The name "Guatemala" comes from the Nahuatl word "Cuauhtēmallān" , or "place of many trees", a derivative of the K'iche' Mayan word for "many trees" or, perhaps more specifically, for the Cuate/Cuatli tree Eysenhardtia. This was the name that the Tlaxcaltecan warriors who accompanied Pedro de Alvarado during the Spanish Conquest gave to this territory.
Etymology
Guatemala
Guatemala | Etymology
The name "Guatemala" comes from the Nahuatl word "Cuauhtēmallān" , or "place of many trees". From the Nahuatl word "Cuauhtēmallān" , or "place of many trees", a derivative of the K'iche' Mayan word for "many trees" or, perhaps more specifically, for the Cuate/Cuatli tree Eysenhardtia It comes from the Nahuatl word "Cuauhtēmallān" , or "place of many trees". From the Nahuatl word "Cuauhtēmallān".
what is operation pbfortune?
user
It was a covert United States operation to overthrow the democratically elected Guatemalan President Jacobo Árbenz
assistant
where did the place get its name?
user
Operation PBFortune, also known as Operation Fortune, was a covert United States operation to overthrow the democratically elected Guatemalan President Jacobo Árbenz in 1952. The operation was authorized by U.S. President Harry Truman and planned by the Central Intelligence Agency. The United Fruit Company had lobbied intensively for the overthrow because land reform initiated by Árbenz threatened its economic interests. The US also feared that the government of Árbenz was being influenced by communists. The coup attempt was planned with the support of the United Fruit Company, and of Anastasio Somoza García, Rafael Trujillo and Marcos Pérez Jiménez, the US-backed right-wing dictators of Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic, and Venezuela respectively, who felt threatened by the democratic Guatemalan Revolution, and had sought to undermine it.
Operation PBFortune | Introduction
Castillo Armas told the CIA he had the support of the "Guardia Civil" (Civil Guard), the garrison at Quetzaltenango, Guatemala's second-largest city, and of the commander of Matamoros. The engineer dispatched by the CIA also told them Castillo Armas had the financial backing of Somoza and Trujillo.
Operation PBFortune | Carlos Castillo Armas
Truman gave the CIA permission to go ahead with the plan, without informing the state department. The CIA placed a shipment of weapons on a vessel owned by the United Fruit Company, and the operation was paid for by Rafael Trujillo and Marcos Pérez Jiménez, the right-wing anti-communist dictators of the Dominican Republic and Venezuela, respectively. The operation was to be led by Carlos Castillo Armas. However, the US state department discovered the conspiracy, and secretary of state Dean Acheson persuaded Truman to abort the plan.
Guatemalan Revolution | Operation PBFortune
Although the administration of Harry Truman had become convinced that the Guatemalan government had been penetrated by communists, it relied on purely diplomatic and economic means to try and reduce the communist influence, at least until the end of its term. The United States had refused to sell arms to the Guatemalan government after 1944; in 1951 it began to block weapons purchases by Guatemala from other countries. In 1952 Truman became sufficiently convinced of the threat posed by Árbenz to start planning a covert overthrow, titled Operation PBFortune. The plan had originally been suggested by the US supported dictator of Nicaragua, Anastasio Somoza García, who said that if he were given weapons, he could overthrow the Guatemalan government.
Guatemalan Revolution | Operation PBFortune
The plan involved providing weapons to the exiled Guatemalan military officer Carlos Castillo Armas, who was to lead an invasion from Nicaragua. The US State Department discovered that details of the plan had become widely known. US Secretary of State Dean Acheson became concerned that the coup attempt would damage the image of the US, which had committed to a policy of non-intervention, and so terminated the operation. Operation PBFortune was followed two years later by Operation PBSuccess, another covert operation in which Castillo Armas played a prominent role. PBSuccess toppled the Árbenz government and ended the Guatemalan Revolution.
Operation PBFortune | Introduction
The name "Guatemala" comes from the Nahuatl word "Cuauhtēmallān" , or "place of many trees", a derivative of the K'iche' Mayan word for "many trees" or, perhaps more specifically, for the Cuate/Cuatli tree Eysenhardtia. This was the name that the Tlaxcaltecan warriors who accompanied Pedro de Alvarado during the Spanish Conquest gave to this territory.
Guatemala | Etymology
From the late 19th century until 1944, a series of authoritarian rulers governed Guatemala. Between 1898 and 1920, Manuel Estrada Cabrera granted significant concessions to the United Fruit Company and dispossessed many indigenous peoples of their communal land. Under Jorge Ubico, who ruled as a dictator between 1931 and 1944, this process was intensified with the institution of brutal labor regulations and the establishment of a police state. In June 1944, a popular pro-democracy movement led by university students and labor organizations forced Ubico to resign. Ubico handed over power to a military junta that was toppled in a military coup led by Jacobo Árbenz in October 1944, an event known as the October Revolution.
Operation PBFortune | Background
Operation PBHistory was a covert operation carried out in Guatemala by the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). It followed Operation PBSuccess, which led to the overthrow of Guatemalan President Jacobo Árbenz in June 1954 and ended the Guatemalan Revolution. PBHistory attempted to use documents left behind by Árbenz's government and by organizations related to the communist Guatemalan Party of Labour to demonstrate that the Guatemalan government had been under the influence of the Soviet Union, and to use those documents to obtain further intelligence that would be useful to US intelligence agencies. It was an effort to justify the overthrow of the elected Guatemalan government in response to the negative international reactions to PBSuccess.
Operation PBHistory | Introduction
In April 1952, Nicaraguan President Anastasio Somoza visited the United States and expressed confidence in his ability to overthrow Arbenz. The Nicaraguan dictator mentioned that given the chance to receive arms and supplies, he could orchestrate Arbenz’ overthrow with the help of Guatemalan exile Carlos Castillo Armas. His hubris caught the attention of the US government, who had already been conceiving ideas on how to deal with the possible uprising of communism in Guatemala—America’s own backyard. President Truman contacted Director of Central Intelligence, Walter Bedell Smith to explore options with Armas. Smith ordered an agent codenamed “Seekford” to make contact with Armas about possibilities of moving forward.
CIA activities in Guatemala | Operation PBFortune
After a report came back to the CIA from Seekford, Deputy Director Allen Dulles drafted a formal proposal to provide $225,000 worth of arms and ammunition to Armas. It also specified plans to enlist air support from Nicaragua and Honduras. On June 17, Arbenz enacted an Agrarian Reform Law, and distribution of land under it began on August 7.[12][13] On September 9, 1952, the plan was officially approved and named Operation PBFortune. It was the first official plan proposed by the CIA and approved by the State Department that sought the overthrow of the Arbenz government. A couple months of planning went into creating a list of officials to be targeted for assassination.
