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Big stick Diplomacy
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Big Stick Diplomacy or Big Stick Policy was the slogan describing U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt's corollary to the Monroe Doctrine. The United States, he claimed, had the right not only to oppose European intervention in the Western Hemisphere, but also to intervene itself in the domestic affairs of its neighbors if they proved unable to maintain order and national sovereignty on their own. Roosevelt first articulated this slogan at the Minnesota State Fair on September 2, 1901, which was twelve days before the assassination of President William McKinley suddenly thrust him into the Presidency. Roosevelt got the term from an West African proverb,"Speak softly and carry a big stick, you will go far". Roosevelt conducted an aggressive foreign policy using Big Stick Diplomacy. Through this policy, the United States became a world superpower in the early 1900s.
It could be seen as a later, more subtle version of Gunboat diplomacy. The intention was to protect United States interests in Latin America. The idea led to the expansion of the U.S. Navy and greater involvement in world affairs. This in turn led to the Dollar Diplomacy in the following Taft administration.
Examples of its use include:
- support for the creation of the nation of Panama in 1903, when Colombia rejected Roosevelt's proposal to build the Panama Canal.
- the Dominican Republic in 1903-1905, when a debt crisis raised the specter of European intervention.
- Cuba in 1906, with an American occupation lasting 28 months.
Eventually, the phrase "Big Stick" was used in reference to any foreign policy that backed up negotiations with the implicit threat of military force.[1]
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