guatemalancivilwarhist242-blog

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Timeline of the Guatemalan Civil War

1954- The U.S.-backed coup, commanded by Guatemalan exile Colonel Carlos Castillo Armas, overthrew the democratically elected President Jacobo Arbenz. Castillo installed himself as President, and the U.S. administration cast him as a hero for his victory over Communism.

1960- Guatemala’s 36-year civil war began fueled by broad polarization between rich and poor in the country. Government military forces and right-wing militias battled leftist rebels, mostly Mayan insurgents, who were fighting for economic and social justice.

1966- Power was brought to the Revolutionary Party (PR) in the 1966 election of candidate Cesar Mendez, this only intensified the civil war. 1970- Colonel Carlos Arana, a conservative military commander is elected president. He suspended civil liberties, placed country in state of siege, and caused years of repression.

1978- General Fernando Garcia became president in what is known as a fraudulent election. He launched a campaign of terror against any potential opposition.

1981- Addressing decades of violence and military dictatorships in Guatemala, the Inter-American Human Rights Commission released a report blaming Garcia’s government for thousands of illegal prosecutions. The era between 1970-1983 became known as the worst for human rights violations in Guatemala.  At least 50,000 people died in the violence and 200,000 fled to neighboring countries.

1982- General Efrain Rios Montt seized power in a coup. During his 17-month reign, the worst atrocities against the indigenous population occur. 1985- A new constitution is drafted and democratic elections are in place. 1993- President Jorge Serrano attempts to prosecute human rights violators but was unsuccessful as accusations of corruption and appropriating state funds were exposed. He was forced to resign and has lived in exile in Panama.

1994- Peace talks between the government and guerilla insurgents began under President Ramiro De Leon Carpio. 1996- Guatemala’s 36-year civil war ends with the signing of peace accords. Still, human rights and peace activists continue to be threatened and assassinated.

-Kendon

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/latin_america-jan-june11-timeline_03-07/

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-Tyler

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Civil War Background

The lead-up to the Civil War began with the 1871 revolution that established a Liberal government. Successive governments opened up the country to foreign trade, especially with the United States. The Guatemalan government worked closely with the US for years, leading to the establishment of the American-owned United Fruit Company, which involved itself in Guatemala’s internal affairs afterwards.

In 1944, the US-backed dictatorship was overthrown by a pro-democracy coup, but after 10 years of reform the US supported a counter-coup that returned the country to dictatorship. The dictatorship overturned most of the reforms that had been enacted (including laws to protect workers from being exploited by corporations as the United Fruit Company). This led to left-wing groups, supported chiefly by natives and peasants, rising up against the government, thus initiating the civil war.

-Phil

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/latin_america-jan-june11-timeline_03-07/ http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/war/guatemala.htm

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Extra Background

-Noah

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-Noah

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U.S. Role in Guatemalan Civil War

Four years after the long and brutal Guatemalan Civil War, the U.S. President Clinton has the opportunity to address a country that is attempting to heal from decades long of human rights violations. Clinton has the opportunity to acknowledge and apologize for U.S. role in directly and indirectly supporting the illegal actions of the Guatemalan government and the repressive Guatemalan army from the 1960’s to the 1980’s.

With the CIA’s 1954 participation in the orchestration of the coup that removed Jacobo Arbenz from office, initiated U.S. involvement in Guatemalan affairs. During the 1960s, the U.S. became deeply involved in training and supplying the Guatemalan army, transforming it into a repressive and violent army. The U.S. participation in distribution of guns and money to opposition forces and facilitating training to mercenaries were excessive in the almost-four decade long Guatemalan civil war. The U.S. involvement at the time and any actions taken by the army were justified as “anti-communist.”

During the 1970s and early 1980s, U.S. Congress was forbidden from direct U.S. military aid to the Guatemalan army but the Reagan administration's continued to covertly and indirectly aid its allies through the CIA. U.S. military aid was restored in the 1980’s but was cut off again in the 1990’s because of the overwhelming amount of human rights abuses that came to light. Years after the end of the civil war, impunity remains, as little progress has been made toward promoting accountability and to bring human rights perpetrators to justice. Guatemalans continue to face high levels of violence and weak and corrupt law enforcement institutions. Most of these abuses have not been investigated, and the perpetrators have yet to be brought to justice.

-Kendon

https://search.proquest.com/docview/421483370?accountid=2837

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-Kendon

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Factors Behind the Guatemalan Genocide

Guatemala was home to its indigenous people, the Maya, until the 16th century when Spanish explorers arrived. After this, the small minority of Spanish conquers began ruling very strictly over the indigenous Mayan people. Ever since then, there has been a history of segregation and discrimination towards the Mayan people. This came to fruition when the Civil War began in 1960 as Mayan rebel organizations tried to take power from the President of Guatemala, Miguel Yidigoras Fuentes, and his autocratic regime. This regime was known for being racist toward the Maya and Ladino (mixed) populations and oppressing women. The threat that these rebel organizations posed was inflated by the government with the intention to label all Maya as internal enemies of Guatemala. Fuentes’ regime did this by spreading racist notions about the Maya, claiming them to be members of an inferior culture, and that they were to blame for all the poverty across Guatemala.

