Search for Security: The United States and Central America in the Twentieth Century

Abstract

The fall of Nicaraguan strongman Anastasio Somoza in July 1979 contributed to the publication of an abundance of literature on United States-Central American relations and, like the literature before it, focused largely upon the crisis at hand. Two historical surveys appeared. Walter LaFeber's Inevitable Revolutions: The United States and Central America represented a revisionist approach, charging that United States economic imperialism is responsible for the present crisis. John Finding's Close Neighbors, Distant Friends: United States-Central American Relations is a straightforward account describing Washington's response to various crisis. Still an analysis of the literature is absent. In an effort to address that issue, this article examines the literature on United States-Central American relations in the twentieth century and concludes that the United States acted on behalf of its own security interests, whether or not the threat of foreign intervention had been real or imagined. In effect, the United States maintained the status quo and failed to deal with the structural problems responsible for the contemporary crisis.