CIA activities in Guatemala | Operation PBFortune
The details of the plot were finalized over the next few weeks by the CIA, the United Fruit Company, and Somoza. The coup's plotters contacted Trujillo and Jiménez, who, along with Somoza and Juan Manuel Gálvez, the right-wing President of Honduras, had already been exchanging intelligence about the Árbenz government, and had considered the possibility of supporting an invasion by Guatemalan exiles. The two dictators were supportive of the plan, and agreed to contribute some funding. Although PBFortune was officially approved on September 9, 1952, planning had begun earlier in the year. In January 1952, officers in the CIA's Directorate of Plans compiled a list of "top flight Communists whom the new government would desire to eliminate immediately in the event of a successful anti-Communist coup".
Operation PBFortune | The plot
This unintentionally drew attention to Operation Washtub, a CIA effort to foist incriminating weapons on the Guatemalan government.
Operation PBHistory | Kersten committee
The initial targets of the operation were the personal possessions and documents of Árbenz and those of Carlos Enrique Díaz (who had been chief of the armed forces under Árbenz, and briefly his successor as president), the offices of trade unions, known front organizations, police agencies, and the headquarters of the Partido Guatemalteco del Trabajo (PGT). The results of the initial searches were disappointing for the CIA; many of the offices had already been plundered both by the Guatemalan army and by other looters. The CIA were particularly interested in finding documents that mentioned the Árbenz government's purchase of weapons from Czechoslovakia, but they were unsuccessful.
Operation PBHistory | First phase
The assassination plans represented the first time the US had considered assassination in Guatemala. The list of targets had been drawn up by the CIA even before the operation had been formally authorized. They were created using a list of communists that the Guatemalan Army had compiled in 1949, as well as its own intelligence. Nine months later the CIA also received through "Seekford" a list of 58 Guatemalans whom Castillo Armas wanted killed, in addition to 74 others he wanted arrested or exiled. "Seekford" also said Trujillo's support was conditional on the assassination of four individuals from Santo Domingo who were at that point living in Guatemala.
Operation PBFortune | The plot
In 1952 Árbenz began an agrarian reform program that transferred uncultivated land from large landowners to poor laborers in return for compensation. In response the US-based United Fruit Company, which had large landholdings in Guatemala, intensively lobbied the US government for Árbenz's overthrow. US President Dwight Eisenhower authorized a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) operation to overthrow Árbenz, code-named Operation PBSuccess in August 1953. Within the CIA, the operation was headed by Frank Wisner, who had worked in the US intelligence services since World War II. While preparations for Operation PBSuccess were underway, the US government issued a series of statements denouncing the Guatemalan government, alleging that it had been infiltrated by communists.
Operation PBHistory | Background and origins
After aborting a coup attempt called Operation PBFortune, the United States—through its Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)—renewed efforts to unseat Árbenz with Operation PBSuccess (1953–1954). It sought to develop relationships with members of Guatemalan military, and instituted an arms blockade that caused the military to fear a security crisis or even US invasion. The key agent for a possible coup was the exiled colonel Castillo Armas. The CIA also intensified propaganda campaigns to isolate Guatemala among Central American nations, and to convince the Guatemalan people that the Árbenz regime was on the brink of collapse.
Decree 900 | United States opposition
On June 30, 1954, three days after the resignation of Árbenz, Wisner sent a telegram that later became known as the "shift of gears cable". Two agents from the CIA, and two from the Office of Intelligence Research (OIR), arrived in Guatemala City on July 4. Castillo Armas had arrived in the capital on the previous day to assume the presidency. One of the CIA officers was Lothar Metzl, who was on the counterintelligence staff of the CIA. Metzl was an Austrian, who had studied communist movements since the 1930s, including in Europe. In Wisner's words, the agents were supposed to perform a "snatch job on documents while the melon was freshly burst open".
Operation PBHistory | First phase
The October revolution of 1944 in Guatemala led to the election of Juan José Arévalo as President of Guatemala, who initiated reforms based on liberal capitalism. Arévalo was an anti-communist, and cracked down on the communist Guatemalan Party of Labour ("Partido Guatemalteco del Trabajo", PGT). The US government was nonetheless suspicious that he was under the influence of the Soviet Union. Arévalo's defense minister Jacobo Árbenz was elected president in 1950. Influenced partly by McCarthyism, the US government was predisposed to see communist influence in Árbenz's government, particularly after the legalization of the PGT. Árbenz also had personal ties to some PGT members.
Operation PBHistory | Background and origins
On 18 June 1954 Carlos Castillo Armas, a Guatemalan army Colonel in exile since a failed coup in 1949, led an invasion force of 480 men into Guatemala. The invasion was supported by a campaign of psychological warfare, which presented Castillo Armas's victory as a "fait accompli" to the Guatemalan people. Worried by the possibility of a US invasion, the Guatemalan army refused to fight, and on June 27 Árbenz resigned. The actions of the United States resulted in international outrage. Media outlets across the world accused the US of sponsoring a coup to reverse Árbenz's agrarian reform in the interests of the United Fruit Company.
Operation PBHistory | Background and origins
In 1975, the Guatemalan Army created a special operations force, the Kaibiles, named after Kaybʼil Bʼalam. The group is centered out of Huehuetenango ("Land of the Old") some 5 km from the original stand off site at Zaculeu.
Kaybʼil Bʼalam | Introduction
Walter Bedell Smith, the Director of Central Intelligence, ordered J. C. King, the chief of the Western Hemisphere Division, to examine whether dissident Guatemalans could topple the Árbenz government if they had support from the dictatorships in Central America. At this point the US government was approached by Nicaraguan leader Somoza, who had been in the United States on a private visit, during which he made public speeches praising the US, and was awarded a medal by New York City. During a meeting with Truman and his senior staff, Somoza said that if he were given the weapons, he would "clean up Guatemala".
Operation PBFortune | Somoza's visit
The documents uncovered by the operation proved useful to the Guatemalan intelligence agencies, enabling the creation of a register of suspected communists. Operation PBHistory did not succeed in its chief objective of finding evidence that the Guatemalan communists were being controlled by the Soviet government, and was unable to counter the international narrative that the United States had toppled the government of Jacobo Árbenz to serve the interests of the United Fruit Company.
Operation PBHistory | Introduction
Many senior figures in his cabinet, including John Foster Dulles and his brother Allen, had close connections to the United Fruit Company, which made Eisenhower more strongly predisposed than Truman to support Árbenz's overthrow. In June 1954, the US-trained and funded an invasion force led by Castillo Armas, backed by an intense campaign of psychological warfare by the CIA. Gálvez, Somoza, Jiménez, and Trujillo again offered the CIA their support in preparing for this operation. Árbenz resigned on June 27, 1954, ending the Guatemalan Revolution. Following his resignation, the CIA launched Operation PBHistory, an attempt to use documents from Árbenz's government and elsewhere to justify the coup in response to the negative international reactions to it.
