Definition of National Security Doctrine

Gemma Alvarado
Lic. in Psychology. Prof. in Humanities

In the history of Latin America there is an important section whose repercussions are palpable to this day in most of the countries that make up the region, which has to do with the implementation of what is known today as the National Security Doctrine (DNS). It consisted of a military and geopolitical plan implemented by the United States and allies in the Latin American region during the 1960s and subsequent decades.

Background and historical framework

With the end of the Second World War, the hegemony of the dominant countries was reconfigured. The United States took advantage of this period of economic loss in European countries to position itself as a world power. However, rivalry arose with the Soviet Union, whose territory was vast and under a political order contrary to capitalism, jeopardized the development of the early capitalism, in addition to the fact that communism was being adopted as a system in other countries such as China and Vietnam, which is why it became a dangerous enemy for the United States. Joined.

In addition to the above, and having as a precedent a war with an important political and symbolic cost, the confrontation of These countries focused on the implementation of a series of strategies focused on the economy and creating blocks of alliances. This confrontation is now known as the Cold War, and involved not only the dispute over territories, but also an entire blockade. towards communism by the United States, as well as strategies to eradicate it in those places where there was already shocked.

An event that undoubtedly shaped the configuration of the DSN in the Latin American region was the Cuban Revolution, which meant a reconfiguration of the political order of the time. Cuba meant for the rest of the region an alternative to change the political and social dynamics of the time, which is why the emergence of more social movements in other countries was not long in coming.

Since the post-war world panorama was that direct confrontations between countries were not only generally repudiated, but also implied costs. The United States, based on these experiences, generated the idea that it had to create a new strategy of domination, based on maintaining control over key countries and that any confrontation would be internal to the countries and in a manner secret

The implementation of the National Security Doctrine

The plan was implemented through several strategies outlined below:

1. The most important was the training that was given to the military and police forces of each country in the Latin American region.. Although the School based in Panama has been considered a myth, it has also been confirmed that, in reality, the law enforcement forces of some countries were trained, and that said Training today can be considered attacks on human rights, since it was implicit in them to commit acts such as forced disappearance, torture, kidnapping, among others. serious crimes.

2. Social destabilization: those countries where there was a certain order and peace, but which was considered a potential danger by States United, was intervened to create chaos and violence and in this way the intervention was justified military. This was achieved by relying on the media and public opinion, which gave in to give a bad image of those governments that were a danger.

3. Economic destabilization: A final particular way in which the DSN worked was by destabilizing the local currency of several countries, using groups considered economic experts who They served a greater purpose from which risky financial plans were proposed for developing economies such as those of the countries Latin Americans. This created major financial crises that ended up creating an image of chaos.

4. The implementation of military dictatorships: The culmination of the DNS was undoubtedly this strategy and the other actions served this greater purpose, which was to undermine democratic and peaceful processes in some countries. Latin Americans, definitively undertaking processes of military dictatorship to be able to act outside the rule of law and proceed with the eradication of ideologies of left.

Consequences of national security doctrine

When the DSN was at its peak, one country after another fell into military dictatorships whose consequences are evident to this day: financial crises that have not been reported. finished recovering even today after so many decades, social and political instability that remains in most countries, poverty, displacement processes forced and above all the ravages of the violence of the military dictatorships and the crisis of forced disappearance that arose from the training of the military forces of the region.

The DNS created an atmosphere of terror in the face of the advance of a communism that never arrived and in exchange for that it inserted into the region bloody governments that created, outside the law of each country, an entire scheme to be able to proceed in a manner unpunished. Today, justice processes regarding acts committed in Latin American military dictatorships have become complex precisely because of how the doctrine was designed.