CARIBBEAN CITIZENSHIP PROGRAMS ARE A THREAT TO U.S. NATIONAL SECURITY

During the Cold War, The United States and Soviet Russia competed for the hearts and minds of the leaders of the Caribbean, each with mixed success. America's long-held foreign policy position, the Monroe Doctrine, held that European powers were to be discouraged from any efforts to impose their colonial influence on any nation south of the Rio Grande. Russia, having already gotten a foothold in the region after the Cuban Revolution, led by a committed Marxist, sought to expand it influence. America responded when it considered events to be a significant threat to its national security, such as the regime change in Grenada, and subsequent construction of an airfield suitable for Russian bombers.

Today the Soviet Union is no more, and Russian influence in the caribbean is limited, according to most observers, to Russian private investment in Grenada, through its Citizenship by Investment (CBI) program. The current threat to US National Security comes from the Peoples Republic of China, whose major economic and diplomatic efforts in the East Caribbean states includes a significant percentage of CBI passport purchases being made by Chinese nationals, in both Saint Kitts and Dominica. Some experts are warning that China is in de facto control of the governments in both those countries, due to its extraordinary financial influence, which includes the payment of bribes & kickbacks, on top of the publicly known fees and "administrative costs" that accompany all CBI passport applications.

America may be focused on electronic surveillance being conducted against its commercial and military structure from Cuba, by its adversaries, but understand that similar activities by the Chinese government is most certainly being performed from China's large embassies in the East Caribbean,as well as the Chinese "tourists" and "businessmen" hold CBI passports from the five East Caribbean states that maintain those sales programs. Is this yet another reason to seek the termination of such programs, either directly or indirectly ? Otherwise, we may see a further expansion of China's footprint in the Caribbean, which should be under the control of its people, and not become a base for further activities. One only needs to look at the recent history in the South China Sea, to understand the gravity of the potential problem.