(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Wilsonianism Comes to México - April 21, 1914 (When the USA invaded my home state.) [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.', 'Backgroundurl Avatar_Large', 'Nickname', 'Joined', 'Created_At', 'Story Count', 'N_Stories', 'Comment Count', 'N_Comments', 'Popular Tags'] Date: 2023-04-21 A painting depicting the defense of the port of Veracruz in 1914 from U.S. invasion. (Mexican National Archives) Despite the Republican Party’s infantile obsession with violating the sovereign territory of México, it is not unprecedented — even by a U.S. President who’s foreign policy reputation has been historically viewed as positive: advocating self-determination, humanitarianism and open diplomacy. Woodrow Wilson’s ideals are often called Wilsonianism. But Wilson did authorize the invasion of México as well as leading U.S. military interventions in Haiti from 1915 (that ended in 1934), Dominican Republic in 1916 (though 1924), Cuba in 1917, and Panama in 1918 (as well as maintaining the Taft-era intervention in Nicaragua throughout his administration). At least the modern-era Republicans have never hid by a façade of ‘moral diplomacy’: their motives are merely two: (1) racism; and (2) economic imperialism for their financial backers. (Those of us from Latin America don’t see much difference between the current attitudes on the right and Wilsonianism.) The Invasion and Occupation In April 1914, Mexican officials in Tampico, Tamaulipas arrested a few American sailors (bluejackets) who entered into a prohibited area. Wilson, already unhappy with General Victoriano Huerta, who came to power in 1913, used the incident to justify ordering the U.S. Navy to occupy the port city of Veracruz. Wilson had a grudge with México long before this. He cloaked his contempt in a moralistic tone about the brutality (and undemocratic) turns of the ongoing La Revolución. But, even in his own papers, evidence shows that his attitude was driven by British relations with México (and the Central American republics) that was exemplified by a stern warning his administration gave the British when they sent warships to Guatemala the year before to collect on an almost 100 year debt! In 1913 Josephus Daniels, Secretary of the Navy warned that the British government was fomenting insurrection in México to benefit their petroleum companies. By the time of the invasion, Lord Cowdray (Weetman Pearson, 1st Viscount Cowdray), who held a number of lucrative oil holdings in México floated General Huerta a loan to help him hold power. On November 24, 1913, U.S. Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan cabled U.S. representatives in México that the U.S. policy on Huerta was “to cut him off from foreign sympathy and… to force him out,” resorting to, if necessary, “less peaceful means to put him out.” After the incident in Tampico, Mexican authorities quickly released the sailors, but U.S. naval forces commander Admiral Henry T. Mayo demanded of Huerta a formal apology and a 21-gun salute. Huerta issued the apology but declined to order the salute. ‘Hope, even now’ Wilson cooking up his Mexican policy with a large seasoning of ‘FORCE’. (Published April 1916 — but was just as relevant two years before.) Tensions worsened. Chief of Staff Major General Leonard Wood sent Douglas MacArthur, then a Captain in the Office of the Chief of Staff, to to assess the situation. Before MacArthur arrived, Wilson used a delivery of arms to the port of Veracruz (300 miles south of Tampico) as a justification. Agents of Huerta had purchased arms and munitions in the U.S. and used a German steamer (that routed the weapons through Europe) for delivery to México. Wilson decided to bombard the city, seize the customhouse at Veracruz and impound the cargo. When this occurred on 21 April, the Mexicans resisted, precipitating a battle in which 126 Mexicans were killed and 200 were wounded. Huerta severed diplomatic relations after U.S. forces occupied the city. (Legend has it — or maybe just historians sympathetic to Wilson editorialized it — that Wilson was appalled by the loss of lives.) Ultimately, the U.S. Army’s 5th Brigade, with 7,000 troops, occupied Veracruz. The move greatly weakened Huerta's control, cutting off one-fourth of all Mexican customs that came through the customhouse. In the U.S., the event sparked debate between labor leaders — Samuel Gompers and the American Federation of Labor (AFL) approved