Commentary
The United States spent much of the past century in policies of containment, first of the Soviet Union, then of China, and then again with Russia. But quietly, however, the United States itself has become in many ways geopolitically isolated—contained—within the Americas.
The United States has few significant, overt outstanding conflicts—other than narco-trafficking and illegal people smuggling concerns—with Central and South American states. But as the June 19 Colombian presidential election highlighted, Washington also has no close allies in the region.
It could be said that the election of a strongly left-of-center president in Colombia signaled the final end to the memory of the Monroe Doctrine, which began in 1823 as a unilateral U.S. policy of suzerainty over the Western Hemisphere….