Customer Reviews

Inevitable Revolutions: The United States in Central America (Second Edition)

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I read this book as part of a Political Science course I took, "The Politics of Revolution". I found this work both highly enjoyable and informative. The author does and excellent job of analyzing American foreign policy towards the region of central america as a whole, and then breaking it down and reviewing US involvement in each of the countries. Whether this book has a "politcal agenda" or not (I don't see how any book on history or political science could not) is not the issue. The author points out mistakes in US foreign policy, as well as its ambiguities and paradoxes. I also found the book to be well written and easy to read, I found myself reading 100 pages one night without even putting the book down. Many of my classmates however, found the book to be difficult to read, so that must be taken into account as well. But, for me, I found the book to be an excellent one-volume work on the region and US involement there in the 20th century, and the results of such involvement. It should not be so neatly wrapped up and generalized as being "left-wing presentist bias" as some people seem to do.

In Inevitable Revolutions, Walter LaFeber paints a thorough picture of United States involvement in Central America. It is a sordid picture. Tracing back to the mid-19th century, LaFeber pinpoints the moments when the U. S. government began carving out its sphere of influence in this poor region. He comprehensively brings his analysis into the 20th century with corporations such as United Fruit and the continuing utilization and expansion of the Monroe Doctrine. This concept was continually shaped in so many various ways that it became unrecognizable from its original form. Of course the dominating force in Central America in the middle and later parts of this century was anti-communism. LaFeber justly attacks characters such as the Dulles brothers, who selfishly pursued their own agenda at the expense of the people in the region. Support for dictators and military-oligarchial complexes play a major part of this century's troubles in Central America. The Somozas in Nicaragua benefitted from their close relationships with US lawmakers and politicians. Somoza (all three of them) made our politicians feel comfortable, they spoke English, and they went to our universities, they also carefully guarded our institutions and corporations. This is really a sad history, the bottom line is that scores of people in these countries never benefitted from the US-Central American relationship. The Reagan era proved to be worse than any other eras, the revolutions and their after effects finally came to fruition. LaFeber shows that if the Reagan administration had not looked to Central America as a zealot's playground, there could have been measurable progress. A sordid tale, indeed.

Written by a distinguished historian of American foreign relations, Inevitable Revolutions is a well written and well documented history of USA policy towards Central America from the end of the 19th century to the Reagan/Bush 1 period. Lafeber provides not only the basic narrative but a nice analysis of the basic structural features of US-Central American relations. The fundamental structural feature that emerges at the end of the 19th century is essentially an colonial one. The Central American nations are the site of considerable US investment and their role in the US economy is to provide primary products for the US market and markets for US industries. In addition, the Central American nations (like several Caribbean nations also subject to US domination) are close to crucial sea lanes, a fact enhanced by the construction of the Panama canal. To guarantee political and economic stability, the US government underwrites the power of local oligarchies. In the first decades of the 20th century, this involves numerous direct military interventions. By the 30s, however, US power rested on indirect rule via indigeous governments, usually oppressive military regimes like that of the Somoza family, ruling in tandem with a small upper class. The nature of the economic relationship between the US and the central American nations, and continued population growth, resulted in progressive impoverishment of the majority of people in central American. The ultimate result is that political and social change are possible only via violent political revolutions, either coups to transfer power within the ruling elites, or actual attempts at real social revolutions aimed at the reconstruction of society. Since the USA was the guarantor of the status quo, the attempts at actual revolution, or even relatively moderate levels of reform within these societies, were intrinsically anti-American.
Added to this combustible mixture were the anxieties of the Cold War with the lamentable tendency of Washington policy makers to assume all attacks on the status quo as manifestations of Soviet revolutionary policy. This led to increased military support for almost Central American states, often transforming the primitive militaries of these natiions into more professional but frequently independent and highly destructive political forces. Even the well intentioned efforts to promote economic growth under the Kennedy administration tended to exagerrate existing social inequalities and promote social conflict. This situation results in the inevitable revolutions of Lafeber's title.
Lafeber devotes the last 2 chapters to an incisive and scathing description and analysis of the Reagan/Bush years. This is a sad tale of ideological blindness, simplistic belief in the value of military power, overemphasis on Presidential executive power, and simple stupidity. As Lefeber is careful to point out, US actions had the effect of markedly exacerbating the conflicts in Central America. The consequences were horrible. In El Salvador in the early 1980s, our client government may have been responsible for as many as 50,000 deaths. Since El Salvador had a population of about 4.5 million, this would be the equivalent of hundreds of thousands of deaths in the USA.
As the events regarding the CAFTA negotiations appear to demonstrate, its not clear that the fundamentals of the US - Central American relationship have changed greatly.

"A reader" wrote a scathing review of this book, which actually inspired me to read it. "A reader" obviously has never read the book, and relies on the back cover quotes to critique the entire book. He uses the common "mistake" defense: if America causes a atrocity, it is a "mistake".

This typical, preprogrammed, ideological, response just shows "a reader" has never read the book. Lafeber meticulously goes through the ENTIRE history of Central America and shows that America's support of dictators and the frequent American intervention is not a "mistake". Americas foreign policy instead is a very successful and profitable policy for American business interests and a small Latin American elite.

"it is very clear that this is agenda history or left-wing propaganda more than it is history."

