The dictators' domino theory: a Caribbean Basin anti-communist network, 1947-1952

摘要

This article uncovers a Caribbean Basin anti-communist intelligence network independent of the U.S. government and the international Cold War. Nicaraguan dictator Anastasio Somoza, Honduran dictator Tiburcio Car?as, and Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo characterized local democratic developments as communist threats to their regimes? national security. With the 1947 Cayo Confites expedition and the 1948 Costa Rican Civil War, the military dictators coalesced into an informal network that increasingly shared intelligence. Joined by the Venezuelan military junta and Fulgencio Batista?s Cuban dictatorship, members nurtured a Caribbean Basin anti-communist domino theory characterising threats to one regime as a transnational danger to regional stability.