14. Heroes and Villains of the Cold War: Revolution and Proxy Wars in Latin America

My Name is Henry Kissinger: U.S. National Security Adviser and Secretary of State

I was born Heinz Alfred Kissinger in Fürth, Germany, in 1923. I grew up in a Jewish family at precisely the wrong moment in German history. Adolf Hitler and the Nazi movement transformed the country around us, and antisemitic persecution became part of daily life. In 1938, my family fled Germany for the United States. I was fifteen years old. That experience taught me something I would never forget: nations are not governed by good intentions alone. Power, security, and the decisions of leaders can determine whether societies survive or collapse.

Becoming an American

America gave my family refuge, and I eventually became an American citizen. During World War II, I entered the United States Army and returned to Germany wearing an American uniform. Because I spoke German, I worked in military intelligence and counterintelligence. I saw firsthand the destruction left behind by Hitler's regime. After the war, I attended Harvard University, eventually earning a doctorate and becoming a scholar of diplomacy, nuclear strategy, and international relations. I became fascinated by a difficult question: how can rival great powers compete without destroying one another?

Entering the White House

In 1969, President Richard Nixon appointed me National Security Adviser. The United States was trapped in a costly war in Vietnam, the Soviet Union possessed a massive nuclear arsenal, and Communist China had emerged as a major power. I did not believe foreign policy could be conducted as a simple struggle between heroes and villains. Nations possessed interests, fears, ambitions, and military power. American diplomacy, I believed, had to deal with the world as it existed rather than as we wished it to be.

China, Moscow, and the Balance of Power

One of our boldest moves was opening relations with Communist China. I secretly traveled to Beijing in 1971, helping prepare President Nixon's historic visit the following year. At the same time, we negotiated with the Soviet Union and pursued détente—a reduction in Cold War tensions. The objective was not friendship. It was balance. If Washington could maintain relationships with both Moscow and Beijing, neither communist giant could easily unite against us. We also pursued nuclear arms agreements because in an atomic age, diplomacy was not weakness; sometimes diplomacy was the instrument that prevented catastrophe.

Vietnam and the Price of Strategy

Vietnam remained the most painful problem. Nixon and I sought to withdraw American forces while preventing an immediate collapse of South Vietnam. Negotiations continued while military pressure—including controversial bombing campaigns in Cambodia and North Vietnam—was used against communist forces. In 1973, the Paris Peace Accords were signed, and Le Duc Tho and I were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, although he refused it. The agreement ended direct American combat involvement, but it did not bring lasting peace. In 1975, North Vietnamese forces captured Saigon.

Latin America and the Fear of Another Cuba

Latin America presented another Cold War battlefield. Washington feared that revolutionary governments might align themselves with Cuba and the Soviet Union. When the Marxist Salvador Allende became president of Chile in 1970, the Nixon administration opposed his government and authorized covert efforts to weaken his political position and influence Chilean politics. Chile's own military overthrew Allende in 1973, and General Augusto Pinochet established a dictatorship. The United States did not directly carry out the coup, but our policies toward Chile remain among the most controversial actions associated with my career.

Diplomacy in the Middle East

After the 1973 Arab-Israeli War, I practiced what became known as "shuttle diplomacy," traveling repeatedly between Israel and Arab governments. Rather than expecting one grand settlement, I sought smaller agreements that could separate armies and reduce the possibility of another immediate war. Foreign policy often works this way. Peace is rarely produced by declaring that peace is desirable. It is created by constructing circumstances in which former enemies conclude that restraint serves their interests better than continued conflict.

Power and Its Consequences

I served as Secretary of State under Presidents Nixon and Gerald Ford and left government in 1977. For the remainder of my long life, I wrote books, advised leaders, and remained involved in debates about China, Russia, nuclear weapons, diplomacy, and the international balance of power. I lived to be one hundred years old, dying in 2023. My policies remained fiercely debated, especially those involving Vietnam, Cambodia, Chile, Argentina, and other authoritarian governments with which the United States dealt during the Cold War.

Guatemala: The Coup That Became a Cold War Warning - Told by Henry Kissinger

1954 - I was not yet serving in the United States government when these events occurred; I was a young scholar at Harvard. But Guatemala became an early example of the strategic dilemma that would repeatedly confront American policymakers during the Cold War. Washington looked at a relatively small Central American nation and saw something larger: the possibility that Soviet-aligned communism might establish another foothold in the Western Hemisphere. Guatemalans, meanwhile, were fighting over land, political power, economic inequality, and the future of their own country.

