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THE US has a long history of interference in governance in the Caribbean and Latin American regions, with multiple countries such as the Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, Honduras, Mexico, Cuba, Haiti, Grenada and Venezuela feeling the brunt of the US’ claim that the region are in its backyard.

Two of the most well-known incidents are the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba in 1961, where CIA-trained Cuban exiles tried and failed to overthrow Fidel Castro’s revolutionary government, and the 1983 Grenadian invasion codenamed Operation Urgent Fury, carried out by the US and a coalition of Caribbean countries, which resulted in the house arrest and execution of Grenada’s second prime minister, Maurice Bishop.

The current movement of US ships into regional waters and a lethal strike against an alleged Venezuelan drug vessel has raised concerns throughout the region about the intentions of the US. US president Donald Trump, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and others have stated that the ships are there to control drug cartels who are using Venezuelan and Caribbean waters to get drugs into the US.