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The conquest of Grenada in 1983

In one of the most egregious examples of asymmetrical warfare in modern times, the United States of America, the world’s most powerful state, invaded Grenada, one of the world’s weakest mini-states, almost exactly twenty-five years ago on Tuesday 25 October 1983.

The US objective might have been to terminate that country’s four-year flirtation with socialism and sovietism. The real results, however, were to discredit the regional security system in which major CARICOM states thereafter refused to participate and to damage the consensual principle which guided decision-making in the then fledgling Caribbean Community.

A small island state of 344 km² − about three quarters of the size of Dadanawa Ranch in the Rupununi − with a population equal to that of the Essequibo Islands-West Demerara Region, Grenada subsisted precariously on the export of its banana, nutmeg and cocoa crop. In this unlikely theatre, regime change was effected by a US military task force comprising an aircraft carrier, two amphibious assault ships, fifteen other naval vessels, several transport and special task aircraft, two Ranger battalions, two brigades of the 82nd Airborne Division, a reinforced Marine Battalion and other support units. Over 7,000 troops − about the population of St George’s, the capital − were involved.

The pretext for external intervention arose out of an internal event. An extremist faction of hard-core Marxist-Leninist within the New Jewel Movement’s Provisional Revolutionary Government seized power on 19 October 1983, executed the prime minister and other cabinet members, dissolved the administration and established a junta called the Revolutionary Military Council. These tragic events could have set the stage for a superb effort by CARICOM to consolidate the bases of small state sovereignty; the supremacy of international law; regional security cooperation and community solidarity. It didn’t.

Within 48 hours of the St George’s meltdown, Prime Minister George Chambers of Trinidad and Tobago − then current CARICOM chairman − convened an emergency meeting of Heads of Govern-ment in Port of Spain on Saturday 22nd to discuss the crisis. A night-long session into early Sunday 23rd October produced consensus on certain fundamentals: a pacific solution should be wholly regional in nature and should exclude extra-regional military intervention; it should accord with international law and the UN Charter; and should aim primarily at restoring normalcy. It was agreed also that a CARICOM fact-finding mission acceptable to the Grenadian authorities should be appointed to go to the island.

With daylight, consensus evaporated. By mid-morning on Sunday 23rd, representatives of Barbados, Jamaica and the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States − the numerical majority at the meeting − renounced the consensus reached only a few hours earlier. In the final analysis, four states − The Bahamas, Belize, Guyana and Trinidad − opposed military intervention. CARICOM stood divided on the most important issue of the security of a small state. The reason for the rejection of the pacific solution soon became evident.

Even as CARICOM Heads were talking on Sunday 23rd, the USA was assembling its invasion force and cobbling together a 300-member ‘Caribbean battalion’ of policemen and soldiers from Barbados, Jamaica and the OECS for the invasion codenamed Operation Urgent Fury. In the aftermath of the action when justification had to be found and the challenge of international law had to be faced, it was learnt that the Authority of the OECS had met in Bridgetown, Barbados, on Friday 21st October and decided to establish a “peacekeeping force” and to request “assistance from friendly countries to provide transport, logistics support and additional military personnel to assist the efforts of the OECS” to deal with the Grenada crisis.
The US rationalisation for the invasion collided with states’ obligations under the UN Charter for the pacific settlement of disputes, threats to peace and regional arrangements for peacekeeping. On the day of the invasion, therefore, Guyana introduced a resolution in the UN Security Council condemning the invasion and calling for the immediate withdrawal of foreign forces. Eleven members supported, three abstained and only the USA vetoed the resolution. For a similar resolution in the UN General Assembly, 108 voted in favour, 27 abstained and nine voted against.

Notwithstanding US explanations for the invasion – an invitation for intervention by the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States; the protection of American lives and an alleged Cuban military buildup in Grenada – the implications for regional peacekeeping were far-reaching.

For small Caribbean states, this was a worst case scenario – neighbouring states arrogating the prerogative to invite an extra-regional power to intervene in an internal security crisis. What could be a greater threat to statehood?

When questions are raised about the deep distrust for the establishment of a permanent regional security system among the small states of the Caribbean that endures to this day, answers must be sought in the web of dissimulation that was woven to facilitate the conquest of Grenada twenty-five years ago.

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10 Responses to “The conquest of Grenada in 1983”

Weitz
on October 8th, 2008 8:20 pm

I was part of the mission to liberate the island from an illegal, murderous group of thugs that threatened the freedoms of the Grenadian people. The corrupt New Jewel Movement was being used by Soviet backed entities (read Cuba) to build a forward operating base (the airport at Point Salinas)…check the length of the runway that was being constructed, using forced labor, under Cuban military direction. The runway was long enough to handle the largest of military transport and bomber aircraft. The American medical students that were supposed to have been in danger, really were not (my opinion). However, every single Grenadian I spoke with (regular people) were happy that we had come. We did not come as conquerers, but as liberators. We did not stay to occupy and defile, but left as friends in freedom.