Jacobo Árbenz Changes Guatemala

Jacobo Árbenz became president in 1951 after winning the 1950 election. He was not simply installed by Moscow, nor was Guatemala a Soviet satellite. Árbenz was a nationalist reformer who wanted to modernize his country, reduce the power of large landowners, and redistribute unused agricultural land. His most controversial measure, Decree 900 of 1952, authorized the government to expropriate certain uncultivated portions of large estates while compensating owners. This brought his government into direct conflict with powerful landowners and especially the American-owned United Fruit Company, which possessed enormous economic interests in Guatemala.

Washington Sees Communism

The Eisenhower administration did not view these developments only as an argument over land. Members of the communist Guatemalan Party of Labor had gained influence within the political system and supported Árbenz, although they did not control his government. Coming shortly after Communist victory in China, the Korean War, and expanding Cold War confrontation, this influence alarmed Washington. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles and CIA Director Allen Dulles believed Guatemala was moving dangerously toward communism. United Fruit aggressively lobbied against Árbenz as well, creating an important mixture of strategic fears and American corporate interests.

Operation PBSUCCESS

President Dwight D. Eisenhower authorized the CIA to conduct a covert operation known as PBSUCCESS. The agency supported a small force of Guatemalan exiles commanded by Colonel Carlos Castillo Armas, supplied weapons and training, conducted psychological warfare, and operated radio broadcasts designed to make the rebel force appear much stronger than it actually was. In June 1954, Castillo Armas's men crossed into Guatemala. Militarily, the invasion itself was limited. Psychologically, however, it was far more successful. Radio broadcasts, aircraft attacks, rumors, diplomatic pressure, and fear of direct American intervention convinced many Guatemalan officers that Árbenz could not survive.

Árbenz Falls

The decisive battle was therefore fought as much in the minds of Guatemala's military leadership as on its roads and fields. Árbenz attempted to arm civilian supporters when the army resisted confronting the invasion, but his position rapidly deteriorated. On June 27, 1954, he resigned. After a brief struggle over who would control the government, Castillo Armas emerged as Guatemala's new leader. Land reforms were reversed, communist organizations were outlawed, and political opponents faced repression. Washington had demonstrated that covert action could remove a government it considered dangerous without deploying a conventional American army.

Victory With a Long Shadow

From the immediate American strategic perspective, the operation appeared remarkably successful. A government suspected of drifting toward communism had fallen quickly and inexpensively. Yet strategy must be measured not merely by what happens the morning after victory. The coup damaged Guatemala's democratic development and contributed to political instability that eventually fed into the country's long civil war beginning in 1960. That conflict lasted until 1996 and became extraordinarily brutal, with government forces and allied groups responsible for the overwhelming majority of documented atrocities, particularly against Indigenous Maya communities.

The Warning Latin America Remembered

The consequences reached beyond Guatemala. To American officials, 1954 seemed to demonstrate the usefulness of covert action against governments considered vulnerable to communist influence. To many Latin American leftists, however, Guatemala demonstrated something very different: that Washington might help overthrow even an elected government when American strategic or economic interests appeared threatened. Ernesto "Che" Guevara happened to be living in Guatemala during the coup. What he witnessed strengthened his conviction that revolutionary movements could not depend upon conventional democratic politics alone.

The Lesson of Guatemala

Guatemala therefore became more than a successful CIA operation or a failed reform government. It became a warning interpreted differently by every side of the Cold War. Washington learned that covert pressure could change governments. Revolutionaries learned to distrust American intentions. Latin American militaries learned that anti-communism could bring American support. And ordinary Guatemalans inherited consequences lasting for decades. The essential lesson of power is that intervention is often easier than controlling what follows. In 1954, the United States helped determine who would lose power in Guatemala; it could not determine everything that would come afterward.

My Name is Che Guevara: Marxist Revolutionary

I was born Ernesto Guevara in Rosario, Argentina, in 1928. Severe asthma followed me throughout my youth, but I refused to allow weakness to dictate my life. I studied medicine and traveled across Latin America, witnessing poverty, disease, inequality, and enormous differences between wealthy landowners and struggling workers. I became convinced that these conditions were not accidents. To me, they were products of capitalism, foreign influence, and governments that protected the powerful.

The Motorcycle Journey

In 1952, I traveled across South America with my friend Alberto Granado. We crossed mountains, deserts, mining communities, villages, and hospitals. The journey transformed my political thinking. I saw miners laboring under miserable conditions and Indigenous communities living in poverty. Medicine could treat one sick person at a time, I thought, but revolution might change the entire system. Gradually, the young physician became something different—a Marxist determined to overturn the political and economic order of Latin America.

Guatemala and the United States

I traveled to Guatemala in 1953, where President Jacobo Árbenz was pursuing land reform. In 1954, a CIA-backed operation helped forces led by Carlos Castillo Armas overthrow Árbenz. To me, Guatemala proved that the United States would intervene when a Latin American government threatened American economic or strategic interests. I concluded that elections and reforms alone could not defeat imperialism. Armed revolution, I increasingly believed, was necessary.

