The Monroe Doctrine began as a warning to European empires two centuries ago but evolved into a doctrine of intervention and hemispheric dominance, shaping how Washington sees its backyard and its power. Though it seemed to recede into history with the end of the Cold War, under Trump’s so-called Donroe Doctrine the Western Hemisphere is once again becoming the centre of American strategic ambition. Will this renewed assertion of power redefine American dominance—or accelerate its decline?
On December 2, 1823, America’s 5th President, James Monroe, made a fateful statement of American policy concerning the Western Hemisphere. Many countries were in the process of gaining independence from their colonial masters in bloody revolutions. There were fears that, if they faltered economically and politically, they might be re-colonised. In a key passage, addressed to the European Powers, Monroe said:
We owe it, therefore, to candour and to the amicable relations existing between the United States and those (European) powers to declare that we should consider any attempt on their part to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace and safety…. We could not view any interposition for the purpose of oppressing them (the nations of the Western Hemisphere), or controlling in any other manner their destiny, by any European power in any other light than as the manifestation of an unfriendly disposition toward the United States.