Operation PBFortune | Aftermath
The CIA also hoped to improve its intelligence resources about communist parties in Latin America, a subject on which it had little information. The first phase of the operation began soon after Árbenz's resignation on June 27, 1954: several agents were dispatched to Guatemala beginning on July 4. These included agents of the CIA and the Office of Intelligence Research (OIR). The first phase involved the collection of 150,000 documents from sources including Árbenz's personal possessions, trade union offices, and police agencies. The ruling military junta led by Carlos Castillo Armas aided these efforts. Following a presentation made to US President Dwight Eisenhower on July 20, a decision was taken to accelerate the operation, and the number of people working in Guatemala was increased.
Operation PBHistory | Introduction
Although the proposal was not taken seriously at the time, US Colonel Cornelius Mara flew back to Nicaragua with Somoza to further explore the idea. Somoza persuaded Mara that the plan was feasible, and Mara returned to the US and gave Truman a favorable report. Smith also sent a Spanish-speaking engineer under the codename "Seekford" to contact exiled Guatemalan Army officer Carlos Castillo Armas and his fellow dissidents, who were in Honduras and Guatemala. Francisco Javier Arana had launched an ill-fated coup attempt against Arévalo in 1949. Castillo Armas had been a "protégé" of Arana, and had risen in the military to become the head of the military academy of Guatemala by 1949.
Operation PBFortune | Carlos Castillo Armas
This would then be released to the press by the "Comité", so that the local agency could receive some credit. The "Comité" also released a short documentary film, titled "Despues Descubrimos La Verdad" (""Later We Discover the Truth""). Through these avenues news media in Guatemala and elsewhere in Central America were saturated with stories of how the Árbenz government had been controlled by communists. While the press releases had a substantial impact within Guatemala, the CIA was unable to staunch the continued criticism of the US role in the coup, which came from virtually all countries except for West Germany and the US itself.
Operation PBHistory | Operation Kugown
Despite their popularity within the country, the reforms of the Guatemalan Revolution were disliked by the United States government, which was predisposed by the Cold War to see it as communist, and the United Fruit Company (UFCO), whose hugely profitable business had been affected by the end to brutal labor practices. The attitude of the U.S. government was also influenced by a propaganda campaign carried out by the UFCO. U.S. President Harry Truman authorized Operation PBFortune to topple Árbenz in 1952, with the support of Nicaraguan dictator Anastasio Somoza García, but the operation was aborted when too many details became public.
Guatemala | Coup and civil war (1954–1996)
In 1831 the government renamed it Flores after the Guatemalan head of state Cirilo Flores.
Nojpetén | Conquest
Operation PBHistory was an effort by the CIA to analyze documents from the Árbenz government to justify the 1954 coup after the fact, in particular by finding evidence that Guatemalan communists had been under the influence of the Soviet Union. Due to the quick overthrow of the Árbenz government, the CIA believed that the administration would not have been able to destroy any incriminating documents, and that these could be analyzed to demonstrate Árbenz's supposed Soviet ties. The CIA also believed this would help it better understand the workings of Latin American communist parties, on which subject the CIA had very little real information.
1954 Guatemalan coup d'état | Operation PBHistory
In May 1954, a shipment of infantry and light artillery weapons was dispatched from Communist Czechoslovakia for the Arbenz Government and arrived in Puerto Barrios. As a result, the United States government—which since 1953 had been tasked by President Eisenhower to remove Arbenz from power in the multifaceted CIA operation code-named PBSuccess—responded by saturating Guatemala with anti-Arbenz propaganda through radio and dropped leaflets, and began bombing raids using unmarked airplanes. The United States also sponsored a force of several hundred Guatemalan refugees and mercenaries who were headed by Castillo Armas to help remove the Arbenz government. On 27 June, Arbenz decided to resign.
Che Guevara | Guatemala, Árbenz, and United Fruit
The money paid to Castillo Armas has been described as a way of making sure he did not attempt any premature action. Even after the operation had been terminated, the CIA received reports from "Seekford" that the Guatemalan rebels were planning assassinations. Castillo Armas made plans to use groups of soldiers in civilian clothing from Nicaragua, Honduras, and El Salvador to kill communist leaders in Guatemala. King continued to explore the CIA's ability to move arms around Central America without the approval of the State Department. In November 1952, Dwight Eisenhower was elected president of the US after a campaign promising a more hawkish stance against communism.
Operation PBFortune | Aftermath
had refused to sell arms to the Guatemalan government after 1944; in 1951 it began to block all weapons purchases by Guatemala. The U.S.'s worries over communist influence increased after the election of Árbenz in 1951 and his enactment of Decree 900 in 1952. In April 1952 Anastasio Somoza García, the dictator of Nicaragua, made his first state visit to the U.S. He made several public speeches praising the U.S., and was awarded a medal by the New York City government. During a meeting with Truman and his senior staff, Somoza said that if the U.S. gave him the arms, he would "clean up Guatemala".
1954 Guatemalan coup d'état | Operation PBFortune
Another one claims that the name originates from the tomatoes which began to grow wild on the island.
Paradajz | Geography
The plan relied on a 1949 Guatemalan Army list of Communists in tandem with the CIA’s own collected intelligence. Armas also provided his own list of 58 Guatemalans to be terminated through executive action. On September 18, 1952, Seekford received contact from General Rafael Trujillo, the dictator of the Dominican Republic, who agreed to aid the operations. Armas began training a special operative teams to carry out the overthrow of the Arbenz government. However, the cover was blown and the plan was terminated before it could ever be carried out. In the later months of 1952 shortly after Operation PBFortune was terminated, the CIA continued to monitor events in Guatemala and collected information that suggested assassination plots were still being concocted by Guatemalan dissidents.
CIA activities in Guatemala | Operation PBFortune
Operation Kugown was the name given to the psychological warfare operation that had played an important part in the overthrow of Árbenz. During the coup, its primary targets had been the Árbenz government. After the conclusion of the coup, Kugown continued, targeting the rest of Guatemala, and the wider international audience. The aim of the operation was to disseminate derogatory information about Árbenz, and to convince Guatemalans—and the rest of the world—that Árbenz's regime had been communist-dominated. The use of documents from PBHistory for Operation Kugown began in August 1954. The standard method employed by the CIA was to select a document that could be portrayed as incriminating and write an explanation covering it.
Operation PBHistory | Operation Kugown
The CIA also contacted Marcos Pérez Jiménez of Venezuela and Rafael Trujillo of the Dominican Republic; the two U.S.-backed dictators were supportive of the plan, and agreed to contribute some funding. Although PBFortune was officially approved on 9 September 1952, various planning steps had been taken earlier in the year. In January 1952, officers in the CIA's Directorate of Plans compiled a list of "top flight Communists whom the new government would desire to eliminate immediately in the event of a successful anti-Communist coup". The CIA plan called for the assassination of over 58 Guatemalans, as well as the arrest of many others.