Meeting Fidel Castro

In Mexico in 1955, I met Fidel Castro and joined his movement against Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista. We sailed for Cuba aboard the Granma in 1956 and began a guerrilla war from the Sierra Maestra. I became a commander, earning a reputation for discipline, determination, and ruthlessness. I participated in revolutionary tribunals and approved or carried out executions of people considered traitors, informants, deserters, or enemies of the revolution. To me, revolution was warfare, and warfare demanded severity.

Victory—and Revolutionary Justice

Batista fled Cuba on January 1, 1959. We won. I became one of the new government's most recognizable leaders and served in several important positions. At La Cabaña fortress, revolutionary tribunals tried members and supporters of Batista's former regime, and numerous prisoners were tortured and brutally executed. Critics called these proceedings political vengeance and condemned their lack of adequate legal protections. I defended revolutionary justice and argued that those responsible for oppression under Batista had to answer for their crimes.

Building a Communist Cuba

I wanted more than a change of rulers. I wanted a socialist revolution that would transform property, industry, agriculture, and society itself. I served as president of Cuba's National Bank and later minister of industries, supporting nationalization and centralized economic planning. I became an outspoken opponent of American capitalism and increasingly aligned myself with the communist world. Yet Cuba's economic transformation encountered shortages, inefficiencies, and hardship, while the revolutionary government increasingly restricted political opposition and independent expression. We took the farmer’s land and gave it to the workers. Those who resisted, even those who helped our cause initially, fought back and were all killed or forced to escape to the United States. The workers that we gave the land to never understood what it took to run a successful farm and they failed, so many of our people starved and that is when I left.

Taking Revolution Beyond Cuba

Cuba was never enough for me. I believed revolution should spread across Africa, Asia, and Latin America. I traveled abroad, spoke against American influence, and called for revolutionary struggle against imperialism. In 1965, I left Cuba and attempted to assist communist insurgents in the Congo. The campaign failed. I then turned toward Bolivia, believing a guerrilla uprising there could ignite revolutions across South America.

My Final Revolution

In 1966, I secretly entered Bolivia and organized a guerrilla force. But the peasants did not rally to us as I had expected. My fighters became isolated, supplies dwindled, and the Bolivian military—assisted by U.S. intelligence and training—closed in. On October 8, 1967, I was wounded and captured near La Higuera. The following day, Bolivian soldiers executed me. I was thirty-nine years old.

Che Guevara and the Attempt to Export Revolution - Told by Che Guevara

1959–1967 - When our revolution triumphed in Cuba in 1959, I did not believe our struggle should end in Havana. Batista was gone, but across Latin America I saw governments protecting old elites, vast inequalities in land ownership, poverty among rural workers, and the influence of the United States. I had embraced Marxism and believed these conditions were part of a larger struggle against capitalism and imperialism. Cuba, in my mind, was not the conclusion of a revolution. It was proof that revolution could succeed.

Creating the Revolutionary Example

Our victory offered radicals throughout Latin America a model. A relatively small guerrilla army had survived in the mountains, gained support, weakened Batista's forces, and eventually helped bring down his government. I came to believe that dedicated revolutionaries could create a foco—a small guerrilla center capable of encouraging a larger uprising. I argued that revolutionaries did not always have to wait patiently for every political condition to become perfect. Armed struggle itself, I believed, could help produce revolutionary conditions. It was a daring idea, but it would prove far more difficult to reproduce outside Cuba.

From Minister to International Revolutionary

For several years I served the new Cuban government as president of the National Bank and later minister of industries. Yet administrative offices could not satisfy me. I traveled internationally, represented Cuba, strengthened relations with communist countries, and spoke openly against American power. At the United Nations in 1964, I defended revolutionary Cuba and denounced imperialism. My message was increasingly international: oppressed peoples should not merely complain about the existing order—they should organize to overthrow it and we were not against killing all that stood in our way.

Revolution Begins Spreading

Cuba provided varying degrees of training, inspiration, and assistance to revolutionary movements abroad, while guerrilla organizations appeared across Latin America. Insurgents fought in countries including Venezuela, Guatemala, Colombia, Peru, and Bolivia. But these movements confronted conditions very different from those we had experienced in Cuba. Governments learned counterinsurgency techniques, the United States provided training and assistance to anti-communist forces, and many rural populations did not automatically support Marxist guerrillas. Revolution could not simply be copied from one country and transplanted into another.

The Congo: My First Great Failure

In 1965, I secretly left Cuba and traveled to the Congo in Africa, hoping to assist rebels following the Congo Crisis and the death of Patrice Lumumba. I expected that experienced Cuban revolutionaries could help strengthen the insurgency. Instead, the mission deteriorated. Rebel forces were divided, discipline was poor, leadership was fractured, and outside powers were deeply involved. After months of frustration, I withdrew. I later described the expedition as a failure. Yet I did not abandon my belief in international revolution. I simply searched for another battlefield.

