ABSTRACT
Most analysts on Caribbean affairs would agree that a major revision of US regional policy occurred in the eventful year of 1979, a revision that represented a break with many aspects of foreign policy during the period following the Dominican invasion of 1965. The prominence of military measures within the new US regional policy has promoted a process of militarization of Caribbean societies with far-reaching implications. The shift in US Caribbean policy in the mid to late seventies can be more clearly identified if the authors briefly consider the evolution of previous policy. The Cuban revolution provoked a major revision of US-Latin American policy represented by the reformism combined with countersub-version of the brief Alliance for Progress period. The shift in military policy toward the Caribbean must be located in the second half of 1979, when the original foreign policy premises of the Carter administration were revised.
