and death) of Salvador Allende by General Augusto Pinochet (CIA support and economic pressure).
- Uruguay (1973): “civil-military coup d’état”.
- Argentina (1976): overthrow of Isabel Perón by a military junta led by Jorge Rafael Videla.
- Venezuela (2002): attempted coup against Hugo Chávez (immediate diplomatic support from the United States, but the coup failed in less than two days).
- Haiti (2004): forced departure of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide (accusations of abduction by US forces during an insurrection).
- Honduras (2009): overthrow of Manuel Zelaya (controversial diplomatic recognition of the interim government).
- Bolivia (2019): forced resignation of Evo Morales
- Venezuela (2019): Washington recognizes Juan Guaidó as president and Trump calls on the Venezuelan military to overthrow President Maduro
The list is far from exhaustive.
Since 1945, US interventions in the Western Hemisphere have encompassed a range of actions, from clandestine operations to proxy wars and conventional invasions. These deployments have varied significantly, from a few hundred men in Guatemala to over 27,000 soldiers in Panama. The human consequences of these interventions have been profound for the nations involved, particularly in the Dominican Republic and Panama.
Conclusion : imperial continuity, from land conquest to hemispheric domination
A historical examination of the wars waged on the territory of the United States and in the Western Hemisphere reveals a fundamental continuity. Violence is not an anomaly in American history: it is its matrix. From the destruction of Native American nations to ongoing interference in Latin America and the Caribbean, the same logic has been repeated over the centuries.
Indigenous peoples were the first victims of this trajectory: dispossessed of their lands, decimated by war, relegated to reserves, deprived of their sovereignty. This internal war, waged in the name of progress and civilisation, provided the ideological and military framework for subsequent interventions. The closure of the “frontier” did not end expansion: it merely displaced it.
Throughout the 20th and 21st centuries, the United States has projected this logic throughout the Western Hemisphere under successive pretexts: the fight against communism, the defence of democracy, the war on terrorism. The methods have evolved, but the objectives have remained the same: to control territories, resources and political decisions of peoples.
Recognising this continuity is not an ideological exercise but a political and historical necessity. It allows us to understand that the interventions taking place today are not breaks with the past but the continuation of a long process. As long as this history remains hidden or minimised, the violence it engenders can continue to be presented as necessary or legitimate.
This article, on the contrary, endeavours to put names on facts, to give a voice back to the dominated peoples and to recall an obvious truth that is too often obscured: American power was built and is still maintained through war and other forms of violence.
Recommended further reading
Ned Blackhawk, Violence on Earth
An in-depth academic study of colonial violence in North America. Blackhawk shows how war, long before 1776, structured power relations and shaped the North American political landscape. Useful for underpinning the analysis of 18th-century conflicts with a solid critical framework.
Dee Brown, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee
A classic of critical history of the Indian wars of the 19th century. Although older and sometimes narrative, this work remains valuable for documenting the massacres, forced displacements and destruction of the Plains nations, based on contemporary accounts and sources.
W. E. B. Du Bois, Black Reconstruction in America: An Essay Toward a History of the Part Which Black Folk Played in the Attempt to Reconstruct Democracy in America, 1860-1880.
In Black Reconstruction in America (1935), W. E. B. Du Bois re-evaluates the Reconstruction period (1865-1880) that followed the American Civil War, showing that African Americans were not passive actors but essential architects of the nascent democracy. Du Bois highlights their efforts to establish a new political and social order, and how the failure of Reconstruction was linked to racial segregation and opposition from white elites, leading to the introduction of segregationist laws.
Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States
An essential reference work in decolonial historiography. The author analyses the formation of the United States as a colonial project based on war, expulsion and the destruction of indigenous societies. A rigorous, well-documented work, particularly useful for establishing a link between the Indian Wars and subsequent imperial interventions.
James D. Cockcroft, Latin America and the United States
Cockcroft’s book consists of three parts, focused on Mexico and Central America, the Caribbean, and South America. This is a two-sided work: on the one hand, it is a practical, easy-to-use and well-documented handbook; on the other, it is a coherent essay offering a global vision that reveals the contradictory but consistent conception of the United States with regard to Latin America.
Eduardo Galeano, Open Veins of Latin America.
In Open Veins of Latin America (1971), Galeano argues that Latin American underdevelopment is not a natural backwardness, but the historical result of centuries of colonial plunder and economic dependence, first under European powers and then under US hegemony.
Greg Grandin, Empire’s Workshop
Essential for understanding the continuity between internal conquest and external intervention. Grandin analyses Latin America as a laboratory for American imperial practices, linking the 19th and 20th centuries in a single trajectory of domination.
Claudio Saunt, Unworthy Republic: The Dispossession of Native Americans and the Road to Indian Territory
A detailed analysis of the political, legal, and military mechanisms behind the expulsion of Native Americans. The book highlights the direct responsibility of federal institutions in the dispossession of Native American nations and debunks the myth of “inevitable” expansion.
Howard Zinn, A People’s History of the United States
An important critical overview. Zinn systematically adopts the perspective of the oppressed – Native Americans, slaves, the working classes – and deconstructs the American national narrative. Although it is a popular work, it draws on a vast corpus of primary and secondary sources. Essential for understanding the overall logic of conquest and state violence.
Acknowledgement: The author would like to thank Rafael Bernabe, Sushovan Dhar and Maxime Perriot for reviewing the text. The author is responsible for any errors it may contain.
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