Bolivia: The Revolution I Expected

Bolivia became my next target. In late 1966, I entered the country secretly and established a guerrilla force in the southeastern mountains. My plan was larger than Bolivia itself. I hoped a successful insurgency could become a revolutionary center from which rebellion might spread into neighboring countries. But the conditions worked against us. Bolivia's Communist Party did not provide the cooperation I had hoped for, local peasants generally did not join us in significant numbers, and our guerrillas became increasingly isolated.

The Hunters Close In

The Bolivian government pursued us relentlessly. The United States supported Bolivia's counterinsurgency effort, and CIA personnel assisted in the hunt while a Bolivian Ranger battalion received American training. Our communications deteriorated, supplies became scarce, and members of my force were killed or captured. The revolution that I had imagined spreading across the continent was shrinking to a desperate band moving through ravines and mountains. My theory had encountered the stubborn reality that revolution requires far more than courage and weapons.

Guerrilla Movements Spread Across Latin America - Told by Che Guevara

1961–1967 - After our victory in Cuba, revolutionaries throughout Latin America asked the same dangerous question: if Batista could be defeated, why not the rulers of Venezuela, Guatemala, Colombia, Peru, Bolivia, and elsewhere? I believed Cuba had demonstrated that a determined guerrilla force could challenge a government stronger than itself. Across the continent, young Marxists, students, workers, and armed revolutionaries began looking toward the mountains and jungles and imagining their own Sierra Maestra.

Why Revolution Found an Audience

We did not invent Latin America's problems. In many countries, land and wealth were highly concentrated, rural poverty was severe, political institutions were fragile, and military governments had repeatedly interfered in politics. Some activists believed elections and reforms could improve these conditions, and they may have been right. But others concluded that existing institutions protected the powerful and could only be changed through force. The Cold War added another dimension. Marxism offered one revolutionary explanation for inequality, Cuba offered an example of victory but then failure in keeping an economy strong and that is when the people truly suffered and even starved. This is when the Soviet-American struggle turned local disputes into international concerns.

Venezuela Takes Up Arms

Venezuela demonstrated both the appeal and limitations of our strategy. After dictator Marcos Pérez Jiménez fell in 1958, the country established a democratic system, yet radical leftist organizations still launched armed rebellion. The Armed Forces of National Liberation, known as the FALN, carried out guerrilla attacks and attempted to undermine the government. Cuba supported Venezuelan revolutionaries, but most Venezuelans did not join their uprising. President Rómulo Betancourt's government resisted the insurgency, and the guerrillas failed to produce the mass revolution they expected.

Guatemala Returns to War

Guatemala carried particularly bitter memories. The 1954 CIA-backed operation against President Jacobo Árbenz had convinced many on the left that peaceful political reform could simply be overturned. In 1960, rebellious military officers helped begin an insurgency that developed into a much longer civil war. Leftist guerrilla organizations fought government forces while Cuba provided assistance to revolutionary movements. The government responded with increasingly severe counterinsurgency campaigns. What began as political rebellion grew into decades of violence in which civilians, particularly Indigenous Maya communities in later years, suffered enormously.

Colombia's Mountains Become a Battlefield

Colombia had already endured years of political bloodshed known as La Violencia. In the 1960s, new communist guerrilla organizations emerged from this environment. In 1964, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, developed from communist-aligned rural armed groups. The National Liberation Army, the ELN, also appeared, influenced partly by Marxism and the Cuban example. Instead of producing a quick revolutionary victory, however, Colombia's insurgencies became the foundation of a conflict that would continue for generations.

Peru and the Failure of the Foco

Revolutionaries also attempted guerrilla warfare in Peru. The Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria launched insurgent operations in 1965, hoping rural discontent could be transformed into revolution. The Peruvian military responded rapidly, and the guerrilla campaign was largely defeated within months. This exposed a weakness in the revolutionary theory I championed: poverty did not automatically create revolutionary soldiers. A population could resent inequality without accepting Marxism, guerrilla warfare, or outsiders who claimed to understand what liberation required.

Washington Responds

The United States watched these movements with growing alarm. After Castro aligned Cuba with the Soviet bloc, American leaders feared that additional revolutionary governments could follow. Washington responded with economic programs such as President Kennedy's Alliance for Progress while also expanding military assistance, intelligence cooperation, and counterinsurgency training. American policymakers hoped reform could reduce the appeal of communism while security forces defeated armed movements. Latin America was becoming another Cold War battlefield, even though American and Soviet armies rarely confronted one another directly there.

