Post-Cold War Guyana has become accustomed to a parade of American admirals, British brigadiers and French marines passing through the country in the cause of fostering friendship and strengthening military co-operation. The sight of Guyanese infantry embarking at the Timehri airport on their way to foreign training exercises must also be a source of silent reassurance to a population living in the shadow of territorial claims from its eastern and western neighbours.

It is tempting to think that these military links with the UK, USA, France and other countries are in Guyana's national interest and contribute in some way to national security. So, the press conference of Lieutenant Commander Gary Lydiate of the Royal Navy on 7 March, and the visit of Brigadier Peter Wall, the British Army's Chief of Joint Force Operations, on 12 March (SN, 14 March) were part of a familiar pattern.Friendly relations with three of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council can't be a bad thing!

But, of course, relations between states of such unequal resources and dissimilar circumstances are not a chance occurrence. The UK, USA, and France, along with the Netherlands, still hold on to significant territorial possessions, and the projection of strategic power is an important aspect of their presence in the Caribbean. This region, to which Guyana belongs, is one of the most Balkanized parts of the earth comprising nearly three dozen different jurisdictions and with a historical reputation of being 'the cockpit of Europe'.

The Caribbean is still a zone of instability and susceptibility to threats which could be injurious to the national interests of the big powers and grave enough to warrant military intervention. For example, the USA gave the most impressive displays of its awesome power by invading four small states over the last four decades - the Dominican Republic (1965); 'Operation Urgent Fury' in Grenada (1983); 'Operation Just Cause' in Panama (1989), and 'Operation Restore Democracy' in Haiti (1994). Unable to attract the support of larger regional states such as Colombia, Mexico and Venezuela, the USA succeeded in cobbling together a motley collection of soldiers from the micro-states of the Anglophone Caribbean for the Grenada and Haiti operations.

But real invasions are an expensive business and although rogue regimes such as those of Panama's Manuel Noriega or Haiti's Raoul Cedras can be occasional short-term distractions, they are not the most serious long-term problems the big powers face in the Caribbean. The big threat is the day-to-day, seemingly ceaseless narco-trafficking and almost unstoppable illegal migration from the Region's numerous statelets. It is these problems, not authoritarianism, communism or terrorism, which led to the military operations in Panama and Haiti. It is these problems which the large masses of resourceful and persistent people pose and which no single army, air force or navy could eliminate.

In accordance with the modern version of the McNamara Doctrine, regional states have been made to play a more active role in the new world order through the Regional Security System (RSS); the US Southern Command's Caribbean Nations Security Conference (CANSEC); the series of mimeographed 'shiprider' agreements and the annual Tradewinds Exercise.

The UK itself has displayed no great zeal in seeking a permanent solution to the two border disputes which it bequeathed Guyana at Independence 36 years ago and which still constitute this country's most serious defence problems. On the contrary, it appears that it is poor Guyana which must now help the UK. As Commander Lydiate put it plainly :" The aim of these exercises is to improve the UK's ability to work overseas and gain from the mutual training that the Guyana Defence Force and the Trinidad [and Tobago] Defence Force can give to the United Kingdom". It is clear who gains and who gives!

And those who thought that the GDFS Essequibo had been bought to help in the detection of threats to our territorial integrity and the protection of our fisheries and EEZ also learnt from Lydiate's lips that: "At the end of this, your ship, the GDFS Essequibo, will be fully ready in all respects for your war against drugs...".

For the big powers, grand strategy is all about national interest, rather than international duty. In the final analysis, Lydiate and others like him come to promote the UK's national interest. Should we expect otherwise?

Guyana's national interest must be the Defence Board's paramount consideration. Even while embarking on the uncertain seas of exercises abroad, Guyana's defence planners must also convince our people of their plans to safeguard this country's territorial integrity against threats of airspace violations and aircraft hijackings; seaspace trespass including the arrest of fishermen, poaching of our fisheries and interdiction of petroleum exploration; garimpeiro settlements and incursions by bandits in the hinterland.

In international relations, it is assumed that every state pursues its own national interest; the UK and USA are certainly doing so. Without a clearly defined national defence strategy based on its national interest, Guyana could dissipate its meagre resources in performing chores for others while ignoring its own domestic obligations, thereby making events such as the CGX expulsion, the BAT withdrawal and the TGA hijacking possible.

In charting the course of Guyana's defence strategy, our planners would do well to remember Dr Peter's adage: "If you don't know where you are going, you will probably end up somewhere else".