Central America in the Cold War: When the Mountains Tremble and Salvador

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Central America in the Cold WarWhen the
Mountains Tremble and Salvador

• Col. Jacobo Arbenz Guzman (1951-54) Elected
  president in Guatemala in the first election
  after the nation enacted universal suffrage.
  Arbenz was a social and economic reformer and
  immediately initiated aggressive political and
  land reforms to benefit the nations large poor
  peasant class. Arbenz was ousted in a CIA-backed
  military coup in 1954.
• United Fruit Company U.S.-based
  food/agricultural company and largest land-owner
  in Guatemala in the 1950s. Large plots of arable
  unused land (such as those owned by UFC) were the
  target of Arbenzs land reforms. Through its
  connections in the Eisenhower administration
  (Sec. of State John Foster Dulles and Cia Dir.
  Allen Dulles for example) UFC pressured the U.S.
  government to stop the so-called communist
  takeover in Guatemala citing land reform and
  Arbenzs close ties to the Guatemalan Communist
  Party.
• Operation PBSUCCESS Name of the CIA-backed plan
  that successfully overthrew the Arbenz government
  in 1954.
  
• Juan Castillo Armas (1954-57) U.S.-trained
  member of Guatemalan military. Armas
  participated in several military coups in the
  1940s and 1950s. Opposed to the reforms
  undertaken by the Arbenz government, Armas fled
  to Honduras and began organizing armed opposition
  to the Guatemalan government. With the help of
  the United States, Armas helped to lead the coup
  that deposed the Arbenz government and became the
  new president. Armas was assassinated in 1957
  and subsequent leaders became increasingly
  oppressive, prompting a growing resistance
  movement that eventually culminated in civil war
  between right-wing military forces and leftist
  guerrilla rebels.
• General Efrain Rios Montt Retired military
  general asked to negotiate power conflict among
  ruling military junta in 1982. Montt named
  himself President of the Republic and vowed to
  end guerrilla rebellion once and for all and he
  tried to do so at the expense of human rights.
  He forced a system of conscription and allowed
  the outright massacre of tens of thousands of
  civilians. Montt was overthrown after one year
  in office, but went on to a political career. He
  served as President of Congress in 1995 and 2000.
  Montt tried to run for president in 2003 but was
  defeated. He was placed under house arrest in
  2004.
• Rigoberta Menchu Mayan peasant woman who
  chronicled her plight of poverty and resistance
  to the Guatemalan military dictatorship in her
  1983 autobiographical account, I Rigoberta
  Menchu. She was also the focus of the
  documentary When the Mountains Tremble. After
  publicizing her cause, Menchu went on to work
  with the United Nations to fight for human rights
  worldwide. For this, she was awarded the Nobel
  Peace Prize in 1992. In 1999, anthropologist
  David Stoll published his own work outlining
  discrepancies in Menchus story.

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• FMLN (Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front)
  Socialist organization in El Salvador formed by
  a coalition of Marxist revolutionary groups in
  1980 in opposition to the right-wing military
  dictatorship. Named after one of the founders of
  El Salvadors Communist Party (who was killed in
  a labor uprising in 1932). The FMLN engaged in
  guerrilla uprisings against the government forces
  throughout the decade. After peace was reached
  in 1992 (Chapultepec Peace Accords), the FMLN
  became an official political party and has been
  active in the political system since then.
• School of the Americas military training school
  operated by the United States (formerly in
  Panama now in Georgia) to train Latin American
  armed forces to combat guerrilla insurgency.
  Reputed to specialize in training in torture and
  other techniques that are considered a violation
  of human rights. Frequently cited as a method of
  covert intervention used by the United States in
  Latin America especially during the Cold War.
  Many right-wing military leaders in Central and
  South America (60,000 est.) have graduated from
  the School since its inception in 1946. In 2001,
  the school changed names to the Western
  Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation.
• Archbishop Oscar Romero (1980) Archbishop in
  San Salvador who became an outspoken critic of
  the military regimes violations of human rights.
  He was assassinated in March 1980 while saying
  mass. His death attracted international
  attention to the El Salvadoran civil war and his
  reputation as a patron of the poor grew even in
  death. Romero is currently being considered in
  the beatification and sainthood process in the
  Catholic Church.
• Dorothy Kazel, Ita Ford, Jean Donovan, Maura
  Clarke Roman Catholic nuns/missionaries working
  in defense of human rights in El Salvador who
  were raped and murdered by members of the El
  Salvadoran national army in December 1980.
  Initial attempts to cover-up this crime brought
  more international attention and outcry to the
  situation in El Salvador. Five members of the
  armed forces were eventually arrested and
  convicted of the murders. Three were released
  from prison in 1998.
• The Massacre at El Mozote Book written by The
  New Yorker journalist, Mark Danner, in 1994 based
  on his investigation into the 1981 slaughter of
  nearly 1,000 civilians in a small village in
  rural El Salvador. The massacre received
  immediate media attention, but was dismissed by
  many as FMLN propaganda. As part of the 1992
  peace accords, a forensic team was called in to
  begin investigating the remains. Mark Danner
  originally published his account in The New
  Yorker, calling it a parable of the cold war.