When you boil down what "A reader" is trying to say is that if this book does not sing the praises of Americanism (the religion of Americans), he will not read it.

"but if you are writing a "history" book be fair and objective and not so obviously political."

What "a reader" means is a "history" which praises America, similar to high school textbooks. A history which ignores or justifies away all of America's massacres.

If a history book doesn't have this tone, "a reader" will not read passed the back cover, nor unfortunately, will most Americans, to our neighbors to the south's detriment.

Thanks "a reader" your mindless Americanism encouraged me to read this book!

This is a great book about U.S. involvement in Central America that starts with the Monroe Doctrine and goes through to today. Interesting, coherent, and with lots of interesting quotes, it provides a great beginning to learning more about this area.

Succeeding editions of LaFeber's book about U.S. policy and Central America have become a standard text. In it he argues that the upsurge of revolutionary activity in Central America in the 1970's and 1980's was largely the product of American policies that kept the region in a state of "neodependency." In many ways this is a rather flawed work. One major shortcoming is misrepresenting the U.S.-Nicaraguan relationship during the time of the Somozas. Contrary to what LaFeber asserts, they were not puppets of the United States. Nor were they always supported by Washington. Ironically it is a left-liberal scholar in a work critical of Reagan administration Nicaragua policy who best sets this record straight. (See Robert A. Pastor, Condemned to Repetition.)

LaFeber tries to downplay the pro-Soviet ideology of movements such as the Sandinista Front of National Liberation (FSLN) in Nicaragua. Unfortunately, for his argument, the facts arguable fail to substantiate his conclusions. For example, he presents the Sandinstas' 1980 agreement with international lending agencies and foreign banks to reschedule Nicaragua's foreign debt as resulting from a desire "to stay out of the Soviet bloc." However, observers such as Alexander Alexiev at the RAND Corporation generally noted that by 1980 the Soviet bloc was quite reluctant to provide substantial economic assistance to those Third World Marxist-Leninist regimes that had come to power in the 1970's. Public Soviet commentary on Sandinista economic policies, including the acceptance of aid from and the maintenance of trade ties to capitalist countries was quite positive. I documented this extensively in my PhD. dissertation on Soviet relations with Central America. There is nothing to support LaFeber's implication that Sandinista economic policies were some daring act of ideological independence from Moscow; one might argue that they seem to have accorded with Soviet advice.

Sometimes this book's rhetoric sheds more heat that light. LaFeber often deprecates the motives of those with whose actions he disagrees. For example, he writes, "The C.I.A. [under the Reagan administration]...hire[d] Argentine military officers to train the Contras in Honduran camps." Actually, it appears that Argentine support for anti-Sandinista Nicaraguan exile groups began in 1980, while the Carter administration was still in office and Washington had not yet suspended economic aid to Managua. Argentina's motive apparently was the fact that the Sandinistas had provided sanctuary for exiled Argentine guerrillas. One does not have to be a fan of Argentina's military regime to find its actions in this regard quite understandable; it was retaliating against a foreign friend of its domestic enemy. Again, see Pastor. LaFeber's description provides none of this context.

Elsewhere his analysis scores some good debating points but misses some key substance. He notes that that a 1985 State Department publication had cited Nicaraguan Interior Minister Tomas Borge's statement that the Sandinista revolution "goes beyond our borders" in a slightly misleading way. Despite the unfortunate use of this quotation in the title, however, this report amply documented the Reagan administration's case that the Sandinistas were in fact supporting revolutionary movements in neighboring countries.

In general, LaFeber substitutes anti-U.S. diatribe for serious description and analysis.

Dr. Robert P. Hager, Jr.
Instructor in Political Science
Los Angeles City College

I've read a lot of history. But all in all, I have to say this is the best history book I've read (despite the regional focus). It isn't pretty, but it's detailed and fairly comprehensive. I last read this in 1999 and I have read so much about a lot of other things since, but this book has really stayed with me. I really urge people to read the occasional book like this and to keep an open mind. It isn't radical like Chomsky nor meandering like Galeano. It just explains itself. Check it out.

I think the book provides excellent and one of a kind information on the goverment & their policies
empress amethyst

This is top notch historical scholarship

The book is well researched, but a little hard to follow due to the fact that it is not chronological.

Aside from this, the book is seemingly "left wing" or "revisionist." I would normally discard such a book because it is clearly biased. However, all of the events described in this book are very well documented and not public knowledge for very good reasons.

If your interest lies in exposing the covert actions of the United States government for the last 100 years in Central America this book is definitely for you.

I can honestly say that I was saddened when I saw this book because it is the book I one day hoped to write myself.

The U.S. domination of Central America from the time of the Monroe Doctrine (which was a reservation for Empire-building in 1823) until the present is the preoccuppying theme of this great book. The United Fruit Company, Standard Fruit Company, Wrigley Gum Inc., Exxon, and other U.S. multi-national corporations have repeatedly sodomized the Central American people and made them into their catamites. Moreover, the ruling elites of the Central American vassal states were the only ones who benefitted from the profiteering and exploitation. The peasant majority were incessantly driven to the margins while the oligarchs and the corporations appropriated the best lands (Dictator Somoza of Nicaragua is on the record as saying,"Nicaragua is my farm" and he meant it as he owned huge tracts of tillable land). In fine, this book is a real eye-opener for those who feel they are being bamboozeled by the media. A must read.