In 1954, on behalf of Washington, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) overthrew the democratically elected government of Guatemala. They funded rebels, supplied weapons, and installed a regime dependent on the US. Under the guise of anti-communism, the US was in reality supporting a coup that significantly served the interests of the United Fruit Company. For Guatemala, decades of civil war followed, with hundreds of thousands dead and even more displaced.
In 1951, Guatemala elected a new president. Their choice was the left-wing reformer Jacobo Arbenz Guzman, the chairman of the „Revolutionary Party of Guatemala,“ who won with nearly two-thirds of the votes. The newly elected president promised the people of Guatemala a better life. Because at that time, a large part of the Guatemalan economy was in the hands of a single U.S. corporation: United Fruit Company.
United Fruit Company
The United Fruit Company (now Chiquita) and its competitors Standard Fruit (now Dole) have been in a competitive struggle for the Dominance in Central America. United Fruit owned around 220,000 hectares and land. The American corporation also owned the railway network and the most important ports. The agri-giant's influence was so great that historians referred to it as the „State within a state“designated, with great influence on both domestic and foreign policy.
Land reform against corporate greed: Guatemala in the crosshairs of the CIA
Arbenz and his government decided to lift the country out of this almost feudal state and implemented land reform. In 1951, the Guatemalan parliament passed the „Decree 900“. In the spirit of the constitution written in 1944, around 600,000 hectares expropriated and returned to Guatemalan families. Specifically, unused land exceeding 90 hectares from large landowners and large corporations, which kept these areas in reserve, are to be transferred to the inhabitants of Guatemala.
This measure was intended to break the dependence of small farmers on the wealthy. An explicit ban on slavery, unpaid labor, and the use of labor as rent payments was also introduced. These were all practices used by companies like United Fruit to make their workers dependent.
But this displeased the United Fruit Company of Guatemala. The then CIA director Allen Welsh Dulles worked as a ... back then Lobbyist for the company. His brother too John Foster Dulles, the 1953 US Secretary of State worked for the company. In the interest of the United Fruit Company, the brothers lobbied US President Dwight D. Eisenhower He convinced the ardent anti-communist Ironnflower davon that Arbenz was a communist who wanted to align Guatemala with the Soviet-led Eastern Bloc. Although Arbenz only wanted to democratize capitalism in the country, Eisenhower decided to put an end to this supposed red threat.
Coup d'État: How to Steal a State
A coup d'état (in German, „Staatsstreich“) describes a sudden, illegal, and violent attempt by one or more small groups to seize power in a state. It differs significantly from a revolution in that a coup d'état „from above“comes from politicians or military personnel, while a revolution„from below“is sought by society.
The Central Intelligence Agency stepped in to eliminate Arbenz and install a US-friendly strongman in Guatemala. Their choice fell on Carlos Castillo Armas, a Guatemalan officer, who already on 1944 coup was involved. In Honduras and El Salvador, the CIA armed rebels and mercenary troops with his help, who Coup d'état should be carried out.
In 1954, around 400 people across the border into Guatemala. They blew up bridges and railway tracks, cut the telegraph network, and marched towards Guatemala City. Castillo Armas and his putschists made a pact with the army. Árbenz, unwilling to sacrifice Guatemala City, tried in vain to mobilize militias. However, CIA propaganda and air attacks paralyzed the army and the population.
When high-ranking officers in the capital also conspired against President Arbenz, he resigned and fled with his family to Mexico City, where he died in 1971.
Profit Coup: United Fruit Company's Bloody Wars
The US-funded coup d'état left deep wounds in Guatemalan society. Castillo Armas, who emerged as a dictator, ruled the country authoritatively. Under his leadership, there was Mass arrests of opposition members and massacres. At Finca Jocatán alone, a center rebellious trade unionist, more than 1000 people murdered. Ironically, the CIA operation was codenamed „Operation Successful“were held. Documents that were still classified at the time are today inspectable.
United Fruit Company Guatemala: How the CIA Couped for Bananas in 1954
On Castillo Armas, who ruled the country until his assassination 1957 ruled, a series of short-lived authoritarian regents followed. 1960 plunged the country into a devastating civil war that would last until 1996.from the anthropologist and Guatemala researcher Carlota McAllister Around 200,000 Guatemalan civilians died during this time. The majority of them were killed by atrocities committed by the US-backed government.
To the historian Nick Cullather According to what, the US undermined its actual goal with the 1953 coup. Instead of a stable Guatemala, they destabilized the entire region for decades to secure the interests of the United Fruit Company. A pattern that repeated itself in the context of Monroe Doctrine will be repeated many more times in history.
