Last weekend’s attack on Venezuela and the abduction of President Nicolás Maduro sent shockwaves across Latin America, with many countries worried about a return to an era of overt US interventionism.
These concerns are particularly acute in Mexico, a neighbor and longtime ally of the United States.
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The country was one of several countries that US President Donald Trump named, along with Cuba and Colombia, in remarks after Saturday’s attack on Venezuela, which killed dozens of people and was widely condemned as a violation of international law.
President Trump has suggested that the United States may carry out military strikes on Mexican territory in the name of fighting drug traffickers.
“We’re going to have to do something about Mexico,” President Trump said in an interview with Fox News Saturday morning after the Venezuela attack.
“She (President Claudia Sheinbaum) is very afraid of cartels,” he added. “They’re running Mexico.”
“We are free and we are sovereign.”
Mr. Sheinbaum has countered Mr. Trump’s threats by firmly asserting Mexico’s sovereignty.
“We categorically reject interference in the internal affairs of other countries,” Sheinbaum said in media comments on Monday.
“In Mexico, the people rule, and we need to reaffirm that we are a free and sovereign country,” she added. “Yes to cooperation, no to subordination and interference”
Even in good times, Mexico’s leaders have walked a line between seeking a productive relationship with its powerful neighbor to the north and protecting its own interests from possible U.S. invasion.
That balance has become even more difficult as the Trump administration has adopted rhetoric and policies similar to earlier imperial interventions.
“Historically, there is a record of US intervention as part of the story of Mexican nationalism,” Pablo Picato, a professor of Mexican history at Columbia University, told Al Jazeera.
Many of those cases loom large in this country’s national memory. The United States went to war against Mexico in 1846, and U.S. forces captured Mexico City and annexed vast territory, including present-day California, Nevada, and New Mexico.
Then, during the Mexican Revolution of 1910-1920, U.S. Ambassador Henry Lane Wilson worked with Mexican conservative forces to overthrow Mexico’s reformist president.
The U.S. military also bombed the port city of Veracruz in 1914 and sent troops into northern Mexico to pursue revolutionary leader Pancho Villa.
“These are considered important moments in Mexican history,” Picato said.
“There is a quote attributed to Mexican President Porfirio Díaz, “Poor Mexico. Far from God, but so close to the United States.”
President Trump has linked America’s history in the region to current challenges in recent statements. In announcing Saturday’s strike, he referenced the Monroe Doctrine, a 19th-century policy that the United States has used to assert its supremacy over the Western Hemisphere.
“The Monroe Doctrine is a big problem, but we’ve largely, significantly replaced it. Now they call it the ‘Don Roe Doctrine,'” Trump said.
The U.S. State Department also shared an image of President Trump on social media on Monday with the caption, “This is our hemisphere.”
“Balancing with a thin wire”
Mr. Sheinbaum’s insistence on Mexican sovereignty has not prevented him from making concessions to Mr. Trump on important priorities such as immigration, security and trade.
Last February, when faced with President Trump’s threat to impose 25% tariffs, Mr. Sheinbaum agreed to send 10,000 Mexican National Guard troops to the U.S. border to limit illegal immigration and drug trafficking.
Mexico also maintains close security ties with the United States and has cooperated in operations against criminal organizations, including the extradition of some drug traffickers.
For example, in February, the Sheinbaum administration extradited 29 criminal suspects whom the United States had charged with drug trafficking and other charges. In August, it sent 26 more suspects to the United States, earning a statement of gratitude from the Trump administration.
The United States has historically pressured Mexico to take a tough stance against drugs, leading to policies that some Mexicans blame for increasing violence and insecurity in their country.
Still, while Mr. Sheinbaum has received praise for his management of the relationship with Mr. Trump, he has consistently said that unilateral U.S. military action against Mexican territory is a red line that should not be crossed.
Experts say Sheinbaum’s cooperative attitude should motivate Washington not to attack Mexican territory.
“Mr. Sheinbaum has done everything in his power to cooperate with the United States,” said Stephanie Brewer, Mexico program director at the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA), a U.S.-based research group. “There is no rationale to disrupt this bilateral relationship by crossing the single red line set by Mexico.”
But the attack on Venezuela also highlighted the Trump administration’s increasingly aggressive stance toward Latin America.
“I don’t think a U.S. attack on Mexican territory is any more or less likely than it was before the attack on Venezuela,” Brewer said. “However, the Trump administration’s threats must be taken seriously and have made abundantly clear that the United States is prepared to violate international law in the use of military force.”
“Sheinbaum is working on a balancing act with increasingly thinner wires,” she added.
