In March 1961, Fidel Castro’s Cuban revolution was a three-alarm reminder that CIA-engineered coups weren’t enough to keep communism out of the western hemisphere. Living standards had to be raised in Latin America, then as now the world’s most inegalitarian region. So U.S. President John F. Kennedy announced the Alliance for Progress to help America’s distant neighbors get their societal acts together: democratize, build stronger economies, pull people out of poverty.
The alliance delivered little of that, as evidenced by the military dictatorships and civil wars that plagued the region soon after. Still, it was a laudable departure from Washington’s indifference to Latin America, which is why President Obama, who so far has seemed largely indifferent to Latin America himself, chose the alliance’s 50th anniversary as the theme of his five-day visit to South and Central America, which starts March 19. And not coincidentally, it kicks off in Brazil, the nation that has done the most
