Guatemala: 1954-1996 Human Rights Violations & U.S. Intervention MAP TIMELINE

1. Guatemala: 1954-1996 Human Rights Violations & U.S. Intervention MAP TIMELINE HISTORY OF GUATEMALA MEMORY OF SILENCE BISHOP’S ASSASSINATION WORKS CITED

2. 1944 - 1950: Arévalo Presidency First democratic election in Guatemalan history results in the presidency of Juan José Arévalo, an Argentine-trained philosopher. Arévalo dissolves many features of the preceding era, such as the Vagrancy Laws, the repressive labor codes and the secret police. He also begins other progressive reforms such as national literacy programs, farm cooperatives and voter registration drives. 1950 - 1954: Arbenz Presidency Following Arévalo, Col. Jacobo Arbenz Guzman becomes president. Much to the anger of the United Fruit Company, he enacts land redistribution measures in the form of Decree 900. 1954: CIA Sponsored Coup Seeing too much Communist influence in the Arbenz regime and a direct threat to their corporate interests, policy makers in the United States, including the Dulles Brothers, decide that he has to be removed. Receiving little domestic support to fight off the invaders, Arbenz resigns and flees the country. John Foster Dulles, brief biography CIA vs communism ? “End of the Innocence” by Mike Lehman The US State Dept. initiates a propaganda and destabilization campaign while the CIA leads a small opposition army into Guatemala from Honduras. .

3. 1954 - 1957: Castillo Armas Presidency 1966 - 1970: Montenegro Presidency Carlos Castillo Armas chosen by the United States to replace Arbenz as President. US Operation PBSUCCESS, 1 US Operation PBSUCCESS, 2 Assasination Proposals, by the US Julio Cesar Mendez Montenegro elected and provides a civilian facade under which counter-insurgency intensifies, wiping out the FAR. US documents "counter insurgency" The use of napalm and death squads initiated during this period, resulting in some 30,000 deaths, most of these civilians. 1958: Ydigoras Presidency Col. Miguel Ydigoras Fuentes elected after the Armas assassination. Increasing military corruption and permission for anti-Castro Cuban exiles to train in Guatemala result in military revolt. 1962: Creation of the FAR Ex-military officers, Guatemalan communist party members and students band together to form the first Guatemalan guerrilla group: the Armed Rebel Force (FAR). United States begins counter-insurgency training for the Guatemalan armed forces.

4. 1970 - 1974: Arana Presidency Col. Carlos Arana Osorio initiates a second wave of "pacification" as president. 15,000 killed or “disappeared” in first 3 years of his term. Emergence of the Guerrilla Army of the Poor (EGP). Practitioners of liberation theology begin to support organization and resistance on the part of poor, rural indigenous peoples. 1978 - 1982: Lucas Garcia Presidency Beginning in the era of Col. Romeo Lucas Garcia and continuing into the next, repression in Guatemala reaches its peak. Creation of the Revolutionary Organization of People in Arms (ORPA). Non-violent, popular organizing increases. The Committee of Peasant Unity struggles for higher wages and better working conditions. 1982 - 1983: Montt Presidency Despite pledges to respect human rights from the military junta, led by Gen. Efraín Ríos Montt, killings continue at the rate of 1,000 per month. “Catholic bishops declared in May 1982, “with assassinations now falling into the category of genocide” (Brown 183). Main elements of Montt's intensive counter -insurgency effort includecivil defense patrols,model villages, and a policy of "Scorched Earth". US "scorched earth" document Indian arming (EGP)

5. 1982 - 1983: Montt Presidency The four existing guerrilla groups join forces in 1982 to fight under one name, the Guatemalan National Revolutionary Unit. “Explaining his approach on television, Rios Montt forthrightly said that he had “declared a state of siege so we could kill legally”—a reference to the death penalties to be handed down by the secret tribunals he had established to try those accused of political crimes” (Brown 183). 1983 - 1986: Mejía Víctores Presidency The Mutual Support Group emerges as one of the most vocal, and most targeted, human rights organizations in Guatemala. “One month after the August 8, 1983 coup […] 10 percent of Rabinal’s population of 30-35 thousand have died by political violence” (Brown 187). "Illusion of Democracy" US sings Montt's praises

6. 1986: Cerezo Presidency Vinicio Cerezo Arevalo elected as the first civilian president since Montenegro. Violence continues, as illustrated by the assassination of anthropologist Myrna Mack Chang. 1991: Serrano Presidency Peace talks begin; accord signed between URNG and the government committing them to internationally verified negotiations. In 1992, Rigoberta Menchu Tum wins the Nobel Peace Prize for her struggle in defense of indigenous rights. Rebel leader Commander Everardo, husband of U.S. lawyer and human rights activist Jennifer Harbury, is wounded in battle and captured by the military for interrogation. He is then tortured by the G-2 and killed by Col. Alpirez, a CIA-paid "asset". 1993: De Leon Carpio Presidency Ramiro De Leon Carpio, former human rights ombudsman for Guatemala, is elected president.

