Dear Editor,
Critics have chided the Guyana administration’s response to the USA and Israeli military intervention in Iran and the latter’s capricious attack on neighbors. President Irfaan responded with a pragmatic policy on West Asia as he did when Trump intervened in Venezuela.
Critics of Irfaan’s policy say he is not “adhering to principles” on the global system of relations and respecting sovereignty. Strong nations pursue self-interests without much respect for principles or national sovereignty. Powerful nations enter into wars to reshape a neighborhood to suit its interests. Recall Soviet or Russian invasion of neighbors. This realpolitik has been this way for centuries except for brief periods after the UN was founded. Since the end of the bipolar balance of power, between the Soviet Union and USA, powerful nations do their own things to promote and defend their interests. That has particularly been the nature of the international system over the last two decades. Russia, USA, and China, as powerful nuclear weapon and geographically large nations do their own things without much repercussions from the rest of the globe; the exception was the sanctions imposed on Russia after its invasion of Ukraine and the former has remained defiant and unrelenting in its goal. When bombs or invasion t work, sanctions and tariffs do; nations quickly capitulate.
American and Israel bombed Iran and eliminated much of the leadership of the sovereign nation. Almost the entire world, the most powerful nations have not condemned the USA. Why should little Guyana?
In certain situations, principles cannot save or protect or favor a state as we found out in Venezuela, Iran, Trump’s treatment of CARICOM leaders, among cases. While a nation or person must embrace principles (of sovereignty, etc.), one must also be pragmatic. One lives in a very dangerous world now unlike previously. If you don’t support Washington, you run the risk of being penalized as has happened to most of Latin America and the Caribbean nations. President Ali and Prime Minister Kamla of T&T, as have six other Latin American leaders, have been invited to the President’s home, Mar-A-Lago, because of their support for him on foreign policy in the region. And were they to disagree with the President on Iran, they most certainly would be disinvited from the summit as you noted.
The leader of the free world, President Trump, ruler of the most powerful country, is different from his predecessors. He does not govern under the principles of the UN Charter. He acts unilaterally on foreign relations like no other President did. He is a mercurial hard nationalist who has demonstrated a proclivity for an expansionist (new frontier) ideology to acquire non-American territories. Guyana is not on the list he wants to acquire although most Guyanese won’t oppose the idea; they want to be Americans with that cherished blue passport that provides a first world lifestyle and gives them unlimited access to the rest of the world.
President Trump is a transactional leader. You support him, and he will watch your back. Guyana is rewarded for supporting the USA. Trump temporarily removed the Maduro threat to Guyana. So, the arguments in your editorial (especially on sovereignty) do not seriously address Guyana’s predicament regardless of which party would have been in government and who is President. Guyana has found itself in a very precarious position – side with President Trump on the conflict in Venezuela and Iran and retain support on territorial integrity (control over oil and gas, minerals, etc.) or face a sovereignty threat, high tariffs, and maybe even decline in oil revenues. There are those who argue that Guyana can use its economic clout (oil and gas and other natural resources) to bargain with Washington on “exercising greater sovereignty” and defying Trump. Those critics don’t understand the people who run the current White House. Iran and Venezuela have a lot of natural resources and economic clout, and they could not bargain with Trump on “sovereignty matters” or make demands. Iran also has some military might and had defied Trump. Yet it is being bombed and forced to capitulate to Washington dictates. Support Trump or face the consequences.
The world is not being run the way it did pre-2025. And even during that era, sovereign nations became victims for not humbling themselves to supporting Washington and respecting the Monroe Doctrine. Guyana was a victim multiple times; adhering to UN sovereignty principles led to the toppling of the government in 1953, racial violence in the 1960s, toppling of the government in 1964, restoration of democracy in 1992, removal of governments from office in 2015 and 2020, and more. Have we forgotten what happened after the government (using principles of sovereignty) attacked Ambassador Brent Hardt on America’s Independence Day? A small country cannot easily defy or disrespect USA without serious consequences. Global principles are not adhered to even by powerful nations as those in Europe (G 7) which have capitulated and are kowtowing to President Trump. Guyana has to adjust to global, if not also regional, reality. If you don’t support Washington on geo-strategic (military) requests, you will be isolated and worse penalized.
President Ali (and PM Kamla in Trinidad) is right to condemn Iran’s attacks on neighbors that widens the West Asia war and risks global economic fallout over energy. Kamla supports USA against Iran. Guyana (or Trinidad) is not in a position to offer guidance on the war or on global relations. Yes, the war must end, and there should be dialogue and diplomacy to end conflict and we should return to a rules-based order. But that won’t happen anytime soon. Diplomacy works when there are equal powers, not between a weak and a powerful nation. We are a weak nation that has a border controversy and faces existential threat without American protection. We must pursue a pragmatic foreign policy that does not run counter to USA security and that also serves our national interests.