The CIA is notorious for its operations in Latin America. Its hard to argue that any other organisation has done more to attack and restrict democracy around the world. Their operations to topple the Presidency of Arbenz in Guatemala in 1954 was the first of many operations carried out that lead to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Latin Americans, and even managed to get several US citizens killed too.
Link: https://youtu.be/YCWmU9fNzpM
The ideological justification for the death squads and mercenaries that terrorised the continent was of course the claim that Communism would take control of the region. Of course this wasn't true, Communists of various ideologies were always in the minority even in Cuba the rebels who overthrew Batista were a coalition of very different political groups, if anything US hostility to the new regime gave the small Communist faction the opportunity to grow and become dominant.
Many of the governments targeted for coups and destabilisation were punished solely for wanting to carry out limited social and economic reforms. Some of the governments weren't even left wing but moderate right wing Christian Democratic administrations. Arbenz was not a communist, his crime was cutting into the profits of United Fruit and pursuing an independent policy. The wars fought in Latin America in the 20th century were always about protecting profits and influence.
Transcript
Program Producer Max Pierson:
We’re going to begin in Guatemala and the coup that signalled
that Uncle Sam was determined to play tough in the face of any perceived threat
from Leftist governments in America’s backyard. The period between 1944 and
1954 was known in Guatemala as the ten years of spring. Free elections had been
held and resulted in a left-leaning government under President Jacobo Arbenz, which
had introduced reforms designed to share the country’s wealth more evenly.
Some in Washington saw that as a “Red threat” creeping
communism. So in 1954 the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) engineered a change
in government in Guatemala, it was the first CIA backed coup in Latin America.
Michael Lanchin has been speaking to the son of Jacobo Arbenz who was forced to
flee into exile along with his father.
[Archival Radio Announcer with an English accent]
Carrying anti-communist banners jubilant soldiers celebrate
victory following their two-week revolt in Guatemala. Colonel Carlos Armas the
rebel leader is embraced by some of his supporters who helped him overthrow the
Red regime in Guatemala.
Michael Lanchin:
It’s the summer of 1954 and the victorious coup leaders are
gathering in Guatemala City after their successful overthrow of the country’s
leftist President. A group of Guatemalan army officers, trained and financed by
the CIA are now in power.
[Another Archival Radio Announcer with an English accent]
Arriving from Guatemala City is Colonel Elfego Monzón, head
of the temporary Junta. He has high hopes of becoming President of Guatemala,
but so has Colonel Armas. Then when the few Red outlaws who still menace the
city have been quelled, free elections will again be held in Guatemala.
Michael Lanchin:
It’s the end of ten years of civilian rule in the Central
American country. And President Jocobo Arbenz and his family are forced to flee.
Juan Jocobo:
When we went into exile, he was extremely bitter about what
had happened. For the betrayal he suffered, his struggle was for the good of
the people of Guatemala. He had great ideals, he was left feeling very, very
bitter.
Michael Lanchin:
Juan Jocobo was the only son of President Arbenz, he was just
five years old when his father was elected in 1950.
Juan Jocobo:
It was quite hard for me as a child because both my parents
were involved in politics from when I was born. So, I rarely saw them, I didn’t
really understand why until later on. We lived in a large estate which my
father had bought with his own money. I remember that it had a huge garden, I
had a nanny, and a bodyguard who also became my tutor. When I was three or four,
I didn’t go to kindergarten, because I later found out there had been some kidnapping
threats. For my own security I grew up pretty much alone at home because my
older sisters all went to school, it was a difficult childhood.
[Music]
Michael Lanchin:
Guatemala had a largely feudal system since colonial times
where the majority indigenous Mayan population lived in poverty, while wealthy
landowners took charge of governing with the support of the United States. But in
the mid 1940’s the US-backed Dictator was overthrown in a popular revolt. And the
country’s first free elections were held.
Jacobo Arbenz a progressive former army Colonel became Guatemala’s
second democratically elected leader. Once in office Arbenz pushed ahead with a
reformist agenda; at the forefront were radical land reforms granting peasants
access to vast swathes of arable land. The move infuriated Guatemala’s largest
foreign investor, the United Fruit’s company one of America’s most powerful
corporations. And it set alarm bells ringing in Washington where President
Dwight Eisenhower had pledged a worldwide fight against the spread of Communism.