1954 Guatemalan coup d'état | Operation PBFortune
Relying on continued material support from the United States and US-allied third parties, the armed forces under Army Chief of Staff, Benedicto Lucas Garcia (the president's brother, known as "General Benny") initiated a strategy of "scorched earth" to "separate and isolate the insurgents from the civilian population", under the code-name ""Operación Ceniza"" ("Operation Ash"). In a strategy developed jointly by Benedicto Lucas Garcia and Lieutenant Col. George Maynes (U.S. Defense Attache and Chief of the U.S. MilGroup in Guatemala), some 15,000 troops were deployed on a gradual sweep through the highlands. By way of a policy of forced recruitment, Gen.
Guatemalan Civil War | 'Operation Ceniza' 1981
Feeling threatened by Árbenz's reforms, the company responded with an intensive lobbying campaign directed at members of the United States government. The Cold War had also predisposed the administration of US President Harry Truman to see the Guatemalan government as communist. The US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) started to explore the notion of lending support to detractors and opponents of Árbenz. Walter Bedell Smith, the Director of Central Intelligence, ordered J. C. King, the chief of the Western Hemisphere Division, to examine whether dissident Guatemalans could topple the Árbenz government if they had support from the authoritarian governments in Central America.
Carlos Castillo Armas | Operation PBFortune and CIA ties
It argued that it had been facing interference in its internal matters from communists in Guatemala.
Operation PBHistory | Other uses
On 5 December 1974, Guatemala's military government created its Commando School ("Escuela de Comandos"). Three months later it renamed it the Kaibil Special Operations Training Centre ("Centro de Adiestramiento y Operaciones Especiales Kaibil"). The name "Kaibil" is derived from Kayb'il B'alam ("Kaibil Balam"), a Mam indigenous leader who evaded capture by the Spanish conquistadors under Pedro de Alvarado. Initially, the Kaibil Centre was located on two estates, "El Infierno" ("Hell") and "La Pólvora" ("Gunpowder") in the municipality of Melchor de Mencos, Petén department. On 12 January 1989, it was moved to the former headquarters of Military Zone 23, in Poptún, Petén.
Kaibiles | History
A final motivation was that international responses to the coup had been very negative, even among allies of the U.S., and the CIA wished to counteract this anti-U.S. sentiment. The operation began on 4 July 1954 with the arrival of four CIA agents in Guatemala City, led by a specialist in the structure of communist parties. Their targets included Árbenz's personal belongings, police documents, and the headquarters of the Guatemalan Party of Labour. Although the initial search failed to find any links to the Soviet Union, the CIA decided to extend the operation, and on 4 August a much larger team was deployed, with members from many government departments, including the State Department and the USIA.
1954 Guatemalan coup d'état | Operation PBHistory
Operation Kugown also released a large quantity of communist propaganda material that had entered Guatemala from countries within the Soviet sphere of influence; these convinced American journalists such as Donald Grant, of the "St. Louis Post-Dispatch", that there must have been a connection between Árbenz and the Soviet government. Ultimately, these operations were unsuccessful in convincing Latin America that the 1954 coup was justified.
Operation PBHistory | Operation Kugown
The United States then wanted to install Colonel Costillo Armas in Arbenz' place. To accomplish these ends, the United States sought to promote a propaganda "terror campaign" in order to terrify and demoralize both Arbenz and his troops. In addition to the propaganda campaign against President Arbenz, the United States began to strafe the capital city with air raids, eventually leading to Arbenz' own forced resignation as President. The CIA understood Operation PBSuccess as having "marked an early zenith" in the CIA's covert history. PBSuccess involved a covert paramilitary and psychological, meaning torture, operation. Commentators noted that the Arbenz government was not communist, but progressive and reformist, and the US coup stemmed from American business self-interest, mainly in the fruit sector.
CIA activities in Guatemala | Operation PBSuccess
The site's name derives from the Mayan name of the ramon tree ("Brosimum alicastrum"), from the words "ixim" and "che", meaning literally "maize tree". Iximche was called "Guatemala" by the Spanish, from the Nahuatl "Quauhtemallan" meaning "forested land". Since the Spanish conquistadors founded their first capital at Iximche, they took the name of the city used by their Nahuatl-speaking Mexican allies and applied it to the new Spanish city and, by extension, to the kingdom. From this comes the modern name of the country. The site has also been referred to as Patinamit by 19th century investigators, a Kaqchikel word meaning "the city".
Iximche | Etymology
As the Cold War developed and the Guatemalan government clashed with U.S. corporations on an increasing number of issues, the U.S. government grew increasingly suspicious of the Guatemalan Revolution. In addition, the Cold War predisposed the Truman administration to see the Guatemalan government as communist. Arévalo's support for the Caribbean Legion also worried the Truman administration, which saw it as a vehicle for communism, rather than as the anti-dictatorial force it was conceived as. Until the end of its term, the Truman administration had relied on purely diplomatic and economic means to try to reduce the perceived communist influence. The U.S.
1954 Guatemalan coup d'état | Operation PBFortune
In May 1952, Árbenz enacted Decree 900, the official title of the Guatemalan agrarian reform law. Approximately 500,000 people benefited from the decree. The United Fruit Company lost several hundred thousand acres of its uncultivated land to this law, and the compensation it received was based on the undervalued price it had presented to the Guatemalan government for tax purposes. The company therefore intensified its lobbying in Washington D.C. against the Guatemalan government. The law convinced the US government that the Guatemalan government was being influenced by communists. The US government's Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) started to explore the notion of lending support to detractors and opponents of Árbenz.
Operation PBFortune | Somoza's visit
The plan was to be carried out by Castillo Armas, and involve no direct intervention from the US. When contacted by the CIA agent dispatched by Smith, Castillo Armas had proposed a battle-plan to gain CIA support. This plan involved three forces invading Guatemala from Mexico, Honduras, and El Salvador. These invasions were supposed to be supported by internal rebellions. King formulated a plan to provide Castillo Armas with $225,000 as well as weaponry and transportation. His plan also suggested that Somoza and Gálvez be persuaded to provide air support, in addition to other help. The proposal went to Dulles.
Operation PBFortune | The plot
Following the end of Arévalo's highly popular presidency in 1951, Árbenz was elected president. He continued the reforms of Arévalo and also began an ambitious land reform program known as Decree 900. Under it, the uncultivated portions of large land-holdings were expropriated in return for compensation and redistributed to poverty-stricken agricultural laborers. The agrarian reform law angered the United Fruit Company, which at the time dominated the Guatemalan economy. Benefiting from decades of support from the US government, by 1930 the company was already the largest landowner and employer in Guatemala. It was granted further favors by Ubico, including of public land, and an exemption from all taxes.
