The Violence Central American Migrants Are Fleeing Was Stoked by the US
We're still dealing with the aftermath of atrocities committed by US allies in Central America during the Cold War.
As courts, law enforcement, and the Trump administration
continue to sort out what to do with the
steady stream of migrants either crossing the southern border illegally or seeking asylum, the roots of the current misery are often forgotten. The desperate border-crossers often come
from Central America’s “Northern Triangle”—El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras—and are fleeing
high homicide rates and violence in those countries. But this instability did not arise in a vacuum. Many historians and policy experts are quick to point out that much of the troubles in Central America were created or at least helped by the US’s interference in those countries going back decades. In other words, the foreign policy of the past has profoundly shaped the present immigration crisis.
“Hundreds of thousands of people were displaced in the 1980s,” said Elizabeth Oglesby, an associate professor of Latin American studies at the University of Arizona. “People were fleeing violence and massacres and political persecution that the United States was either funding directly or at the very minimum, covering up and excusing.” Violence today in those countries, she said, is a directly legacy of US involvement.
Oglesby spoke to me from Guatemala, which even today is still feeling the cumulative effects of US actions from over 50 years ago. In the 1950s, Guatemala attempted to end exploitative labor practices and give land to Mayan Indians in the highlands. The move, according to
now-unclassified CIA documents, threatened US interests like the United Fruit Company, which controlled a good portion of land in Guatemala. But instead of citing economic factors, many in the US cried “communism,” saying the labor reforms were a threat to democracy. Wisconsin Senator Alexander Wiley, chair of the Foreign Relations Committee at the time, said he believed that a "Communist octopus" had used its tentacles to control events in Guatemala. In 1954, the CIA helped organize a military coup to overthrow Guatemala’s democratically elected government, and continued to train the Guatemalan military well into the 70s.
More:
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/qvnyzq/central-america-atrocities-caused-immigration-crisis
Been saying this for years, it was US policy in Central America that created the situation they are fleeing from! US govt is responsible to provide help.