-Tyler

http://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/guatemalan-migration-times-civil-war-and-post-war-challenges

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Ethnic Extermination

With widespread Mayan opposition of the government breaking out in the 1960’s the Guatemalan government began conducting military operations with the goal to exterminate the Maya. Most of these massacres took place between 1981 and 1985 with most of the ethnic cleansing taking place. The main killers of the Mayan people were a special squad of soldiers who were nicknamed “The Kaibiles” by its soldiers. They would go from village to village killing every person they could find until they would leave the village completely lifeless. Overall there are 626 documented cases of such villages. Majority of the victims were not guerilla fighters but instead were community leaders, religious leaders, teachers, and children. Overall there were over 200,000 people that were either killed or disappeared as a result of the genocide. Of those 200,000, 83 percent were Maya and 17 percent were Ladino. On top of the massive killing of Maya, the government also put into place a “Scorched Earth Policy”, which  forced over half a million Maya out of their homes and off of their lands because they could not work properly.

-Tyler

http://combatgenocide.org/?page_id=158

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Article found by Noah

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This image shows one of hundreds of mass graves that are scattered across Guatemala after the Civil War

-Tyler

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Long Lasting Effects of the War

A ceasefire was signed between the government and main rebel forces at the start of 1997, backed by UN peacekeepers, but the violence continued in much of the country. Guatemala was economically devastated and crime was rampant. Despite elections and nominal civilian rule, the people feared their government could still turn against them at any moment. While the large-scale fighting has stopped, violence is still commonplace in Guatemala today, with many sources discussing the “normalization of violence.”

Guatemala still remains a major hub of trade and interaction between North and South America, and as such has become a target of drug cartels, so gang violence is an issue faced by many Guatemalans, urban and rural. While the country has become more democratic in time, the legacy of violence and racism that the civil war left behind greatly hinders civil society, and it will likely be a very long time before Guatemala will see any real semblance of peace.

-Phil

http://www.transitionsabroad.com/listings/travel/narrative_travel_writing/guatemala-city-aftermath-of-civil-war.shtml https://birdinflight.com/inspiration/experience/20160630-james-rodriguez.html

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This image portrays the indigenous Ixil people of Guatemala, survivors of the Ixil genocide. They’re protesting against the uplift of an 80-year sentence against genocide leader and former Guatemalan dictator, Efrain Rios Montt in May 2013. The banner reads “More than 626 massacres in indigenous towns, and they still deny there was GENOCIDE.”

-Noah

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Related article

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2016/04/16/guatemalas-civil-war-ended-20-years-ago-today-here-are-4-things-to-know-about-its-path-to-democracy/?utm_term=.7bcf4a1b7fa6

Getting to a position of democracy wasn’t easy for the Guatemalan population. The country’s government remains volatile in elections to this day, 20 years later. In April 2015, the International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG) accused many high-profile politicians of bribery from importers in exchange for lower tariffs. There’s still an emphasis for cleaning out all the political corruption going on, and citizens are pushing for a stronger rule of law.

-Noah

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Articles and Documents of the Guatemalan Civil War

http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB11/docs/doc01.pdf -This document explains how John Longan (US Public Safety Advisor) helped establish police raid plans, sales of US supplies, bounties on various leaders from the resistance, and a counter-terrorism organization for the Guatemalan government (January 4, 1966)

http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB11/docs/doc02.pdf -This CIA document contains a list of individuals who were captured, tortured, and then subsequently executed by Guatemalan security forces in March of 1966.

http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB11/docs/doc08.pdf -This is a telegram to the Department of State regarding a clandestine organization called Escuadron de Muerte (Death Squad) that was killing alleged criminals without authorization. This was assumed to be a police operation, as were earlier executions, but the group was previously known as Buitre Justiciero (Avenging Vulture). (February 4th, 1974)

http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB11/docs/doc12.pdf -Detailed explanation of the Guatemalan army killing many civilians/non-combatants in the village of Cocob. The justification was that the local population was believed to support the Guerrilla Army of the Poor. The Guatemalan army soldiers were ordered to "fire at anything that moved." (April 1981) http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB11/docs/doc14.pdf

-CIA document citing the executions of native populations and villages that supported the opposition by the Guatemalan Army. (February 1982) http://nsarchive.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB11/docs/doc22.pdf -This document outlines a series of bombings carried out by the Guatemalan Government in Guatemala City used to intimidate the opposition. (August 31st, 1989)

-Miranda