Carlos Castillo Armas | Operation PBFortune and CIA ties
The name refers to the country of origin, Guatemala.
Mictopsichia guatemalae | Etymology
Due in part to this support, a number of clandestine "safe-houses" operated by the insurgents were subsequently infiltrated and a clandestine network of the Organizacion del Pueblo en Armas (ORPA) was destroyed in Guatemala City. Argentine military advisors also participated in the Guatemalan army's rural scorched-earth campaign in the Guatemalan highlands in 1981 code-named "Operation Ash 81."
Operation Charly | Guatemala
Though PBSuccess was viewed positively within the US soon after it occurred, the violence perpetrated by the Guatemalan governments supported by the US in the 1970s and 1980s changed the perception of the coup among the US public. Despite the report produced by the Office of Intelligence Research, by 1957 the CIA realized that its version of the history of the Árbenz government and the coup was not gaining traction. Books written by defenders of the Árbenz government, which were strongly critical of the US intervention, were generally better received. Nationalist Latin Americans were inclined to view the Castillo Armas government as a creation of the US.
Operation PBHistory | Aftermath and analysis
Throughout the Cold War years, the U.S. acted as a barrier to socialist revolutions and targeted populist and nationalist governments that were aided by the communists. The CIA overthrew other governments suspected of turning pro-communist, such as Guatemala in 1954 under Jacobo Arbenz Guzman. The CIA Operation PBSuccess eventually led to the 1954 coup that removed Arbnez from power. The operation drew on an initial plan first considered in 1951 to oust Arbenz named Operation PBFortune. Arbenz, who was supported by some local communists, was ousted shortly after he had redistributed of United Fruit Company land in Guatemala. United Fruit had long monopolized the transportation and communications region there, along with the main export commodities, and played a major role in Guatemalan politics.
Cold War (1953–1962) | Guatemala
In 1980, and 1981, the United States under Reagan administration delivered $10.5 million worth of Bell 212 and Bell 412 helicopters and $3.2 million worth of military trucks and jeeps to the Guatemalan Army. In 1981, the Reagan administration also approved a $2 million covert CIA program for Guatemala. On 15 April 1981, EGP rebels attacked a Guatemalan Army patrol from the village of Cocob near Nebaj, killing five personnel. On 17 April 1981, a reinforced company of Airborne troops was deployed to the village. They discovered fox holes, guerrillas and a hostile population. The local people appeared to fully support the guerrillas.
History of Guatemala | 'Operation Ceniza'
The plan of PBSuccess was to try and remove the Guatemalan government without the use of assassination. The CIA and State Department were torn on whether or not assassinations would be necessary to complete this mission. A memo from the Western Hemisphere division suggested assassinating key Guatemalan military officers if they refused to join the rebellion against Arbenz. Trujillos trained pistoleros would be utilized in order to eliminate the top leaders of Guatemala. An elaborate plan was created that laid everything leading up until D-Day. PBSuccess also included a sixth stage, that being plans to remove opposition after a successful coup also.
CIA activities in Guatemala | 1953
The Guatemalan Revolution was disliked by the United States federal government, which was predisposed during the Cold War to see it as communist. This perception grew after Árbenz had been elected and formally legalized the communist Guatemalan Party of Labour. The United Fruit Company (UFC), whose highly profitable business had been affected by the end to exploitative labor practices in Guatemala, engaged in an influential lobbying campaign to persuade the U.S. to overthrow the Guatemalan government. U.S. President Harry Truman authorized Operation PBFortune to topple Árbenz in 1952; although the operation was quickly aborted, it was a precursor to PBSuccess.
1954 Guatemalan coup d'état | Introduction
Within the historical analyst report about the Operation PBSuccess, Cullather states, "Agency officials had only a dim idea of what occurred before Jacobo Arbenz Guzman came into power".
CIA activities in Guatemala | Operation PBSuccess
In 1980 and 1981, the United States under Reagan administration delivered $10.5 million worth of Bell 212 and Bell 412 helicopters and $3.2 million worth of military trucks and jeeps to the Guatemalan Army; and in 1981, the Reagan administration also approved a $2 million covert CIA program for Guatemala. On April 15, 1981, EGP rebels attacked a Guatemalan Army patrol from the village of Cocob near Nebaj, killing five personnel. On April 17, 1981, a reinforced company of Airborne troops was deployed to the village. They discovered fox holes, guerrillas and a hostile population. The local people appeared to fully support the guerrillas.
Fernando Romeo Lucas García | 'Operation Ceniza'
The proposal did not receive much immediate support, but Truman instructed the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to follow up on it. The CIA contacted Carlos Castillo Armas, a Guatemalan army officer who had been exiled from the country in 1949 following a failed coup attempt against President Arévalo. Believing that Castillo Armas would lead a coup with or without their assistance, the CIA decided to supply him with weapons and 225,000 U.S. dollars. The CIA considered Castillo Armas sufficiently corrupt and authoritarian to be well suited to lead the coup. The coup was planned in detail over the next few weeks by the CIA, the UFC, and Somoza.
1954 Guatemalan coup d'état | Operation PBFortune
The new team members posed as unaffiliated with the US government to maintain plausible deniability. The operation helped set up the Guatemalan National Committee of Defense Against Communism, which was covertly funded by the CIA: agents of the committee became involved in PBHistory. The team studied over 500,000 documents in total, and finished processing documents on 28 September 1954. PBHistory documents were used to support the CIA's existing operations Kufire and Kugown, which sought to track Latin American communists and to disseminate information critical of the Árbenz government. Documents were also shared with the Kersten Committee of the US House of Representatives, which publicized PBHistory within the US.
Operation PBHistory | Introduction
The plan was put into motion in autumn 1952 by the CIA. King had obtained weapons from the stock of those that had been confiscated by port authorities in the city of New York. These included 250 rifles, 380 pistols, 64 machine guns, and 4,500 grenades. The United Fruit Company lent one of its freighters to the CIA. The freighter was specially refitted in New Orleans, and loaded with weapons under the guise of agricultural machinery. It was scheduled to sail to Nicaragua in early October 1952. The CIA had encouraged Somoza and Gálvez to provide support to Castillo Armas' forces.
Operation PBFortune | Execution and termination
Additionally, the US government was concerned that the success of Árbenz's reforms would inspire similar movements elsewhere. Until the end of its term, the Truman administration relied on purely diplomatic and economic means to attempt to reduce communist influences. Árbenz's enactment of Decree 900 in 1952 provoked Truman to authorize Operation PBFortune, a covert operation to overthrow Árbenz. The plan had originally been suggested by the US-backed dictator of Nicaragua, Anastasio Somoza García, who said that if he were given weapons, he could overthrow the Guatemalan government. The operation was to be led by Carlos Castillo Armas. However, the US state department discovered the conspiracy, and secretary of state Dean Acheson persuaded Truman to abort the plan.
