The Heritage Foundation has published a report on security in the Caribbean. They begin their report with a paragraph that summarizes the entire publication:
“The Trump Administration has secured the southern border, forcing international cartels to increase their drug trafficking activities in the Caribbean. Operation Southern Spear has deterred much of the trafficking, but the cartels are continuing. Limited security capabilities in partner countries, the long U.S. neglect of the region, and the profit-seeking motives of the cartels combine to make Caribbean security a lasting concern for the United States. The United States should expand its law enforcement presence in the U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico, securing porous borders and expanding detention centers for illegal migrants and drug traffickers who seek to reach the U.S. mainland. The United States should then work with partner governments to build capacity so that they can secure their own borders against traffickers and gangs.”
The report underscores the strategic importance of Puerto Rico to the United States. “The Caribbean is pivotal to the Administration’s National Security Strategy as part of President Trump’s reassertion of American security interests in the Western Hemisphere,” they claim. “The United States seeks a hemisphere free of the malign foreign influence of adversaries like China and Russia and free of the destabilizing influence of the drug cartels that have taken root across the Americas.”
Not just geography
It’s not only the geographic location of Puerto Rico that makes the Island so important. Certainly, geography matters. “The Caribbean region lies between the world’s largest narcotics production zone, South America, and the world’s largest narcotics market, the United States,” the Heritage Foundation points out, “making the Caribbean the highway between producer and consumer.”
Supply and demand are certainly key factors. With a lack of success in decreasing either U.S. demand or South American production, the Caribbean transport route is the best opportunity for limiting narcotics trade and the accompanying violence. Since the U.S. is the primary supplier for guns used in gang violence in the Caribbean, the importance of the transport route cuts both ways.
But Puerto Rico is the key to security at the third border — the Caribbean. Puerto Rico has functional military bases, particularly with recent investment in and reopening of Ramey Air Force Base and Roosevelt Roads.
Puerto Rico also has unparalleled loyalty to the United States. While China and Russia have both worked to build influence in South America and the Caribbean, Puerto Ricans are U.S. citizens. The repeated votes for statehood, the statehood movement from the earliest days of the territory, and even the devotion of the “commonwealth” party to permanent union with the United States show that Puerto Rico has been an essential ally for the federal government.
Next steps
The Heritage Foundation report also recognizes that more investment in Puerto Rico is essential. “The U.S. federal government needs to enhance security support with the governments of the two U.S. territories in the Caribbean, where the trafficking of drugs and migrants through Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands contributes to violent crime that negatively affects the lives of the U.S. citizens living in the two territories,” the authors state. “As U.S. territories, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands have no customs checks for goods shipped between them and the mainland United States, and once illegal drugs or migrants reach the U.S. Virgin Islands or Puerto Rico, it is difficult to prevent them from reaching the ports or mailboxes of the U.S. mainland.” The federal government can’t behave as though U.S. territories are foreign lands with less claim on U.S. support than the states. The report points out that the security of the Caribbean border “has been neglected for decades.”
The report affirms that it’s time to change that pattern. The Heritage Foundation calls for increased budgets, regular upgrades to Puerto Rico’s military bases, and increased local law enforcement. This is not a question of Puerto Rico coming to Congress with hat in hand asking for funds. This is what’s needed to strengthen a fuindamental part of the nation’s overall security. The United States needs Puerto Rico — a strong and loyal Puerto Rico — for national security.
The Heritage Foundation does not call for statehood, but it is obvious that a state of Puerto Rico, with full representation in Congress and the sovereignty of a State of the Union, will be in a stronger position than the territory of Puerto Rico is now. The increased prosperity that inevitably comes with statehood and the indissoluble nature of the relationship with the federal government will improve the position of the Island and of U.S. security overall.
Reach out to your legislators and make sure they understand the urgency of admitting Puerto Rico as a state.
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