In August of 1953 President Eisenhower gave his approval for
an operation codenamed PBSuccess, authorising the Central Intelligence Agency
the CIA to begin organising and arming an opposition to President Arbenz.
Juan Jacobo:
I first realised that the situation was serious when they
told us we had to leave Casa Presidencial the Presidential Palace because of
the threat of bombing from aircraft. I remember being told “get your stuff
ready, the toys you want to take with you”. We went to a house in Zone 10 of
the city, it had a big garden, at times we had to hide under the beds. It was
an anxious time.
Michael Lanchin:
The first group of anti-government rebels -former Guatemalan
soldiers- had crossed the border from CIA bases in neighbouring Nicaragua and
Honduras in mid-June of 1954. Newsreel from that time cast them as plucky
freedom fighters.
[Another Archival Radio Announcer with an American accent]
Guatemalan insurgents stand guard at a Honduras airstrip
while newspapermen press near a lone plane seeking passage over the rocky
wooded hills to the border town of Esquipulas, capital of the Free Guatemalan
Government.
Michael Lanchin:
The Guatemalan army though still loyal to President Arbenz
feared that an all-out American invasion would soon follow. By late June the
Guatemalan top brass had lost their nerve and senior officers urged President
Arbenz to go.
On the night of June 27th 1954 an emotional and
exhausted President Arbenz announced his decision in a radio message.
[Extract from Arbenz Radio Speech Announcing his
Resignation]
Our enemies have used the pretext that we are communists,
though the reality is very different.
Michael Lanchin:
The next day the deposed President, his family and dozens of
his closest associates took refuge in the Mexican Embassy in Guatemala City.
Juan Jocobo:
People were sleeping in the corridors, in the stairways, both
floors of the embassy were full of people. I remember us having to go to the
rooftop to play, my parents didn’t like us going up there because there weren’t
any railings. Sometimes when we went to look out of the windows – which we
weren’t allowed to- I remember seeing demonstrations out on the streets, people
with banners against Arbenz.
Michael Lanchin:
So, you were with your parents inside the Embassy for about
three months, did you see much of your father during that time?
Juan Jocobo:
I saw very little of him, he was always locked away,
smoking, drinking coffee and in meetings with all his associates who were hiding
in the Embassy with us.
[Music]
Michael Lanchin:
The family were eventually granted safe passage out of the
country. First to Mexico then to France, Switzerland, Czechoslovakia and then
to the Soviet Union where Juan Jocobo still not even ten years old was sent to
a boarding school.
Juan Jocobo:
One of the things that really affected me was that it got to
a point where I didn’t really understand what was happening. I didn’t want to
ask my parents, they looked so anxious. It was starting to affect my schooling,
to the point that my mother had to teach me to read and write in Spanish. After
that I began learning Czech, then I had to start learning Russian, at boarding
school in Russia I used to look out of the windows when it snowed.
Everybody else spoke Russian, nobody spoke Spanish, I felt
isolated and lonely, cut off from my family and my country.
Michael Lanchin:
In 1956 the family moved to the relative stability of Uruguay.
Later they went to live in Cuba on the invitation of Fidel Castro. Juan Jocobo
says that his father never really recovered his spirits and he died a broken
man in Mexico in 1971 aged just 57. But there is one more tragic detail to this
story which Juan Jocobo only mentioned at the very end of our conversation.
Juan Jocobo:
The pressures from being in exile was so great that my eldest
sister killed herself when she was just 25. My other sister killed herself in 2004,
it was all terribly difficult for the family. We’d been separated from all our
childhood friends, our relatives, because of the circumstances of our
situation. We lost everything that you normally have growing up, stability,
school, family around you.
When I look back now and try to make some sense of it, all
that we’ve suffered I’ve often thought about it in quiet moments and wondered
why, why, why?
Michael Lanchin:
Juan Jocobo Arbenz later returned to his native Guatemala
and in 2003 he ran unsuccessfully for the Presidency. He’s now 69 and he lives
in Costa Rica.
Max Pierson:
Michael Lanchin was speaking to Juan Jocobo Arbenz whose
life and the lives of so many others was turned upside down by that CIA backed
coup in Guatemala in 1954.
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