Jacobo Árbenz | Political motives
Operation Kufire was a wide-ranging effort to track communists from various countries across Latin America who had come to Guatemala during the presidency of Árbenz. The CIA expected that these individuals would return to their home countries, or to other countries that had liberal policies about political asylum, and by tracking them, the CIA hoped to disrupt their activities. During the course of this operation, a CIA analyst asked Philips whether to open a file on a 25-year old physician, who did not at the time appear to be particularly threatening. Philips said yes, thereby opening a file on Ernesto "Che" Guevara, which would quickly become one of the thickest files the CIA had on a single individual.
Operation PBHistory | Operation Kufire
The name of the place was derived from the Spanish word "telegrafista" which means a talkative person or one who spreads the news to the people. Accordingly, there was a "telegrafista" who lived in this place and resides in a stone tower to watch over the attacks of the Moros. Because of his work, he protected the natives from such attacks, thus, the name of place was derived from the term "telegrafista" in his honor.
Telegrafo | Etymology
PBHistory was the final phase of the operation that was to obtain documentation left behind by President Arbenz's administration. Frank Wisner wanted to take every opportunity he could to try to expose Soviet connections to the Western hemisphere which included trying to show the communist qualities of the Arbenz rule. The Army and Castillo Arma's junta were able to obtain around 150,000 documents, however very few of these actually showed a connection to the Soviets. Later, examination of said documents had found no proof of possible Soviet control within Guatemala, only Guatemalan communists had been acting on their own. Agents created a booklet containing the obtained documents which specifically showed photographs of Arbenz's library filled with Marxist texts, Chinese communists materials, and a copy of Stalin's biography.
CIA activities in Guatemala | 1953
In 1954, the democratically elected Guatemalan government of Colonel Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán was toppled by U.S.-backed forces led by Colonel Carlos Castillo Armas who invaded from Honduras. Commissioned by the Eisenhower administration, this military operation was armed, trained and organized by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (see "Operation PBSuccess"). The directors of United Fruit Company (UFCO) had lobbied to convince the Truman and Eisenhower administrations that Colonel Arbenz intended to align Guatemala with the Soviet Bloc. Besides the disputed issue of Arbenz's allegiance to communism, UFCO was being threatened by the Arbenz government's agrarian reform legislation and new Labor Code.
United Fruit Company | Guatemala
Díaz chose a corps of officers who were all known to be men of personal integrity, and who were loyal to Árbenz. By June 21, Guatemalan soldiers had gathered at Zacapa under the command of Colonel Víctor M. León, who was believed to be loyal to Árbenz. The leaders of the communist party also began to have their suspicions, and sent a member to investigate. He returned on June 25, reporting that the army was highly demoralized, and would not fight. PGT Secretary General Alvarado Monzón informed Árbenz, who quickly sent another investigator of his own, who brought back a message asking Árbenz to resign.
Jacobo Árbenz | Operation PBSuccess
Once the CIA had stopped using the documents for propaganda purposes, the agents in charge of PBHistory decided that the best use of the documents they had uncovered would be to record the growth of the communist movement in Guatemala. This research was undertaken by the US State Department's Office of Intelligence Research. The OIR produced a 50-page report after five months of work; the State Department considered it the "definitive answer" to the question of how communism had arisen in Guatemala. The government of Honduras, which had allowed its territory to be used as a "staging area" for the coup against Árbenz, also made use of the PBHistory papers to justify its position.
Operation PBHistory | Other uses
This led to a CIA-orchestrated coup in 1954, known as Operation PBSuccess, which saw Arbenz toppled and forced into exile by Colonel Carlos Castillo Armas. Despite most Guatemalans' attachment to the original ideals of the 1944 uprising, some private sector leaders and the military began to believe that Arbenz represented a communist threat and supported his overthrow, hoping that a successor government would continue the more moderate reforms started by Arevalo.
History of Guatemala | Operation PBSuccess
From this comes the contemporary name of the country, Guatemala. The day of the city's foundation was 25 July, which is the feast day of St. James, hence the full name of the city. After the Kaqchikel rebelled against their former allies, the Spanish refounded the capital as Santiago de los Caballeros de Guatemala in 1527, in the Almolonga Valley near the Volcán de Agua. In 1541 the crater of the volcano collapsed, unleashing a flood upon the new capital, which was once again moved. The Almolonga Valley site is now known as Ciudad Vieja ("Old City").
Santiago de los Caballeros de Guatemala | Introduction
The CIA operation to overthrow Jacobo Árbenz, code-named Operation PBSuccess, was authorized by Eisenhower in August 1953. Carlos Castillo Armas, once Arana's lieutenant, who had been exiled following the failed coup in 1949, was chosen to lead the coup. Castillo Armas recruited a force of approximately 150 mercenaries from among Guatemalan exiles and the populations of nearby countries. In January 1954, information about these preparations were leaked to the Guatemalan government, which issued statements implicating a "Government of the North" in a plot to overthrow Árbenz. The US government denied the allegations, and the US media uniformly took the side of the government; both argued that Árbenz had succumbed to communist propaganda.
Jacobo Árbenz | Operation PBSuccess
The country name comes from Nahuatl "Cuauhtēmallān", "place of many trees", a translation of K'iche' "K’ii’chee’", "many trees" (="forest").
List of placenames of indigenous origin in the Americas | <a href="Guatemala">Guatemala</a>
Santiago de los Caballeros de Guatemala ("St. James of the Knights of Guatemala") was the name given to the capital city of the Spanish colonial Captaincy General of Guatemala in Central America. The name was first associated with the Kaqchikel Maya capital Iximche, adopted as the Spanish capital soon after the Spanish conquest of Guatemala began in July 1524. The Kaqchikel capital was called Guatemala by the Spanish, with its origin in the Nahuatl word "Quauhtemallan", which means "forested land". The Spanish took the name of the city used by their Nahuatl-speaking Mexican allies and applied it to the new Spanish city and, by extension, to the Captaincy General of Guatemala.
Santiago de los Caballeros de Guatemala | Introduction
The shipment of these weapons acted as the final spur for the CIA to launch its coup.
Guatemalan Revolution | Operation PBSuccess
The operation received attention again during the attempts by the U.S. government to exploit the products of Operation PBHistory, the CIA effort to gather intelligence from documents left in Guatemala after the 1954 coup by the government and the communist party. Anti-Communist members of the US Congress, especially Charles J. Kersten and Patrick J. Hillings of the Kersten Committee, began to use PBHistory documents in their reports, provided by the CIA to forestall the possibility that members of Congress, officially ignorant of the CIA's role in the Guatemalan coup, would expose other CIA projects. A subcommittee headed by Hillings produced a final report.
