This debate did not start with Donald Trump, and it did not start this month.
For more than a decade, this reporter has had a front-row seat to repeated, urgent calls from across the Caribbean for stronger intervention by the United States in response to gun- and narcotics-fuelled violence that has hollowed out our communities. Long before today’s headlines, leaders warned that transnational gangs were outgunning police, draining public resources and stealing our youngest people.
Much of the public messaging leaned toward calls for fewer guns flowing from the United States, but the practical response from Washington evolved into something else: tactical undergirding of the Caribbean. Training, intelligence sharing, maritime surveillance and joint operations expanded under successive U.S. administrations — Republican and Democrat alike.
Then came Venezuela.
President Nicolás Maduro proved himself an unhinged and destabilising force, openly threatening Guyana’s oil-rich territory and pushing the region to the brink of a conflict no Caribbean state could afford. The United States showed up. The threat of war was blunted. That mattered.
But while geopolitical flames were contained, the narcotics trade exploded.
CARICOM convened emergency meetings on transnational gang violence. Crime became so pervasive that it was formally classified as a public health threat. Entire communities were terrorised. Courts clogged. Police forces stretched beyond capacity.
And now — quietly but noticeably — the tempo has shifted.
While no single forensic study can capture the full picture, it is easily verifiable on the ground that major narcotics busts and trafficking activity have slowed in recent months. Something has changed. Pressure works.
This is the reality Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar is responding to.
Her critics accuse her of breaking ranks. What she is actually doing is refusing to indulge in strategic hypocrisy — demanding international help to confront narco-terrorism while appearing to defend or excuse the very networks and actors we have spent years condemning.
Sovereignty is not an insult. The Caribbean invokes it constantly. To deny it to the United States — especially when the policies in question were telegraphed months in advance and remain adjustable — is not diplomacy. It is posturing.
What is most troubling is the region’s selective memory. CARICOM has directed months of rhetorical fire at Trump-era policies, yet when disaster struck — from security crises to Hurricane Melissa — the United States remained one of the region’s most reliable supporters. Outcomes matter more than allegiance theatre.
Kamla Persad-Bissessar is not suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome. She is applying commonsense statecraft. She understands that small states do not gain leverage by moral outrage alone, and that credibility is lost when we appear aligned with individuals, regimes or activities we ourselves have deemed a threat.
Her warning to CARICOM is simple and necessary: do not undermine your own cause.
The Caribbean’s fight against narco-violence, corruption and instability has been long, costly and painful. If pressure is finally producing results, we should be wise enough to recognise it — and brave enough to say so.
Angle by Deandrea Hamilton. Built with ChatGPT (AI). Magnetic Media — CAPTURING LIFE.