Bolivia Becomes My Test

I eventually decided that speeches and Cuban support were insufficient. In 1966, I secretly entered Bolivia to establish a guerrilla foco myself. I imagined Bolivia becoming the center of a revolutionary wave spreading across South America. Instead, my force became isolated. Local peasants generally refused to join us, Bolivia's Communist Party leadership withheld the support I expected, and government troops steadily tightened the trap. The Bolivian military, aided by American training and CIA assistance, hunted us through the countryside.

My Name is Augusto Pinochet: Chilean Military Dictator

I was born in Valparaíso, Chile, in 1915. I chose the army as my profession and entered military school as a young man. Discipline, hierarchy, patriotism, and obedience shaped my understanding of society. I rose steadily through the ranks until President Salvador Allende appointed me commander-in-chief of the Chilean Army in August 1973. Within weeks, I would become one of the most powerful and controversial figures in Latin American history.

Chile Divided

By 1973, Chile was in a severe political and economic crisis. Allende, a Marxist elected president in 1970, had nationalized major industries and pursued sweeping socialist reforms. Inflation, shortages, strikes, political violence, and confrontation between left and right shook the country. The United States opposed Allende and secretly worked to undermine his government, while Allende maintained relationships with Cuba and the Soviet bloc. I came to believe that Chile was moving toward Marxist revolution and that the armed forces had a duty to intervene.

September 11, 1973

On September 11, 1973, Chile's armed forces overthrew Allende. Tanks entered Santiago, troops occupied strategic locations, and aircraft attacked the presidential palace, La Moneda. Allende died inside the palace by suicide as the government collapsed. I became the dominant figure in the military junta that assumed control. I presented our action as a rescue of Chile from communism. Congress was dissolved, political parties were restricted or banned, and the democratic system Chile had known was replaced by military rule.

Destroying the Opposition

I was determined that Marxist organizations would not simply reorganize and challenge us again. Security agencies arrested thousands of suspected opponents. Prisoners were held in stadiums, military facilities, and detention centers. My government described these measures as necessary to defeat subversion, but the repression went far beyond armed guerrillas. Political opponents, activists, union members, students, and others were imprisoned, tortured, killed, or forced into exile. More than 3,000 people were killed or disappeared under the dictatorship, and tens of thousands were subjected to imprisonment and torture.

Operation Condor

Chile's struggle became connected to a wider anti-communist campaign across South America. During the 1970s, Chile cooperated with military governments in Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Bolivia, and elsewhere through Operation Condor. Intelligence agencies shared information and pursued political enemies across national borders. I viewed international revolutionary networks as requiring an international response. But Condor also became an instrument for kidnapping, torture, disappearance, and assassination, including operations reaching beyond South America.

Changing Chile's Economy

I intended to transform more than Chile's politics. Economists influenced by free-market ideas—often called the "Chicago Boys"—helped introduce privatization, deregulation, reductions in trade barriers, and other market-oriented reforms. Supporters credited these policies with helping restructure Chile's economy and laying foundations for later growth. The transition, however, brought severe early unemployment and hardship, while inequality remained a major issue. My government pointed to economic modernization as evidence that military rule had restored order; my opponents argued that economic change could never justify political repression.

The Cold War and Washington

The United States regarded communism in Latin America as a major strategic threat, especially after the Cuban Revolution. Washington had covertly opposed Allende before the coup and subsequently maintained relations with my government, although tensions grew over human-rights abuses. I considered Chile part of the worldwide struggle against Marxism. Yet this was one of the Cold War's central contradictions: governments claiming to defend freedom sometimes cooperated with dictatorships because those dictatorships were anti-communist.

The People Vote

I did not rule forever. A new constitution approved in a controversial 1980 referendum provided for a future plebiscite on whether I should remain president. In 1988, Chileans were asked to decide. I expected victory. Instead, approximately 56 percent voted "No." I accepted the constitutional process, and democratic presidential elections followed in 1989. Patricio Aylwin took office in 1990, although I remained commander-in-chief of the army until 1998 and afterward became a senator-for-life.

Judgment Comes After Power

My final years were dominated by investigations rather than military commands. I was arrested in London in 1998 following a Spanish extradition request, and Chilean courts later pursued cases involving human-rights violations and financial misconduct. I died in 2006 without being convicted in a completed criminal trial. I had spent decades insisting that harsh measures saved Chile from communism. Yet at the end, there is a truth that power cannot erase: people were tortured, murdered, and disappeared under the government I commanded. A leader may believe his cause necessary, but history must still ask whether fear of one form of tyranny can ever justify creating another.