of Wilson’s actions, mineworkers leader William D. Haywood denounced it. (After the Revolution, Gompers ultimately supported the Mexican government and aided in setting up labor organizations modeled on the AFL rather than a more radical approach advocated by a number of labor leaders in México.) Armed civilians (Mexican National Archives). I will not post the photos of a foreign flag flying over my homeland but Wikipedia and the Library of Congress has many. Seeking his own adventures after arriving on May 1, Captain MacArthur snuck out of the port city and, using a railway handcar and a Mexican engineer and two railway workers as paid collaborators (in essence, hostages), sought out railway engines. He ended up about 50 miles down the coast in the coastal city of Alvarado. On his return trip, he encountered more resistance, including a shoot-out with two pursuers. (Of course, it beggars belief that MacArthur, hearing where the engines were at, merely did not have the U.S. Navy take him (on one of their reconnaissance vessels) to the port of Alvarado. That would have deprived him of fodder for his memoirs.) The U.S. settled in for a seven-month occupation. Wilson welcomed an offer of Argentina, Brazil, and Chile to mediate; and Huerta also accepted. Wilson wanted to use the mediation conference, which began in Niagara Falls, Canada, on May 20th, 1914, to get rid of Huerta. But Carranza, who had denounced the U.S. aggression at Veracruz, instructed his delegation, which never really participated in the conference, to refuse a cease-fire and to deny the right of the mediators to discuss the Mexican situation. The conference adjourned on July 2nd without positive results. México and the U.S. occupation, 1914 Huerta now feared a number of enemies: (1) internal armies, separate opposing troops lead by Emiliano Zapata and Álvaro Obregón made their moves toward the capital, and (2) the U.S., who he thought might advance toward the capital as well. After Huerta’s Federal Army was repeatedly defeated in battle by general Obregón and the defeat to Pancho Villa at the Toma de Zacatecas (“Taking of Zacatecas”), Huerta bowed to pressure and resigned the presidency on July 15, 1914. Venustiano Carranza would assume the presidency a month later, hoping that Wilson would recognize him as the de facto president of México. However, Carranza had to negotiate for this recognition — to a point that the Mexican leader would not accept. Wilson wanted public assurances from Carranza on protecting U.S. interests in México as well as limiting land reform and economic relations with European governments and businesses. So much for Wilson’s belief in ‘self-determination.’ Instead, Carranza publicly denounced the U.S. occupation. Carranza would be recognized by the Wilson government over a year later, mainly to neutralize German activity in the hemisphere. (The First World War broke out in Europe in the summer of 1914.) The occupation ended in November but U.S. incursion into México would occur again in 1916 when General John “Black Jack” Pershing would pursue Pancho Villa after Villa crossed into New Mexico and murdered sixteen U.S. mining engineers and technicians in Chihuahua. Villa’s intent, it seems, was to provoke U.S. intervention in México and trigger Carranza’s nationalist reaction. (Right or wrong in this provocation, the U.S. did fail to notify Carranza in advance or seek his permission to chase Villa in México.) Early in 1917, when it began to appear that the United States could not avoid being dragged into the European war, Wilson withdrew all U.S. forces from México. Remembering 1914 I was born and raised in a small town in the state of Veracruz, México, southern-eastern in the country near, well, near nothing. It was a town called Veinticuatro de Febrero (translated as the 24th of February - Flag Day in México). My town was quite remote: you didn’t see outsiders unless someone had really wandered off the 185 searching for Juchitán de Zaragoza in the south or Minatitlán or Coatzacoalcos in the north. In our schools, every year on April 21st, we commemorated La Heroica Defensa de Veracruz (The Heroic Defense of Veracruz). This day was a time to remember the USA’s occupation of Veracruz in 1914. It was a day of pride: we did not denounce the USA, we celebrated those who defending our land. The Monumento a los Héroes de 1914 was erected in Veracruz in 2014, commemorating the four invasions of the port, with the following inscription: Monumento a los Héroes, Veracruz with two tombs. 