A Return to Colonialism?
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From Rubio´s speech at the Munich Conference:
“In a perfect world, all of these problems and more would be solved by diplomats and strongly worded resolutions. But we do not live in a perfect world, and we cannot continue to allow those who blatantly and openly threaten our citizens and endanger our global stability to shield themselves behind abstractions of international law which they themselves routinely violate.
This is the path that President Trump and the United States has embarked upon. It is the path we ask you here in Europe to join us on. It is a path we have walked together before and hope to walk together again. For five centuries, before the end of the Second World War, the West had been expanding – its missionaries, its pilgrims, its soldiers, its explorers pouring out from its shores to cross oceans, settle new continents, build vast empires extending out across the globe.
But in 1945, for the first time since the age of Columbus, it was contracting. Europe was in ruins. Half of it lived behind an Iron Curtain and the rest looked like it would soon follow. The great Western empires had entered into terminal decline, accelerated by godless communist revolutions and by anti-colonial uprisings that would transform the world and drape the red hammer and sickle across vast swaths of the map in the years to come.
Against that backdrop, then, as now, many came to believe that the West’s age of dominance had come to an end and that our future was destined to be a faint and feeble echo of our past. But together, our predecessors recognized that decline was a choice, and it was a choice they refused to make. This is what we did together once before, and this is what President Trump and the United States want to do again now, together with you.
Marco Rubio spent his whole life talking against the cuban goverment, Fidel Castro, and Che Guevara. But now he is in a worse political stance than the Cuban government.
Granma, besides calling him Gusano, also called him a midget, holding the job of a giant, and they are correct, he is just Donald Trump’s delivery boy ( a peasant expression: Muchachito de mandao )
He was a member of one of the most backward and reactionary political parties known as the Tea Party; the nazis party of Germany was liberal compared with the Tea Party. Eliminating petroleum and bank remittance to the island of Cuba would be like killing the whole population and spreading hunger, misery, diseases, unemployments
https://en.granma.cu/mundo/2026-01-20/narco-rubio
https://en.granma.cu/mundo/2026-01-08/the-mythomaniac-marco-rubioMarco Rubio built much of his political career on opposition to the Cuban government and figures such as Fidel Castro. Yet political irony often reveals itself in unexpected ways. Today, his position appears less defined by independent policy vision and more by alignment with broader strategic interests within US domestic politics, particularly those associated with hard-line approaches toward Cuba.
Personal insults exchanged between governments — whether calling someone a “gusano” or reducing politics to ridicule — may generate headlines, but they do little to clarify the real issue: the human consequences of economic policy. Measures aimed at restricting remittances, financial flows, or access to essential resources do not primarily affect political elites; they fall most heavily on ordinary people, families, workers, and the elderly who depend on those connections for survival.
History repeatedly shows that economic pressure framed as a tool for political change often deepens hardship without producing the intended transformation. Instead, it can reinforce nationalist narratives on all sides while worsening living conditions for the population caught in between.
The deeper problem is that geopolitical confrontation tends to treat societies as instruments in political struggles rather than communities of human beings with everyday needs. Policies designed to “punish” governments frequently translate into shortages, unemployment, migration pressures, and social instability.
A serious discussion should therefore move beyond partisan loyalty or ideological hostility and ask a simpler question: do such policies improve the lives and autonomy of ordinary people, or do they merely reproduce cycles of conflict while leaving working populations to bear the cost?I have mentioned the non-political stand of the Cuban government because those are the only arguments that they have; they would never mention anything when they were part of the imperialist soviets, and they were also the delivery boy of the soviet union in Latin America, which produced the deaths of thousandsd of peoplees, the creation of the death squad, Condor Operation, and the Colombian paramilitary, and military coup including the government of chile
Barack Obama only implemented a more open policy because some members of the US oligarchy wanted to use the cheap labor forces of Cuba to produce high profits and bring new business, while the European capitalists were making profits from factories and tourism
Colonialism has been replaced by capitalism, and capitalism produces more profits than the old classical colonial conception. Some colonial powers eliminated colonialism, and a new ruling class emerged in those countries, including Cuba, and now China is taking their places in Africa and Latin America
Several countries in Europe are abandoning the US and Joining china, Canada signed a new treaty with China, England signed a new treaty with Mercosur, and most of those countries are members of BRICS.
Mexico is not eliminating its ties with China; on the contrary, they are building a train network to transport Chinese commodities from the Peruvian China megaport, which can lead to the elimination of the importance of the Panama Canal.
In Argentina, Milei promised to cut ties with Communists, but he did not eliminate their treaties with China, and Chase and Citibank did not approve the monetary swap.
