The Invasion of Grenada

This essay will focus on the Reagan Administration which spanned from January 1981 to January 1989. When Reagan became President, he had only one clear, defined foreign policy goal – containment of the Soviet Union, or the “evil empire” as he referred to it. He primarily wanted to stop the USSR from growing larger and to keep other non-Communist countries from becoming Communist. In the past, American presidents had used a theory called the “Domino Theory” to justify the need for intervention around

The United States history during 1977 to 1989 went through two presidencies and whirlwind of events happened. When President Jimmy Carter became president he wanted to lower the inflation rates to make life easier for the people of the United States. While that was his goal it got completely derailed. Near the end of Jimmy Carters presidency, a group of Iranian students took over the U.S Embassy in Tehran and took people hostage. Over the course of the 444 days the hostages where held captive while the people of the United States voted for a new president to help lead them into a new direction. The people voted for Ronald Reagan. While he was president things didn’t go as he planned as well. The issues with Iran did not calm down and escalated to something bigger. After the Iran hostage crisis, the US had another issues with Iran and it was the Iran- Contra affair. During this essay I will be talking about the book called “Taken Hostage” by David Farber and the information in the book. The book is about the time frame of Jimmy Carter’s presidency and the issues with Iran and the hostage crisis. The second half of my essay is towards President Ronald Reagan’s and the issues about the Iran- Contra affair and the lasting issues between Iran and the United states.

One of the significant events of Reagan that influenced public was Iran-Contra affair in 1986, which the United States was found guilty by the International Court of Justice of war crimes against Nicaragua. As a result, Reagan’s popularity slipped from 67 percent to 46 percent in less than a week (Mayer). By the time, it was the low point of the Reagan presidency (157, Ehrman) Add to this situation, the failure of space program led to negative ethos of Reagan in public’s mind. President Reagan understood this situation and tried to calm the hostilities by delivering the speech sincerely.

Which followed through to Ford’s Administration and the Carter Administration. As well as the illegal bombing of Cambodia. Carter gets harassed about his evidence of his failed foreign policy because of the Iranian Hostage crisis, which was not handled well, and the credit for the solution belonged to Reagan.

To begin, Congress, by fair vote, decided in the 1980s that the United States should not assist the contras fighting the socialist Sandinista government of Nicaragua (Corn 2006). Yet, the Reagan White House concocted several imaginative ways to pull an end-run around democracy (Corn 2006). Reagan’s decisions such as selling weapons to Iran were made with the knowledge that he would not suffer a decline in presidential approval. Thus, Reagan took various steps that were violations of law that not only involved himself, but members of the CIA. By 1986, two big revelations happened that caused this scandal to abrupt publically. The first was the shoot-down of a cargo plane over Nicaragua and the admission by the sole survivor that the plane had been delivering arms to the Contras against congressional restrictions (Kornbluh 2011). The second, revelation was the news story of Lebanon that stated

Maddow is very good on the master of executive-branch high jinks, Ronald Reagan. We first meet him starring in World War II propaganda films for the Army Air Corps’ First Motion Picture Unit, better known as Fum-Poo. Forty years later, as president, Reagan seems like he’s still in a movie when he tilts at the windmill of “Soviet-Cuban militarization” by attacking Grenada. Maddow reminds us just how thin the justification for bombing that small island really was: In an Oval Office speech, Reagan made Grenada’s new airfield sound

weapons and troops. The Reagan Doctrine, this aided the anti communist movements in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. In 1983, Reagan announced his plan to make space weapons to protect America from attacks by Soviet nuclear missiles. He also sent 800 U.S. Marines to Lebanon as a part of the international peacekeeping force after Israel invaded in 1982.

During the election of 1980 most Americans eyes were fixed on two presidents. Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan. Most Americans hearts were fixed on one issue. The Iranian hostage crisis. Jimmy Carter, the current president, had tried without success to end the crisis diplomatically. Ronald Reagan, an actor turned politician, had very little experience in a political position. Carter was not fit to handle the current crisis. His attempts to free the hostages had gone poorly both diplomatically and through use of force. Ronald Reagan was not very well known as a politician, he was known as an actor and many people believed that he would just act in office instead of being the

Where he was later accused of condoning a radical leader identified as Rios Montt and death units affiliated with the Salvadoran military that was subsidized by the U.S. government. But with those accusations, Reagan put a lot of energy into overthrowing the government in Nicaragua that almost ended Reagan's presidency. Thus resulting in the U.S. Senate cutting Reagan's ties to his surrogate army in Central America. Which this ended with The White House running the war from the basement of The White House and funded the operation by paying for some of it with prohibited arms sales to Iran that triggered the Iran-Contra Affair. These complications ended in Reagan evading prosecution by his affiliates saying he had no knowledge of the affair.