Military Coups and the Rise of Anti-Communist Governments - Told by Pinochet

1964–1976 -  By the 1960s, Latin America had become another battlefield of the Cold War. Castro's revolution in Cuba had demonstrated that a Marxist movement could seize power only a short distance from the United States, while Che Guevara openly called for revolution elsewhere. To soldiers like me, the danger seemed unmistakable: guerrilla movements, political extremism, economic disorder, and foreign communist influence could destabilize governments from within. Across Latin America, military officers increasingly claimed that their armies were not merely defending borders—they were defending their nations from revolution.

1964: Brazil's Military Takes Power

Brazil became an important turning point. President João Goulart promoted reforms involving land, education, taxation, and greater state involvement in the economy. His opponents feared economic disorder and believed his government was moving dangerously toward the radical left, although Goulart was not establishing a Soviet-style communist state. In March and April 1964, military forces moved against him, and Goulart fled. The United States welcomed his removal and had prepared Operation Brother Sam to provide logistical support if necessary, though the coup succeeded without that assistance. Brazil then entered more than two decades of military rule.

The Army Becomes a Political Weapon

Brazil was not alone. Bolivia experienced a military coup in 1964 when General René Barrientos helped overthrow President Víctor Paz Estenssoro. Argentina's military removed President Arturo Illia in 1966 and installed General Juan Carlos Onganía. Across the region, some officers embraced what became known as national-security doctrine: the belief that communist subversion inside the country could be as dangerous as an invading foreign army. Under this thinking, political activists, labor organizations, students, and suspected revolutionaries could be treated as potential enemies of the state.

Washington and the Anti-Communist Front

The United States feared another Cuba and strengthened relationships with Latin American militaries through training, weapons, intelligence cooperation, and economic assistance. American leaders did not create every military coup, and Latin American officers had their own ambitions and domestic reasons for acting. But Washington frequently preferred strongly anti-communist governments to governments it feared might move toward Marxism. For military leaders, American support could provide valuable resources and international legitimacy. For Washington, these armies became part of the larger strategy of containing communism.

1973: Chile Joins the Military Governments

Then came my country. Salvador Allende had become Chile's president through an election in 1970 and attempted a democratic road toward socialism. His government nationalized industries and expanded socialist programs while Chile descended into intense political polarization, shortages, strikes, inflation, and institutional confrontation. The Nixon administration covertly worked against Allende and sought to weaken his government. On September 11, 1973, Chile's armed forces overthrew him. Allende died by suicide inside La Moneda, and I emerged as the dominant leader of the military government.

Order Through Repression

We said we had saved Chile from Marxism. But military rule meant far more than replacing one president. Congress was dissolved, political activity was restricted, and opponents were arrested. Security agencies pursued suspected leftists, and detention centers filled with prisoners. Torture, executions, forced exile, and disappearances became features of the dictatorship. Similar repression appeared elsewhere in South America. Governments argued that extraordinary measures were necessary because they were fighting revolutionary warfare; victims and human-rights organizations saw state terror being justified in the name of national security.

1976: Argentina's Dirty War

In March 1976, Argentina's armed forces overthrew President Isabel Perón amid political violence, guerrilla attacks, economic turmoil, and governmental breakdown. The junta launched what became known as the Dirty War. Security forces abducted suspected opponents, operated clandestine detention centers, tortured prisoners, and caused thousands to disappear. Armed revolutionary organizations had themselves committed kidnappings, bombings, assassinations, and other violence, but the state possessed vastly greater power and used systematic illegal repression far beyond the battlefield.

A Continent Under Generals

By 1976, military or authoritarian governments controlled much of South America. Brazil, Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, and Bolivia were governed by regimes intensely hostile to communism. Their security services increasingly cooperated across borders, culminating in Operation Condor, which allowed governments to track and attack opponents internationally. What began as separate national struggles was becoming an organized anti-communist network.

The Price of Fighting Communism

We military rulers portrayed ourselves as guardians standing between our countries and revolutionary dictatorship. That fear was not entirely imaginary: armed Marxist organizations existed, Cuba supported revolution abroad, and Cold War competition was real. But fear can also become an excuse for unlimited power. Governments claiming to defend civilization imprisoned people without trial, tortured opponents, murdered prisoners, and made citizens disappear. I spent years defending harsh measures as necessary to save Chile. Yet history presents an uncomfortable question to every anti-communist ruler of this period: if you destroy liberty in order to protect a nation from tyranny, what exactly have you saved?

Salvador Allende and Chile's Road to Crisis - Told by Henry Kissinger

1970–1973 - In September 1970, Chile presented the Nixon administration with an unusual Cold War problem. Salvador Allende, a committed Marxist, won a plurality—about 36 percent—of the presidential vote. Because no candidate received a majority, Chile's Congress would choose between the leading candidates, as its constitution required. Allende was not a guerrilla who had seized the presidential palace. He had reached its doorstep through an election. For Washington, that made Chile not less important, but strategically more complicated.

