THE PATH TO FAVOR: TIBURCIO CARÍAS ANDINO AND THE UNITED STATES, 1923-1941

This dissertation examines the United States' relationship with Honduran politician Tiburcio Carías Andino between 1923, when Carías became a major fixture of Honduran politics, and December 8, 1941, when Honduras declared war on Japan and began a new chapter in Carías's relationship with the United States. Most scholarship has depicted Carías as little more than an obedient puppet controlled by the United States and the United Fruit Company, the classic client dictator running the archetypical "banana republic." This dissertation challenges the validity of Carías's supposedly unquestioned compliance with US demands, and demonstrates that Carías was an independent actor capable of using, manipulating, and defying the United States for his own purposes. The dissertation begins by studying the United States' understanding of Honduras from the late nineteenth century through the beginning of Carías's presidency. Guided by the belief Honduras was a land rich with natural resources but home to a degenerate race, US policymakers showed themselves eager to pacify the country by any methods available. The United States' desire to stabilize Honduras for the purpose of making it more productive and prosperous brought Washington into conflict with Carías throughout the decade before his presidency. During the 1920s, far from the patron-client relationship some have described, Carías threatened and instigated revolutions when US officials advocated peace, undermined the US backed presidency of Miguel Paz Baraona, and used anti-US sentiment to his political advantage. Once he successfully took power, US policy shifted to grudging acceptance of his stabilizing rule, even as he continued to defy directives from Washington on a range of issues.The dissertation demonstrates that during the Franklin D. Roosevelt Administration the United States failed to practice its espoused policy of noninterference in Honduran affairs. Evidence for direct US intervention in Honduras can be found in US support of the Honduran military during the 1930s, the manipulation of the Honduran economy during the Great Depression, and the heavy pressure Carías's government received from the United States on major matters of domestic and international policy. The dissertation shows that members of the Roosevelt Administration, while claiming to promote democracy and the self-determination of Latin Americans, instead consciously found themselves encouraging dictatorship in Honduras. This study illuminates how Latin American dictators used the United States' repudiation of interference in the region to their own benefit.