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AP U.S. History Diagnostic 24. How did the United States choose containment over the National Security Council Report in Latin America?
AP U.S. History Exam 1.45. How did the United States both follow and violate the Truman Doctrine with its Cold War actions in Latin America?
AP U.S. History Exam 1.45 169 Views
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AP U.S. History Exam 1.45. How did the United States both follow and violate the Truman Doctrine with its Cold War actions in Latin America?
Transcript
- 00:00
[ musical flourish ]
- 00:04
And here's your Shmoop du jour, brought to you by overthrow,
- 00:07
the underestimation of one's outer strength.
- 00:12
All right, give this excerpt a read.
- 00:13
[ mumbles ] Truman Doctrine.
Full Transcript
- 00:17
All right, and the question:
- 00:19
How did the United States both follow and violate the Truman Doctrine
- 00:22
with its Cold War actions in Latin America?
- 00:24
And here are your potential answers.
- 00:26
[ mumbles ]
- 00:31
All right, well, during the Cold War, the U.S. made some
- 00:33
pretty, uh, interesting choices in how it dealt with
- 00:36
political instability in Latin America.
- 00:38
So let's see how the U.S. managed to simultaneously
- 00:41
play by and break the rules of the Truman Doctrine
- 00:44
in their adventures south of the border.
- 00:47
During the Cold War in Latin America did A -
- 00:49
the United States offer economic support to countries not
- 00:53
threatened by outside forces?
- 00:55
Well, actually, the U.S. sent significant financial aid only to
- 00:58
countries they believed were threatened by outside forces,
- 01:01
so that knocks out A and D.
- 01:03
Did the U.S. overstep its mission because B -
- 01:07
extensive military aid was sent to countries
- 01:10
fighting off communist threats? Hmm.
- 01:12
Well, most of the country's military resources were
- 01:14
pretty tied up in Asia at the time, so our efforts were primarily
- 01:18
economic ones.
- 01:19
So that eliminates B.
- 01:21
Which means that the U.S. both followed and violated the Truman Doctrine
- 01:24
in Cold War Latin America because C -
- 01:26
communist leaders were overthrown and replaced by dictators
- 01:30
in a series of CIA-led coups.
- 01:33
The main policy of the Truman Doctrine involved
- 01:35
"supporting free peoples who are resisting
- 01:38
attempted subjugation."
- 01:41
But the U.S. often assisted those free peoples
- 01:43
by overthrowing their country's leadership and installing
- 01:46
hand-picked dictators. [ chuckles ]
- 01:48
So C is the right answer.
- 01:50
Unfortunately, these U.S.-backed leaders sometimes sparked as many problems
- 01:53
as the leftists who preceded them,
- 01:55
creating a pretty charged climate
- 01:57
for those clinging to power. [ groaning ]
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