The Regional Security System was created in 1982 to counter threats to the stability of the region in the late 1970s and early 1980s. On 29 October four members of the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States—namely, Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, St. Lucia, and St. Vincent and the Grenadines—signed a memorandum of understanding with Barbados to provide for "mutual assistance on request". The signatories agreed to prepare contingency plans and assist one another, on request, in national emergencies, prevention of smuggling, search and rescue, immigration control, fishery protection, customs and excise control, maritime policing duties, protection of off-shore installations, pollution control, national and other disasters and threats to national security. Saint Kitts and Nevis joined following independence in 1983, and Grenada followed two years later after Operation Urgent Fury, a combined U.S. and RSS invasion of the country. The MOU was updated in 1992 and the system acquired juridical status on under the Treaty which was signed at St. Georges, Grenada. The RSS initially started as a U.S. instrument to combat the spread of Communism in the Caribbean region. As of 2001, the RSS further cooperates with the CARICOM Regional Task Force on Crime and Security. In June 2010, United States and Caribbean regional officials resumed a plan for close cooperation established under the former Partnership for Prosperity and Security in the Caribbean from the Clinton era. As part of the joint agreement the United States pledged assistance with the creation of an Eastern Caribbean Coast Guard unit among RSS countries. The United States Coast Guard unit will underpin the wider US-Caribbean Basin Security Initiative which has deemed the RSS as "central to the CBSI’s success, given its reach across the Eastern Caribbean." Subsequently, Canada also pledged collaboration with the RSS bloc to combat a threat of Central American criminal gangs from expanding into the English-speaking Caribbean region.
Member States
The current member nations are:
Previous activities
The R.S.S., as it is commonly referred to, is based in Barbados at the Paragon Centre, headed by many regional army chiefs. It mainly serves as a defence system for the Caribbean Sea, conducting many operations by detecting and combating cross-Atlantic and intra-Caribbean drug smuggling, protection of the sovereignty of the nations of the Caribbean, providing assistance to Caribbean countries at the request of governments and are usually the first to respond after natural disasters occur, such as hurricanes, floods and earthquakes.