[Reply to this]
g
In reply to the above comment on November 15th, 2008 2:19 pm:
oh please. i was twelve years old at the time. and i see that situation as ronald regan found that bishop was not in his best interest to be in power. so he plant a mole there and got bishop exicuter, where is bishop body? all that invasion and liberation was a smoke screen. wee all know how america operates. want to rule the world.

[Reply to this]
Adam Frankowski
on October 8th, 2008 8:40 pm

Let’s put all this into some sort of perspective.

In 1979, the New Jewel Movement overthrew a democratically elected government in Grenada.

In 1983, the USA’s intervention restored democracy.

Was this the USA’s sole motivation? Of course not. This was at the height of the “Cold War”, and the Americans didn’t want another pro-Soviet regime in their “backyard”.

Interestingly though, when free and fair elections were held later on, the New Jewel Movement didn’t win a single seat.

The Guyanese government’s opposition to military intervention, at the time, had more to do with ideology than principle.

[Reply to this]
Adam Frankowski
on October 8th, 2008 9:29 pm

Weitz,

I’ve only just read your post. You’ve put it a lot better than I could have done. It’s good to get the views of someone who was actually there at the time.

[Reply to this]
Georgie
In reply to the above comment on October 9th, 2008 11:55 am:
Utter nonsesense! The said runaway at the airport was completed by the US, so that Air Force 1 could have landed with Uncle Reagan to celebrate victory and The
New York Post papers front page to declare, “We win one!”
I would like to know how many Grenadian students were given scholarships to study agriculture, soil physics, agronomy, engineering and the like in the US after the 1983 invasion.
Hurricane Hugo devasted the whole island. How much assistance did the US give its new found friend? Guyana poured its heart out to render assistance to Grenada. Check the records.
The invasion of Grenada was never about Grenada and its people.

[Reply to this]
Adam Frankowski
In reply to the above comment on October 9th, 2008 8:23 pm:
You obviously haven’t read my first post. If you had, you would have worked out that there is little disagreement between us. Whatever motives the USA had, democracy was restored. And when it was, the Grenadian people indicated that they had little time for the New Jewel Movement.

It’s an ill wind that blows no good.
Georgie
on October 10th, 2008 11:44 am

” Democracy was restored.” This has to be a joke. The people of Grenada were not prevented from travelling in and out of Grenada prior to October 1983. They enrolled their kids in schools of their choices. Market forces dictated consumption and income. Freedom of speech was not curtailed.
What exactly is your concept of democracy? Oh! You believe that if a gov”t reaches out to an “unfriendly” country for assistance in its development, then it is deemed undemocratic.

[Reply to this]
Adam Frankowski
In reply to the above comment on October 11th, 2008 9:27 pm:
Do calm down.

The New Jewel Movement overthrew a democratically elected government. At no time did the New Jewel Movement seek or receive a mandate from the electorate. After the liberation of Grenada in 1983, free and fair elections were held and the New Jewel Movement failed to win a single seat.

The Oxford English Dictionary defines democracy as “(State practising) government by people as whole, especially through elected representatives”.

That is also my concept of democracy.

Just because people can travel into and out of a country does not make it democratic. Poles were able to travel into and out of Poland between 1945 and 1989. Just because people can send their children to schools of their own choices does not make a country democratic. And, no, a country is not undemocratic because it reaches out to an “unfriendly” country for assistance.

It would be most helpful, in future, if you were to read what I actually write, instead of “reading between the lines” and extrapolating, from that, to what you presume my political opinions to be.

[Reply to this]
Georgie
In reply to the above comment on October 13th, 2008 11:09 am:
Please, you probably knew little of the ‘Spice Island” before 1983 and especially when Eric Gairy was Prime Minister.
No my friend, those are tenets of democracy and not democracy in itself as you said, ‘democracy was restored.’ And, by the way, The New Jewel Movement as a political party died when its leader Maurice Bishop was assasinated
Maybe you should take a read of Fareed Zakaria’s book ‘Elected Dictatorship’

Adam Frankowski
In reply to the above comment on October 13th, 2008 7:59 pm:
I knew a fair amount about the “Spice Island” before 1983, although I have not, as yet, read the book which you have so kindly recommended.

From all that I have heard about Eric Gairy, I understand that he was a very unpleasant man who headed a very unpleasant government.

The rest of your comments amount to little more than nit-picking.