Why is Trump shifting millions in military aid to South America?

The funding will reportedly subsidize purchases of American weapons by four governments on the continent The US has decided to redirect $52 million in foreign military financing to four countries in South America, the Associated Press reported on Tuesday.

The funds, which subsidize purchases of American military equipment, are being reallocated from Slovakia, North Macedonia, Tunisia, and Iraq to Panama, Peru, Ecuador, and Colombia, the news agency said, citing a State Department notification to Congress.

The shift comes as US President Donald Trump has placed greater emphasis on the Western Hemisphere under what he has called the ‘Donroe Doctrine’, his version of the 19th-century hegemonic Monroe Doctrine.

The Trump administration has said it intends to strengthen US influence in the Americas while preventing rival powers from gaining strategic positions in the region.

The State Department said the previous distribution of foreign military financing did “not align with the administration’s prioritization of” the Western Hemisphere.

Spending the money in South America will help recipients “combat narcoterrorism in our backyard and help continue to secure the Panama Canal” and “prevent adversaries from establishing strategic footholds in our hemisphere,” the department explained.

How did the South American recipients align with Trump? Since Trump returned to office in January 2025, all four recipients have taken steps aligning themselves more closely with his administration’s priorities.

Read more US squares up to China over Panama Canal Panama withdrew from China’s Belt and Road Initiative and expanded security cooperation with Washington, though President Jose Raul Mulino pushed back on Trump’s suggestion that the US should retake direct control of the Panama Canal.

Mulino’s government has scrapped contracts with Hong Kong-based firm CK Hutchison Holdings, which Washington cited as evidence of a slow Chinese takeover of critical ports in Peru.

The company owned by billionaire Li Ka-shing’s family is seeking $1.5 billion in damages.

Ecuador has signed a trade agreement with the US, lowering trade barriers and making other concessions to American exporters.

President Daniel Noboa has also expanded counter-narcotics cooperation with Washington, tacitly endorsing Trump’s controversial tactics that involve airstrikes on boats in international waters that the Pentagon deems suspicious.

Noboa’s proposal to once again allow foreign military bases in Ecuador was rejected by voters last year.

Peru has joined Trump’s signature Shield of the Americas initiative under new President Keiko Fujimori, the daughter and political heir to dictator Alberto Fujimori, and otherwise expanding security cooperation with Washington.