Did We Forget the Monroe Doctrine?

From AP via Da Shadow

“BOGOTA, Colombia – Venezuela and Ecuador sought Monday to make Colombia pay a high price for killing a leftist rebel leader in the Ecuadorean jungle — expelling its diplomats, ordering troops to the border and cracking down on trade across the border.

But Colombia quickly struck back, revealing what it said were incriminating documents seized from the rebel camp that suggest its neighbors have been secretly supporting the leftist rebels’ deadly insurgency.

And in a tit-for-tat move, Venezuela later displayed the laptop of a slain drug trafficker, which it said contained information implicating Colombia’s national police chief in the cocaine trade.”

This article continues on to discuss the possibilities of Columbian rebels buying and selling uranium, Venezuela actively funds Columbian rebels (upwards of $300 mil), and that Columbia, Venezuela, and Ecuador are all actively mobilizing troops on their borders.

In an article by Seth Weinberger of Security Dilemmas (found via Da Shadow) he discusses the United States role in this situation:

“The country that is most needed, in theory at least, to defuse the rising tension is the United States. With its political clout, military power, and economic might to provide inducements for cooperation, the US is invaluable in resolving these kinds of situations. In theory at least. In reality, US involvement would be, to put it mildly, counter-productive. The US, and President Bush,(Ah, yes, the “diplomat” has been at work again God help us thank you Lord)  have spent so much time and energy needling Venezuela and Chavez about low-level policy disagreements like Venezuelan arms deal, not to mention the idiotic near-support for the attempted 2002 coup, the US has so poisoned the waters that it has no ability to influence the country when the situation is serious, as it is now. US attention has only emboldened and strengthened Chavez, allowing him to use US “imperialism” as a diversionary tactic to justify his domestic policies. It’s hard to understand what the US believes it has gotten out of such antagonism, and now the policies are having a real impact on the ability of the US to maintain regional stability and order.

We can only hope that this situation will be resolved short of war. The countries of South America have enough problems without adding war to the mix. But we can also only hope that US policymakers will learn a valuable foreign policy lesson. Foreign policy capital is far too precious to squander on meaningless needling and ineffective interference. By engaging with and responding to Chavez’s rhetoric and by developing a reputation as partisan and opposed to Chavez, the US has compromised its ability to act when its influence and power is most needed.”

 

I think this situation, although possibly at a boiling point, will subside.   I can’t see this turning into a full scale war because I believe these leaders should be smart enough to see that the US would step in if need be.

 

Although the problem with that is that our military force is so divided in the Middle East that I do not know what troops we would send.  Any Minutemen still lurking around in Massachusetts?  Dust off those muskets boys, some crooked drug dealing politicians need some baby sitting!!

 

It is our responsibility as the only real superpower in this hemisphere to help bring this issue back to a low simmer.   What can be done in the long run remains to be sun.  As Da Shadow pointed out to me, if its a McCain presidency should we be expecting a lot of the same?