Operation Washtub (Nicaragua) | Introduction
Many of the names of the municipalities of Guatemala consist of one of two things: the name of a catholic saint to worship the day the city was founded or a description with Náhuatl roots. These influences are due to the troops in command of Pedro de Alvarado who invaded the region in 1520. These troops were composed of Spanish soldiers and indigenous Tlaxcaltecs. The name Escuintla, comes from the indigenous language nahuatl «Itzcuintlán», which is a word composed of two words: · «Itzcuintli»: means “dog”
Escuintla | Etymology
On 24 May 1891, it was referred to as the Honor Guard once again. He had several headquarters transfers, during the mandate of José María Orellana and Jorge Ubico Castañeda, in 1940 he was named Infantry Regiment by General Ubico, It played a decisive role in the October 1944 Guatemalan Revolution, when military personnel, at command of Major Francisco Javier Arana Castro, with heavy artillery, joined the popular movement and allowed the entrance of a group of 14 university students.
Presidential Honor Guard (Guatemala) | History
With Nojpetén safely in the hands of the Spanish, Ursúa returned to Campeche; he left a small garrison on the island, isolated amongst the hostile Itza and Kowoj who still dominated the mainland. Nojpetén was renamed by the Spanish as "Nuestra Señora de los Remedios y San Pablo, Laguna del Itza" ("Our Lady of Remedy and Saint Paul, Lake of the Itza"). The garrison was reinforced in 1699 by a military expedition from Guatemala, accompanied by mixed-race "ladino" civilians who came to found their own town around the military camp. The settlers brought disease with them, which killed many soldiers and colonists and swept through the indigenous population.
Spanish conquest of Guatemala | Fall of Nojpetén
Based on oral local history in San Jeronimo of Alta Vera Paz, it is told that a ship carrying enslaved people from Africa broke on the shores of Guatemala prior to the European invasion. The ship had broken on the shores and the enslaved people became free people with the enslavers dead. The oral history continues to claim that the name Alta Verapaz – the land of " High True Peace" was given to that territory by the Spaniards after conquering the people of African and Mayan descent through religion – the cross – and not the sword as in other parts of Guatemala.
Afro-Latin Americans | Guatemala
Castillo Armas joined the General Staff and became director of the military academy. Arana and Castillo Armas opposed the newly elected government of Juan José Arévalo; after Arana's failed 1949 coup, Castillo Armas went into exile in Honduras. Seeking support for another revolt, he came to the attention of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). In 1950 he launched a failed assault on Guatemala City, before escaping back to Honduras. Influenced by Cold War fears of communism and the pressure from the United Fruit Company, in 1952 the US government of President Harry Truman authorized Operation PBFortune, a plot to overthrow Arévalo's leftist successor, President Jacobo Árbenz.
Carlos Castillo Armas | Introduction
In the meeting they said that a filibuster by the chairman of Democrats for Eisenhower, one of Ike's richest, and most generous contributors was their last ditch hope, with a 20% chance of success. A withdrawal of $150,000 from Riggs Bank purchased three fully armed P-47 Thunderbolts. On June 27, after days of the miniature bombing campaign, Arbenz, thinking his forces outmatched, and thinking that his grasp on the military was failing ceded power to Colonel Carlos Diaz. The CIA orchestrated several transfers of power, ending when the CIA finally placed Castillo Armas in the office of President.
History of the Central Intelligence Agency | Guatemala
These names were deleted in the declassified documents, taking away any verification of their survival pre/post-coup.
CIA activities in Guatemala | 1954
This story was believed to be the reason why the bureaucrats recorded the name of the town as "Pinabacdao".
Pinabacdao | Etymology
Guatemalan intelligence was directed and executed mainly by two bodies: One the Intelligence Section of the Army, subsequently called Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff of the National Defense and generally known as "G-2" or "S-2". The other the intelligence unit called Presidential Security Department, also known as "Archivo" or AGSAEMP (Archives and Support Services of the Presidential General Staff). "Archivo" was formed with money and support from US advisers under President Enrique Peralta Azurdia, during which time it was known as the "Presidential Intelligence Agency". A telecommunications database known as the Regional Telecommunications Center or "La Regional" was integrated into this agency and served as a vital part of the Guatemalan intelligence network.
Guatemalan genocide | Terror apparatus
On August 4, a new and larger US contingent was deployed to Guatemala. In order to remain covert, this group identified itself to Armas as the "Social Research Group", composed of businessmen and experts from universities. It consisted of eight CIA officers, three men from the State Department, and one from the US Information Agency. It was led by an officer working under the pseudonym "Francis T. Mylkes," and included David Atlee Phillips, who was fluent in Spanish and had been part of the PBSuccess team. The group presented itself as unaffiliated with the US government in order to avoid nationalist backlash and to maintain plausible deniability.
Operation PBHistory | Second phase
The task force was given the cover name Social Research Group. To avoid confrontation with Guatemalan nationalists, the CIA opted to leave the documents in Guatemalan possession, instead funding the creation of a Guatemalan intelligence agency that would try to dismantle the communist organizations. Thus the National Committee of Defense Against Communism ("Comité de Defensa Nacional Contra el Comunismo") was created on 20 July, and granted a great deal of power over military and police functions. The personnel of the new agency were also put to work analyzing the same documents. The document-processing phase of the operation was terminated on 28 September 1954, having examined 500,000 documents.
1954 Guatemalan coup d'état | Operation PBHistory
Throughout the Cold War years, the U.S. acted as a barrier to socialist revolutions and targeted populist and nationalist governments that were aided by the communists. The CIA overthrew other governments suspected of turning pro-communist, such as Guatemala in 1954 under Jacobo Arbenz Guzman. The CIA Operation PBSuccess eventually led to the 1954 coup that removed Arbenz from power. The operation drew on an initial plan first considered in 1951 to oust Arbenz named Operation PBFortune. Arbenz, who was supported by some local communists, was ousted shortly after he had redistributed of United Fruit Company land in Guatemala. United Fruit had long monopolized the transportation and communications region there, along with the main export commodities, and played a major role in Guatemalan politics.
Sovereignty of Puerto Rico during the Cold War | American involvement
"The soldiers were forced to fire at anything that moved." The army killed 65 civilians, including 34 children, five adolescents, 23 adults and two elderly people.
History of Guatemala | 'Operation Ceniza'
The CIA operation to overthrow Jacobo Árbenz, code-named Operation PBSuccess, was authorized by Eisenhower in August 1953. The operation was granted a budget of 2.7 million U.S. dollars for "psychological warfare and political action". The total budget has been estimated at between 5 and 7 million dollars, and the planning employed over 100 CIA agents. In addition, the operation recruited scores of individuals from among Guatemalan exiles and the populations of the surrounding countries. The plans included drawing up lists of people within Árbenz's government to be assassinated if the coup were to be carried out. Manuals of assassination techniques were compiled, and lists were also made of people whom the junta would dispose of.