Why Washington Was Alarmed

President Nixon and those of us responsible for national security feared that Allende intended to move Chile permanently into the Marxist camp. He maintained close relations with Fidel Castro's Cuba and later strengthened Chile's connections with the Soviet Union and other communist states. We worried that if a Marxist government consolidated power through democratic institutions, it might provide a model for leftist movements elsewhere in Latin America and beyond. American corporations also had substantial investments in Chile, particularly in copper and telecommunications, adding economic disputes to an already dangerous strategic confrontation.

Washington Tries to Stop Allende

The United States secretly attempted to prevent Allende from taking office. The CIA pursued what became known as Track I and Track II. One approach sought a political solution through Chilean institutions; another encouraged conditions for a military intervention that could block Allende's inauguration. General René Schneider, commander-in-chief of Chile's army, strongly defended constitutional government. During a kidnapping attempt by Chilean plotters in October 1970, Schneider was shot and later died. The CIA had contacts with coup plotters and had provided weapons to one group, though the weapons used in the fatal Schneider operation came from another group. The episode remains one of the darkest chapters of American involvement in Chile.

Allende Begins His Experiment

Allende nevertheless became president in November 1970 and began what he called Chile's peaceful road to socialism. His government expanded nationalization, accelerated land redistribution, increased wages, and brought major industries under state control. Congress unanimously approved the constitutional amendment nationalizing the country's great copper mines in 1971, but disputes over compensation intensified conflict with American companies and Washington. At first, increased wages and government spending helped stimulate consumption. Soon, however, inflation accelerated, shortages worsened, investment declined, and economic instability deepened.

Castro Comes to Chile

In November 1971, Fidel Castro arrived in Chile and remained for more than three weeks. His lengthy visit was symbolically important. To Allende's supporters, Castro was a revolutionary hero visiting a government attempting to reach socialism without following Cuba's armed path. To Chile's conservatives and many in Washington, the spectacle reinforced fears that Chile was moving deeper into the revolutionary camp. Yet there was an important difference: Allende still operated within a constitutional system containing an opposition-controlled Congress, independent political parties, courts, newspapers, and armed forces that had not yet abandoned their constitutional role.

The Country Begins to Break Apart

By 1972 and 1973, Chilean politics had become extraordinarily polarized. Strikes disrupted transportation and commerce. Business owners resisted government policies. Left-wing groups pushed Allende to move faster, while right-wing organizations demanded his removal. The United States covertly funded opposition political parties and media and sought to exert economic pressure, but Washington did not create Chile's entire crisis. Domestic political conflict, government economic policies, opposition resistance, falling confidence, shortages, and escalating street violence all contributed. By 1973, annual inflation had reached several hundred percent.

The Constitutional Crisis

The struggle spread into Chile's institutions. Allende's opponents accused his government of violating constitutional limits, while Allende and his supporters accused their opponents of deliberately making the country ungovernable. In June 1973, an attempted military uprising known as the Tanquetazo failed, but it demonstrated how unstable the situation had become. On August 22, the Chamber of Deputies passed a resolution accusing the government of serious constitutional violations and calling upon ministers who were members of the armed forces to help restore constitutional order. Chile was approaching a point from which compromise became increasingly difficult.

The General Who Seemed Loyal

One figure initially appeared unlikely to overthrow Allende: General Augusto Pinochet. Allende appointed him commander-in-chief of the army on August 23, 1973, believing him to be a professional soldier. Less than three weeks later, Pinochet joined the commanders preparing to overthrow the government. On the morning of September 11, Chile's military moved against Allende. Naval forces seized Valparaíso, soldiers occupied Santiago, and aircraft attacked the presidential palace, La Moneda.

A Crisis Becomes a Coup

Allende refused demands that he surrender and leave the country. Later that day, as troops entered La Moneda, he died by suicide. The military seized power, and Pinochet eventually emerged as Chile's dictator. The United States had spent years working to weaken Allende and encouraging alternatives to his government, although historical investigations have not established that Washington directly organized or controlled the September 11 coup itself. That distinction matters—but it does not erase American intervention.

The Lesson of Chile

We feared that Allende's Chile might demonstrate how Marxism could gain power democratically and reshape a country from within. Chile's own political failures and polarization were real, as were our Cold War concerns. But what followed the coup—dictatorship, executions, torture, disappearances, and years without democratic government—forces a harder judgment. Great powers often convince themselves that preventing one danger justifies accepting another. Chile reminds us that once constitutional politics collapses, those who believe they can control what comes afterward may discover that history has escaped their control.