The Spanish began losing control over Cuba, and in a desperate attempt to prevent an uprising against the government, many rural Cubans were sent to concentration camps. The source argues that reconcentration camps had despicable conditions. For instance, the source stated, “The circumstances are the following: complete accumulation of bodies dead and alive, so that it was impossible to take one step without walking over them; the greatest want of cleanliness, want of light, air, and water; the food lacking in quality and quantity what was necessary to sustain life…” (3). Fundamentally, this provides that Cubans were mistreated greatly and deprived of their life and liberty. The source believes that the Spanish kept the Cubans in intolerable conditions. For example, the source also states, “Four hundred and sixty women and children thrown on the ground heaped pell mell as animals, some in a

The invasion of Normandy, also known as Operation Overlord or D-Day, was perhaps one of the most important battles in the human history. The invasion took place on June 4, 1944, at the Coast of Normandy in France. Troops from over twelve countries, including Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America participated in the fight against Germany. Although the battles were enduring and hard-fought, the Allies achieved the final victory; the Allies were finally able to set their feet on the European soil again. The Allied invasion of Normandy was a major turning point of the war that led to the ultimate liberation of Europe from the Nazi forces.

A solution to the Nicaraguan problem seemed more difficult to solve, Reagan wanted desperately to help the “contras” but was mandated by congress to stay out of the affair. His advisors secretly proposed a way to kill two birds with one stone, a decision that came to be referred to as Ronald Reagan’s black mark on his almost spotless record on foreign policy. The U.S would sale weapons to Iran in return for hostages taken by Muslim Jihadist in Lebanon, and with the money Iran paid those weapons with the U.S would direct that money to the contras fighting the Sandinistas. While the reasons for the trade were honorable and the president was following the American policy of communist containment at the time, it was still nonetheless illegal and badly battered Reagan’s reputation.

Throughout Reagan’s eight years of presidency he had some traumatic events unfold. One very big moment for Reagan was the release of the 53 Americans that had been held hostage in Iran. On the issue of Communism and the Cold War Reagan once said, "Our strategy is defensive; our aim is to protect the peace by ensuring that no adversaries ever conclude they could

The U.S invasion of Grenada, also known as Operation Urgent Fury was an invasion of the Caribbean island nation by forces led by the United States. It resulted into victory for the United States in just a few weeks . Grenada is a nation inhabited by approximately 91,000 people. The invasion was prompted by a military coup, which ousted the revolutionary government, it restored the constitutional government. The invasion was also as a response to the request for help by the Organization of American States (OAS). The official reason given by the U.S government for the invasion was the presence of approximately eight hundred American students at the True Blue Medical Facility. The presence of Soviet and Cuban personnel on the island was also

The U.S. invasion of Grenada was the first major U.S. military operation ever since the end of the Vietnam War. Undeniably, many have concluded that it may have in part been an assessment of the purported "Vietnam syndrome," the alleged condition that makes it problematic for the American public to support U.S. military interference deprived of a just cause. As with Iraq, the early defences for the invasion proved to be either extremely debatable or obviously false, hitherto it still received bipartisan support in Congress and the approval of nearly two-thirds of the American public. The invasion of Grenada by the U.S was very unusual compared to other 20th century wars. It was by far the easiest, shortest and most successful invasion for the United States during the 20th century period. The United States intervention in Grenada has been characterised by some as a rescue mission, by others an act of aggression. Therefore the purpose of this essay is to analyse and examine the reasons and causes behind the U.S. led invasion into Grenada during the latter part of 1983, as well as the consequences faced by both the United States government and the people of Grenada. The Grenada Invasion also Codenamed Operation Urgent Fury, was the U.S. decision to invade Grenada after the overthrow and subsequent killing of the Grenadian President Maurice Bishop evoked widespread criticism from several different outlets (Green, 2013). Recognizing such outlooks, this essay also seek to examine