7. 1996: Arzú Presidency Alvaro Arzú Irigoyen elected president. Arzú purges the upper ranks of the Military of some of its more corrupt members. Peace talks, which originated in 1991, culminate in late 1996 with the signing of the final peace accords. UN Human Rights documents, 1 UN 1995 Human Rights Commission report ( Independent Expert report in 1995 Works Cited Guatemala: A Human Rights History of Guatemala. Amnesty International. 1 January 2003. <www.west.net/~tmiller/gh/> . Brown, Cynthia. ed. With Friends Like These: The Americas Watch Report on Human Rights and U.S. Policy in Latin America. New York: Pantheon, 1985.

8. Carlos Castillo Armas Before the coup of 1954, Castillo Armas was a retired military officer working in Honduras as a furniture salesman. He was chosen by the CIA to lead the National Liberation Movement (MLN) into Guatemala to overthrow the Arbenz regime. With the resignation and flight of Arbenz, Castillo Armas was flown into Guatemala on the personal plane of U.S. Ambassador John Peurifoy. He was installed as President and given some $80 million from Eisenhower over the next three years to boost his government. As president, he re-instituted the mechanisms of repression, including the MLN's Committee Against Communism, which compiled lists of thousands of union members and Arbenz supporters who were suspected subversives. In 1957 Castillo Armas was assassinated by military rivals. John Foster Dulles and Alan Dulles Under the Republican Administration of Eisenhower, John Foster Dulles and his brother Alan were placed in positions of great influence. John Foster was the Secretary of State and Alan sat as the head of the Central Intelligence Agency. Both were essential Cold Warriors, convinced of an international conspiracy to increase the communist sphere of influence and construct a beach-head in the Western Hemisphere. This virulent anti-communism and their own personal ties to United Fruit made them perfect connections in the U.S. government to implement an ouster of Jacobo Arbenz. Both Dulles brothers had been principle lawyers for the New York law firm that represented United Fruit Company. John Foster Dulles had been involved in that law firm’s international corporate accounts. • Jacobo Arbenz Guzman • Jacobo Arbenz was a nationalist military officer elected as president in 1951. In addition to continuing the progressive reforms begun under Arévalo, he set out to challenge the monopoly held by United Fruit in the Guatemalan economy. Though he was not himself a communist, his wife was and he accepted the support of other communist intellectuals. Additionally, the newly legal Communist Party won some 4 of the 50 seats in the National Legislature. These facts, along with limited land expropriations he enacted, were enough to convinceWashington that he was 100% "Red" and a threat to American hegemony in the region.

9. United Fruit Company United Fruit Company (now known as Chiquita) has long exerted enormous influence throughout Central America and within the United States Government. It had grown to be the most important corporation in Guatemala. United Fruit controlled roughly 40% of the most fertile land, owned a railroad, held a monopoly on electricity production and ran the port facilities in Puerto Barrios, Atlantic Coast. Though United Fruit owned huge tracts of land, it paid little in the way of property tax in Guatemala in part because they claimed their land was only worth a fraction of it's real value on tax receipts. When Arbenz expropriated 400,000 of their 500,000 acres, he offered them the $1.2 million they had claimed it was worth. United Fruit demanded $16 million. When Arbenz refused, they turned to their friends in the United States Government to assist. Some, like Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs John Moors Cabot had family ties to the company. Others, such as U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Henry Cabot Lodge, were major stockholders. The Dulles Brothers had both worked as lawyers for United Fruit's legal firm. With connections such as these, it was not difficult for UFCo. to convince the U.S. Government of the need for action against Arbenz. Model Villages In order to bring communities in guerrilla territory under government control, "model villages" were constructed, often on or close to the ruins of villages destroyed by military counter-insurgency. Though the government promised water, electricity, a school, a church and so on, these facilities and services often went unprovided. Meanwhile, military detachments kept a close eye on the activities of everyone, as no person was above suspicion of "subversion".

10. Civil Defense Patrols The so-called Civil Defense Patrols were an integral part of military's counter-insurgency plans. All able-bodied males in a given village were forced to go on patrol for 24 hours, once each week. Ostensibly, this was to protect the villages from guerrilla attack. Often, civil patrollers were forced to beat or kill neighbors, for fear of themselves being branded a "subversive". Some of the worst human rights violations, including massacres of entire villages, were committed by civil patrol members. Though the Guatemalan Constitution of 1985 declared that un-paid, forced military service is illegal, civil defense patrols have persisted, even through the present period. A model village under military control A civil patrol

11. Works Cited Site #1 (MAP):<http://www.lib.utexas.edu/Libs/PCL/ map_collection/americas/guatemala.jpg>MA Site #2 (HISTORY OF WAR): <http://www.west.net/~tmiller/gh/> Site #3 (MEMORY OF SILENCE): <http://shr.aaas.org/guatemala/ceh/report/ english/>

12. Site #4 (BISHOP'S ASSASINATION): <http://www.halcyon.com/blackbox/hw/ Bishop%>20Slain%20in%20Guatemala. html> Brown, Cynthia. With Friends Like These: The America’s Watch Report on Human Rights & U. S. Policy in Latin America. New York: Pantheon, 1985. Schlesinger, Stephen and Stephen Kinzer. Bitter Fruit. New York: Doubleday, 1983. Fried, Johnathan L., et al, eds. Guatemala in Rebellion: Unfinished History. New York: Grove. 1983. Back to Title Page