Caribbean Matters: Remembering 'Urgent Fury'—Reagan's invasion of Grenada
Lest we forget. Openly racist former president and current Republican nominee Donald Trump is not an anomaly. He actually represents a continuum of the policies and positions of former President Ronald Reagan, who holds “Saint Ronnie” status in the minds of far too many Americans.
Yes, the very same Reagan who opened his 1980 campaign in Philadelphia, Mississippi. That’s where civil rights workers James Chaney, Michael Schwerner, and Andrew Goodman were tortured and murdered during “Freedom Summer.” The same Reagan who we have to thank for the meme of “welfare queens.”
Reagan’s policies and positions didn’t just shape Republican domestic policy. He manufactured a military push to flex his anti-communist bona fides, choosing the tiny island of Grenada to make an example of by invading it on Oct. 25, 1983. That invasion was dubbed “Operation Urgent Fury” and sent 7,000 U.S. troops into an island nation only about twice the size of Washington, D.C.
Was Grenada a threat to the U.S.? You be the judge. The past is far too often prologue, and the Caribbean our Caliban. But if we forget recent history, it could be repeated on a far larger scale should Trump win another presidency.