| Chapter 2: | The Relations of Cuba with Latin America and the Caribbean: The Long and Winding Road of Reconciliation |
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active Latin American countries—Mexico, Colombia, Venezuela, and Panama—created the Contadora Mediation Group to look for solutions to the Central American civil wars, utilizing Cuba’s close relations with the Sandinista government and the guerrilla forces from El Salvador and Guatemala as important channels of communication.
The debacle of the Argentinean military dictatorship forced it to accept a transition to democracy under the radical president Raul Alfonsin in December 1983. The country reestablished its diplomatic relations with Cuba later that year. The Argentine events were the start of a process of democratization across South America that by the end of the decade would bring to power democratic governments in several countries, including Brazil, Chile, and Uruguay. The arrival of these democratic governments created new diplomatic openings for Cuba.13
However, the 1980s also saw the neoconservatives come to power in the United States. President Reagan was a spokesperson for an articulate sector of intellectuals, politicians, and powerful businessmen who launched a new crusade against communism. The primary anti-Communist front was against the Soviet Union, challenging the activity of its so-called proxy states by providing funding to rebel groups in Nicaragua, Afghanistan, Angola, Cambodia, and Mozambique. However, Cuba was not exempted from attack. The primary thrust of the attack against Cuba occurred in Grenada in October 1983 when the United States invaded the island on the pretext that Cuban support for the leftist New Jewel Movement government was part of a Cuban plan to spread revolution throughout the Caribbean. Several Cuban construction workers died in the invasion, and at its end, a pro-U.S. government was installed on the island.
The consequences of the Grenada events for Cuba’s relations with the Caribbean countries were serious. The U.S. military intervention was legitimated by political and legal support by the members of the Association of Caribbean States (ACS). It was a time of dominance by conservative leaders in the region, led by Edward Seaga of Jamaica and Eugina Charles of Dominica, who championed the U.S. invasion. As scholar Anthony Maingot articulated, it was the time of the Adams Doctrine (named for the Barbados premier, Tom Adams), which stated