The US treasury dept lent 20 billion from its own funds, and China is willing to provide financial support to the mini anarcho capitalist government of argentina and, taking over the place of the IMF
The new government of Chile is not going to eliminate its business relationship with China, and probably Venezuela will not be able to do so either. China and the US are among the few countries that can process lithium, rare earth, and uranium, and China is buying its copper to produce warships, marine ships, and submarines
China is buying more than 70% of the Chilean copper
The type of petroleum extracted from Venezuela can only be processed by China and the US, as well as the processing of rare earth. China has a monopoly, too. The leftists talk about neo-colonialism, but they do not mention the capitalist expansion of China and Russia.
The USA has encountered a new problem with the extraction of petroleum in Venezuela, because the equipment is outdated, and they do not have any parts,s and China is willing to fix the problem.
The old wrong conceptions of Lenin on Imperialism highest state of capitalism, are gone; there is a new realignment of forces, different from the post-war.
The world according to Donald Trump and its oligarchs is not coming back anymore; isolation and expansion do not work anymore either. This is a global economy. In Latin America, the old Monroe Doctrine is not applicable either
A clear difference exists between classical colonialism and today’s global capitalist system. Under colonialism, powers like Britain, France, and Spain directly controlled territories. For example, in 1900, India produced around $3.5 billion worth of raw materials exported to Britain annually, while British companies controlled most industry and infrastructure. Political power was overt, and the local population had no meaningful control.
Today, countries like India are formally independent, yet foreign capital still dominates key sectors. In 2025, India attracted over $100 billion in foreign direct investment, much of it in technology, manufacturing, and service industries. Local workers produce goods for global markets, and profits largely go to multinational corporations. Unlike colonial rule, this control is indirect: governments manage territories, but the economy is integrated into global capitalist networks.
Another example is Cuba. During the Soviet era, the island received subsidized oil and traded sugar for machinery, but the state essentially acted as a regional agent of the Soviet capitalist system, not an independent socialist economy. Today, Cuba engages with tourism, Chinese investment, and remittances from abroad — again, participation in a global capitalist system, where profits and economic pressures reflect world market forces rather than colonial edicts.
The pattern is clear: exploitation no longer requires colonial governors or flags. Workers everywhere, whether in formerly colonized nations or “developed” states, sell their labor to a global market where capital seeks maximum profit. Independence and sovereignty cannot remove exploitation if production is organized for profit. National independence changed the political form, but not the economic reality.Lenin described imperialism as the “highest stage of capitalism,” focusing largely on early 20th-century European powers and their colonies. This framework implied that only certain nations could behave as imperialists while others were subordinate. Yet the current global economy reveals that capitalist exploitation and dominance are not confined to specific countries. Today, nations such as China exert massive economic influence worldwide, engaging in trade, infrastructure investment, and control of critical supply chains.
For example, Canada’s trade with China exceeded CAD 64 billion in the first half of 2025, with strong demand for energy products and minerals such as copper and iron ores. Canada and China also signed a preliminary trade agreement in early 2026 reducing tariffs on electric vehicles and agricultural products. Across Latin America, trade with China surpassed $500 billion in 2024, with major infrastructure projects, from megaports to railways, financed through Chinese investment under the Belt and Road Initiative. Countries such as Chile, Peru, Ecuador, and Nicaragua have signed free-trade agreements, diversifying away from traditional patterns. In global supply chains, China processed over 90 % of rare earths and more than 40 % of global copper in 2023, consolidating a central position in strategic industries.
These shifts illustrate that geopolitical influence today operates through economic integration and global supply chains, not only through traditional alliances. From this perspective, imperialist behavior emerges wherever private profit drives accumulation and control over labor and resources, regardless of the national identity of the state. Lenin’s focus on a few “imperialist nations” obscures this systemic reality. Exploitation is built into capitalism itself, whether in Europe, North America, Latin America, or Asia.
True economic democracy requires recognition that the logic of profit, not national identity, underlies domination. Any society seeking to transcend these patterns must prioritize democratic ownership and control of production globally, rather than assuming some states are inherently anti-imperialist.Not exactly a return to classical colonialism. Today’s global dynamics reflect capitalist expansion through economic dependence rather than formal political control. Trade between China and Latin America exceeded $500 billion in 2024, with major infrastructure projects — megaports, railways, and energy plants — financed by Chinese investment as part of the Belt and Road Initiative. China processes over 90 % of rare earths and more than 40 % of global copper, while Chile supplies more than 70 % of its copper to China.
Canada’s bilateral trade with China reached CAD 64 billion in the first half of 2025, including energy products and minerals. Meanwhile, U.S. influence persists through strategic financing, like the $20 billion Treasury loan to Argentina, but countries increasingly balance between Washington, Beijing, and other global partners.