1825 · 1838 · 1847 · 1914 La patria agradecida a los héroes que defendieron su libertad y soberanía. Centenario de la Gesta Heroica Hca. Veracruz Ver. Abril 21 de 2014 Cadete Virgilio Uribe. Murio por la patria. 21 de abril de 1914. ¡A las armas muchachos, la patria está en peligro! Teniente Jose Azueta. Murio por la patria. 10 de mayo de 1914. English translation: 1825 · 1838 · 1847 · 1914 The grateful homeland to the heroes who defended our freedom and sovereignty. 100th anniversary of the Heroic Stand Heroic Veracruz, Veracruz, April 21, 2014 Cadet Virgilio Uribe Died for the homeland, April 21, 1914. To arms boys! The nation is in danger! Lieutenant José Azueta. He died for the country, May 10, 1914. The four years signify years of foreign intervention in the city: Spain in 1825, France in 1838 and the USA in the other two. Two tombs honor two of the defenders: Uribe was one of the Mexican Naval cadets that died while resisting the U.S. invasion. Azueta was injured while fighting against the U.S. invasion and died later of his wounds. Monumento a los Héroes, Veracruz — Comodoro Manuel Azueta: ¡A las armas muchachos, la patria está en peligro! (Author photo, 2019) The official name of the city is Heroica Veracruz. Outside of Veracruz, Wilson’s adventures in Veracruz and Tampico received little attention in our (Mexican) history books about La Revolución. We grew up on the tales of Pancho Villa and Emiliano Zapata in books and films. We had our villains, like Victoriano Huerta, and our resolute leaders, like Venustiano Carranza. This period is rife with battles between heroes and bandits and ideological arguments with the backdrop of the First World War, the Russian Revolution and a general upheaval in moral thought (notably, the movement toward social justice). Even Adolfo Gilly’s La Revolución Interrumpida, (1971, reprinted and revised in 1994/2005) only devotes a few paragraphs to this occupation. Wilsonianism in Latin America I cannot begin to direct you to the massive literature on Wilson’s many interventions in Latin America. As I mentioned at the top, interventions throughout the Caribbean and Central America are at the top of his phony ‘moral diplomacy’ list. United States intervention in Latin America escalated to extremes that made everything from the Walker expedition to "big stick" and dollar diplomacy seem like dress rehearsals. Ultimately, Wilsonianism represented a disdain for non-U.S. investments in Latin America. Wilson's unconcern for the lives, property and democracy in Latin America is best understood in this context. Unfortunately, this would be a blueprint for Franklin Roosevelt’s ‘Good Neighbor Policy’ before and during the Second World War. Last Thoughts Some words from former Mexican president (1934-1940) Lázaro Cárdenas in 1961: "The trouble up there," he said, waving vaguely toward the North, "is that it's all business. People are business. Latin America is business. Until the United States begins to see America as a continent with people, and not just a market, raw materials, customers, with money to buy, buy, buy, the rulers will not understand us. They will not understand that we have little money, we are poor, we need above all to be allowed to develop economically, to become truly independent. What we really want, and what I prefer, is true continental development, in which the United States and Latin America cooperate in building a better society for all of us.” Interview with Harvey O’Connor, published in Monthly Review, Vol. 13, No. 2: June 1961. Resources: Gregg Andrews, Shoulder to Shoulder? The American Federation of Labor, the United States, and the Mexican Revolution, 1910–1924 (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1991). David Sears, “The Making Of A Hero: Douglas Macarthur’s Daring Mexican Heroics” 2017. www.historynet.com/... Leigh Thelmadatter, “The Tampico Affair: how Mexico saw the US’ 1914 invasion” Mexico News Daily. 2023. mexiconewsdaily.com/... About the Mexican Revolution: Adolfo Gilly, The Mexican Revolution (New York and London: The New Press, 2005). Translated by Patrick Camiller. (First published as La revolución interrumpida (D.F. México: El Cabillito, 1971. Expanded edition, 1994.) [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/4/21/2163335/-Wilsonianism-Comes-to-M-xico-April-21-1914-When-the-USA-invaded-my-home-state Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/