The Monroe Doctrine and Manifest American Destiny: The Myth About Reason (3)

Published at: 19/06/2026 05:00 PM

For the United States to consolidate its global power, it must reaffirm its influence in the region, and to this end, it maintains as its premise the myth of manifest destiny and the Monroe Doctrine, now updated to the times, applies what is known as the Donroe Doctrine; which is a geopolitical term that emerged to describe the aggressive foreign policy approach of the American president Donald Trump to the Western Hemisphere. This policy was officially formalized in the Office of National Security Strategy (ESN) under the formal label of “ Trump Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine”.

The Argentinian journalist and political scientist, Ayelén Oliva, wrote an article called “The new National Security Strategy takes up the Monroe Doctrine”, which was published on the BBC NEWS portal in December 2025, and in which she explained that “the new D. Donroe's doctrine is understood within the framework of the ESN policy, published by the White House on December 4, which embodies the vision of the world of the American government”.

In the same way, in a document signed by Trump in November 2025, he assured that his government “has acted with historic urgency and speed to restore American strength at home and abroad and, after years of neglect, the United States will reaffirm and apply the Monroe Doctrine to restore preeminence. American in the Western Hemisphere”; assuming that document according to its approach as the “Trump Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine”.

According to the new security guidelines applied by the ESN, the United States reaffirmed its decision to expand its military presence and influence in the region on the grounds of curbing illegal immigration, containing the spread of drug trafficking and improving relations with its ideological allies and business partners.

To do so, Trump proposes to return to President James Monroe's foreign policy of “America for Americans”, with which the country declared in 1823 its intention to protect the region from the advance of powers outside the continent, and mentioned the pun during a press conference where he spoke of the operation against the president of Venezuela , Nicolás Maduro: “Now they call it the Donroe Doctrine. U.S. dominance in the Western Hemisphere will never be questioned again.”

Given these facts, we can ask ourselves: What is the new Monroe Doctrine like in the region? and What are Trump's concerns and interests in Latin America?

Convinced that the continent must respond to American interests, Trump signed that document endorsed by the ESN and in it he explained that “the United States must be pre-eminent in the Western Hemisphere as a condition for our security and prosperity, a condition that allows us to assert ourselves with confidence wherever and whenever we need it in the region”.

On this topic, Will Freeman, a researcher at the Council on Foreign Relations , Trump seeks to give a “new twist to an old idea, it is a kind of ideological justification for US intervention or for the heavy hand in the region, which explicitly focuses on immigration”.

The idea of a strategy inspired by the old Monroe Doctrine is not new. As early as 1904, President Theodore Roosevelt established his own “ Roosevelt Corollary” to that 19th century doctrine.

At the time, Roosevelt argued that the United States should intervene in countries in the region if they were unable to meet their financial commitments or care for their democracies, as Freeman explained.

Freeman explained that “for Trump, Latin American countries are the source of many of the problems faced by the United States, such as illegal immigration and drug trafficking, but at the same time they can be the key to solving them, a problem that originates in Latin America, since half of the immigrants come from the region. He also mentions the danger of drug cartels, considering that almost all the cocaine consumed in the United States comes from three countries in the region: Colombia, Peru and Bolivia.”

The document also mentions the need to limit hostile foreign incursions, in a clear reference to China, although it does not mention it, in commercial matters, Trump seeks to impose his agreements with his partners in the region under the imprint of America First (first the United States). According to the ESN, “an economically stronger and more sophisticated Western hemisphere becomes an increasingly attractive market for American trade and investment.”

For Bernabé Malacalza, author of the book “The Crusades of the 21st Century”, the new architecture of national security is based on the fact that “the United States considers the region as part of its internal security border and that is why it seeks a more convincing military presence to control land borders and maritime routes”.

The ESN even enables “the use of lethal force to replace the failed strategy based solely on law enforcement in recent decades” and maintains that “force is the best deterrent”; what a foreign policy is leaves open the option of retaliation. The Trump administration seeks to recover the idea of “peace through force”, the motto of former President Ronald Reagan, which is based on trusting military power as a guarantor of its stability.

For the Venezuelan case, after the war operation that began with the kidnapping of President Nicolás Maduro in January 2026, the interest of the United States in the country was basically focused on guaranteeing the natural and strategic resources at its disposal, with its own commercial conditions. The Trump administration maintains economic sanctions against Venezuela due to strategic reasons and geopolitical control that the White House uses as a tool of extortion and pressure to seize the country's resources.

After 6 months of the kidnapping of President Maduro, the United States maintains a conditioning of sanctions and has adopted a strategy of “dropper relief”. Instead of lifting the blockade in a generalized way, the Trump administration prefers to grant specific licenses and individual benefits, such as surgical measures to facilitate bilateral and oil negotiations without losing economic control over the country.

It seems then that with these imperial actions under the so-called Donroe Doctrine, it is intended to manage economies and impose governments in the region, allowing the United States to use wealth according to its interests and decide on the future of the Peoples, just as Monroe did at the time.

AMELYREN BASABE/Mazo News Team