1954 Guatemalan coup d'état | Planning
PBHistory documents were used for years afterward to discredit Árbenz (living in exile) and to counter Soviet propaganda about American imperialism in Guatemala. When Árbenz moved to Montevideo in 1957, the CIA used the PBHistory documents to produce a biography of Árbenz that described him as a Soviet agent, in an attempt to prevent him from moving to Mexico, where opposition to Castillo Armas' regime was coalescing. Nonetheless, Árbenz remained a symbol of principled resistance to the United States, helped in part by Soviet propaganda to that effect. When some of the PBHistory documents were published, they received little attention in Latin America.
Operation PBHistory | Aftermath and analysis
While its use in Latin America to describe such a gathering is attested, the word itself originates from Spanish and not any of the indigenous languages; the mistaken belief of the word's indigenous origin is probably reinforced by Palenque—the famous Maya archaeological site in Chiapas, Mexico—which was named after the nearby Spanish village when the site was rediscovered in the mid-18th century.
Palengke | Etymology
The CIA planning included drawing up lists of people within Árbenz's government to be assassinated if the coup were to be carried out. Manuals of assassination techniques were compiled, and lists were also made of people whom the junta would dispose of. After considering several candidates to lead the coup, including Miguel Ydígoras Fuentes, the CIA settled on Carlos Castillo Armas. The US state department also embarked on a campaign to ensure that other countries would not sympathize with the Guatemalan government, by linking it to communism and the Soviet Union. By 1954 Árbenz had become desperate for weapons, and decided to acquire them secretly from Czechoslovakia, which would have been the first time that a Soviet bloc country shipped weapons to the Americas.
Guatemalan Revolution | Operation PBSuccess
In January 1954, the Guatemalan Government began mass arrests of suspected subversives and accused the US of a plot to invade. PBSuccess, authorized by President Dwight D. Eisenhower in August 1953, was the codename for the CIA's first covert operation in Latin America, carried out in Guatemala. PBSuccess carried a $2.7 million budget for "psychological warfare and political action" and "subversion," among other paramilitary war components. By recruiting a Guatemalan military force, the CIA's operation succeeded in overthrowing the Árbenz government and replacing it with a military junta headed by Colonel Carlos Castillo Armas. Arbenz resigned from his presidency on June 27, 1954, and fled the country with his top aids, leaving behind hundreds of Guatemalan.
CIA activities in Guatemala | 1954
Knowing that he could not fight on without the support of the army, Jacobo Árbenz resigned on 27 June 1954, handing over power to Colonel Carlos Enrique Diaz. US ambassador John Peurifoy then mediated negotiations held in El Salvador between the army leadership and Castillo Armas which led to Armas being included in the ruling military junta on 7 July 1954, and was named provisional president a few days later. The US recognized the new government on 13 July. Elections were held in early October, from which all political parties were barred from participating, and Castillo Armas was the only candidate, winning the election with 99% of the vote.
Guatemalan Revolution | Invasion
The US stopped selling arms to Guatemala in 1951, and soon after blocked arms purchases from Canada, Germany, and Rhodesia. By 1954, Árbenz had become desperate for weapons, and decided to acquire them secretly from Czechoslovakia, an action seen as establishing a communist beachhead in the Americas. The shipment of these weapons was portrayed by the CIA as Soviet interference in the United States' backyard, and acted as the final spur for the CIA to launch its coup. Árbenz had intended the shipment of weapons from the "Alfhem" to be used to bolster peasant militia, in the event of army disloyalty, but the US informed the Guatemalan army chiefs of the shipment, forcing Árbenz to hand them over to the military, and deepening the rift between him and the chiefs of his army.
Jacobo Árbenz | Operation PBSuccess
Operation WASHTUB was a covert operation organized by the United States Central Intelligence Agency to plant a phony Soviet arms cache in Nicaragua. It was a part of the CIA's effort to portray the administration of Guatemalan President Jacobo Árbenz as having ties to the Soviet Union, prior to the CIA sponsored 1954 Guatemalan coup d'état which overthrew Árbenz later the same year. On 19 February, 1954, the CIA, working through the Guardia Nacional de Nicaragua, planted a cache of Soviet-made arms on the Nicaraguan coast near the fishing village of Masachapa to be "discovered" weeks later by Rafael Lola, a lieutenant in the Nicaraguan army, and fishermen in the pay of Nicaraguan president Anastasio Somoza García.
Operation Washtub (Nicaragua) | Introduction
The fruit company was the strongest pillar of Ubico's regime and was part of the American policy for the region since President Teddy Roosevelt started negotiations with Colombia to build the Panama Canal in 1903. German males also were forced to leave their country and forced into the ranks of the German army. Guatemalan historian Francis Polo Sifontes wrote that during the Second World War many Germans were called for military service in his country. After the war, some were imprisoned in concentration camps in Russia, and others claimed to be Guatemalans to avoid prison. There are a number of names that Germans bequeathed their children; due to the mix with the Maya-Q'eqchi' population, many German names have remained in Q'eqchi' people since.
Franja Transversal del Norte | During World War II
To circumvent this, Guatemala turned to countries like Argentina, Israel and Switzerland, and the United States continued to supply dual-use aircraft and covertly provided the air force with millions of dollars in overhauls and spare parts for previously purchased aircraft. From Switzerland, twelve Pilatus PC-7 were acquired in 1979–1980 as training aircraft, but they were also used in combat during the counter-insurgency.
Guatemalan Air Force | History
On 19 October 1944 a small group of soldiers and students led by Árbenz and Arana attacked the National Palace in what later became known as the "October Revolution". Ponce was defeated and driven into exile; and Árbenz, Arana, and a lawyer name Jorge Toriello established a junta. They declared that democratic elections would be held before the end of the year.
Guatemalan Civil War | Jorge Ubico regime
Arbenz was out shortly afterwards, and Guatemala came under control of a repressive military regime.
Cold War (1953–1962) | Guatemala
In 1954 the CIA was engineering a "coup d'état" in Guatemala to replace its elected government with a dissident Guatemalan colonel, Carlos Castillo Armas. In May 1954 the Swedish cargo ship had evaded US sea and air patrols to deliver a cargo of Czechoslovak armaments to Puerto Barrios on Guatemala's Caribbean coast to augment the elected government's defences. The CIA was determined to prevent any further arms deliveries. This included using a covert "Liberation Air Force", disguised as rebels unconnected with the USA, that the CIA had created to support Colonel Castillo's few hundred rebels. Early on the morning of 27 June 1954, the day that the CIA "coup" forced Guatemala's elected President Jacobo Árbenz to resign and flee into exile, "Springfjord" was under charter to the US shipping company Grace Line and was at Puerto San José, Guatemala loading a mixed cargo that included coffee and 976 bales of cotton.
SS Springfjord | Napalmed and sunk by the CIA