This illustrates global economic dependence: independent states negotiate deals, but their economies are constrained by the demands of powerful states and global capital. Unlike classical colonialism, there is no formal political domination, yet populations remain subject to exploitation through markets and resources.
In sum, capitalism today produces subordination without colonies, reinforcing economic inequality and dependence, showing that while the methods have changed, the underlying system of global exploitation persists.The concept of Banana Republic emerged because one corporation used to control a large territory or a complete nation and established a mono crop, as was the case with Chiquita bananas, Puerto Rican Sugar Company, and Gulf and Western.
The ex-president of a Latin American country said that the real president of the nation is seated at the US embassy, the elected president was only a decorative figure
They had company towns, and the workers owed their whole salaries to the corporation’s grocery stores; they were working for free. Workers were not allowed to emigrate in great quantity, and many did not have a passport
Those days are already gone, and the concept of Banana Republic is not applicable anymore, although lefwingers continue using it,
States and nation-states became independent, a new ruling class came out, and sometimes entered into contradiction with their old colonial rulers, but foreign capital still prevails in the so called indepedent nations.
Colombia, which was a strong ally of the US challenge their domination and became a partner of Russia and China, and are going to become member of BRICS, and is buying weapons from European nations
Brazil has a large industrial production, they build their own atomic plants,( they have the technology to build their own atomic bombs ), they have their own satellites, and they produce airplanes and cars
What is often missed in discussions about “banana republics” is that the decisive transformation was not simply political independence but the globalization of capital itself. In the past, domination appeared visible because it was concentrated in a single corporation or foreign power controlling land, labour, and government institutions directly. Today, control is more diffuse and therefore less obvious. No single company needs to govern a country when financial markets, credit systems, trade dependence, and technological monopolies can discipline entire economies.
Modern states are not passive victims; they actively compete to attract investment, secure export markets, and integrate into global production networks. This creates a situation where governments formally exercise sovereignty while simultaneously adapting policies to maintain competitiveness within the world market. The pressure no longer comes from a colonial administrator but from capital mobility itself — investment can simply move elsewhere.
This helps explain why countries with very different political ideologies often pursue similar economic strategies. Whether governments describe themselves as left, right, nationalist, or progressive, they must operate within the same global framework of profitability, productivity, and trade balance constraints.
In this sense, the historical “banana republic” has not returned, but neither has dependency disappeared. What has emerged instead is a system in which economic power operates structurally rather than territorially. The question today is not who rules directly, but how global economic relations limit the range of choices available to every nation-state.The economic dependency continues to exist while most of the third-world countries continue borrowing money from the International Monetary Fund, and they continue paying the old debts with new debts, or asking for a moratorium to pay the debts, or just to pay the interest without making payments to the principal of the debts
Some countries have imposed their own dependency on other countries. For example, Venezuela created a new dependency with Petro Caribe, which imposes its own financial requirements to export petroleum; they labelled it international socialist cooperation, and they created Banco Del Sur, which, in some way take the job of the IMF.
To pay those monetary or service debts, the governments must impose austerity plans on the working class. The mono crop production has been eliminated, but the exploitation of the working class has continued in higher level, and more diversified production, and they are producing more surplus value
What often disappears from discussions about debt and dependency is not only who lends, but how the global economic system itself reproduces dependence regardless of ideology or political alignment.
Today, formal colonial rule no longer exists, yet economic pressure operates through financial mechanisms rather than direct administration. Developing countries collectively hold around $31 trillion in public debt, and in 2024 alone they paid nearly $921 billion just in interest payments, resources that could otherwise fund health, education, or infrastructure.This creates a structural cycle: governments refinance old obligations with new loans, negotiate moratoriums, or pay interest without reducing principal. The result is not simply foreign domination, but a system where national economies must prioritize debt servicing over social needs. Austerity policies are therefore not accidental political choices but economic requirements imposed by participation in global markets.
Attempts to replace Western financial influence have often reproduced similar relations. PetroCaribe, for example, offered oil under preferential credit terms, but still tied recipient economies to long-term payment obligations denominated in commodities and state agreements. Likewise, alternative institutions such as Banco del Sur aimed to challenge existing financial structures, yet they operated within the same logic of credit, repayment, and accumulation.
What changed from the old “banana republic” period is not the existence of exploitation, but its form. Instead of monocrop plantations owned directly by foreign corporations, economies are now integrated into global production chains — exporting minerals, agricultural goods, or manufactured components — while surplus value continues to flow through trade, finance, and debt mechanisms.
In this sense, dependency today is less visible but more systemic: no single empire governs it, yet all states must compete within the same global capitalist framework. The question is therefore not whether dependency exists, but why it persists even when governments change ideology, alliances, or geopolitical partners.
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