The Chilean Coup and the Rise of Augusto Pinochet - Told by Augusto Pinochet

1973 - By September 1973, I saw Chile as a nation approaching collapse. President Salvador Allende's socialist experiment had produced bitter confrontation between left and right amid shortages, strikes, political violence, institutional conflict, and inflation running at several hundred percent annually. Allende remained Chile's constitutional president, but his opponents accused his government of exceeding constitutional authority, while his supporters accused conservatives, businesses, and foreign powers of deliberately sabotaging him. Each side increasingly feared that the other intended to destroy Chilean democracy.

I Become Commander of the Army

Only weeks before the coup, I was not yet the most important military figure in the crisis. General Carlos Prats, commander-in-chief of the army and a defender of military constitutionalism, resigned amid growing political pressure. On August 23, Allende appointed me to replace him. He apparently believed I would remain loyal to the constitutional government. Yet senior officers in the navy, air force, police, and army were already moving toward intervention. By early September, I joined the conspiracy that would end Allende's presidency.

September 11 Begins

Before dawn on September 11, 1973, the operation began. The Chilean navy seized control of the port city of Valparaíso. Military units moved throughout the country, radio stations were occupied or silenced, and troops surrounded strategic locations. The armed forces demanded Allende's resignation. He refused. He went to La Moneda, the presidential palace, carrying an AK-47 given to him by Fidel Castro. From there he delivered a final radio address, telling Chileans that he would not surrender his office.

The Attack on La Moneda

Tanks opened fire around the palace, and shortly before noon Chilean Air Force Hawker Hunter jets attacked La Moneda with rockets. Smoke and flames poured from the building. The image would become one of the defining scenes of the Latin American Cold War. Allende permitted many people inside to leave, but he remained behind with a smaller group of defenders. When soldiers finally entered the palace, they found the president dead. Later investigations concluded that Allende had committed suicide with his rifle.

The Military Takes Chile

The coup succeeded quickly, but the struggle over Chile's future had only begun. I joined Admiral José Toribio Merino, Air Force General Gustavo Leigh, and General César Mendoza of the Carabineros in a four-man military junta. Congress was dissolved, political activity was severely restricted, Marxist parties were banned, and constitutional government effectively ended. Although the junta was initially presented as collective leadership, I steadily accumulated authority. By 1974, I had assumed the title of President of the Republic.

The Stadiums Fill

We announced that Chile had been saved from Marxism and that the armed forces were restoring national order. What followed was severe repression. Thousands of suspected leftists, activists, union members, students, and political opponents were detained. Santiago's National Stadium became a detention center. Prisoners were interrogated and tortured; some were executed or disappeared. The Caravan of Death, a military mission traveling through Chile shortly after the coup, carried out executions of political prisoners. These were not rumors invented decades later. Chilean investigations would document extensive human-rights violations committed by the state.

Where Did the United States Stand?

The United States had spent years opposing Allende. The Nixon administration and CIA financed opposition groups and media, sought to weaken his government, and earlier explored ways of preventing him from taking office. American officials knew that Chilean officers were considering a coup in 1973. Yet available evidence does not establish that the CIA planned or directed the military operation of September 11 itself. Washington nevertheless recognized and developed relations with the new military government. In the logic of the Cold War, an anti-communist Chile was considered preferable to an Allende government moving toward socialism.

From General to Dictator

I believed that Chile required more than a temporary change of government. The political system, economy, and institutions would be remade. My government introduced increasingly market-oriented economic reforms while constructing an authoritarian state designed to prevent Marxist movements from returning to power. Supporters would later credit portions of these economic changes with contributing to Chile's development. But political stability was maintained through censorship, imprisonment, exile, surveillance, torture, and fear.

Operation Condor and the Dirty Wars - Told by Augusto Pinochet

1975–1980s - By 1975, I believed Chile was fighting an enemy that recognized no national frontier. Marxist organizations communicated across borders, revolutionaries found refuge abroad, and Cuba continued encouraging revolutionary movements throughout Latin America. If our opponents could cooperate internationally, I reasoned, then the governments fighting them must do the same. Chile was not alone. Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Bolivia, Brazil, and other governments shared fears of communist revolution. From that reasoning emerged one of the Cold War's most notorious security networks: Operation Condor.

Operation Condor Is Born

In November 1975, intelligence representatives from several South American governments met in Santiago, Chile. Manuel Contreras, head of my secret police organization, the Dirección de Inteligencia Nacional, or DINA, played a central role in organizing the system. Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Bolivia, and later other governments cooperated in varying ways. Intelligence services exchanged information about suspected revolutionaries and political opponents. But Condor went far beyond sharing files. Agents helped locate, kidnap, interrogate, and in some cases kill opponents who had escaped across national borders.

Argentina Descends Into the Dirty War

Argentina became another major battlefield after the military seized power in March 1976. The country had already experienced severe political violence involving left-wing guerrillas, right-wing paramilitary organizations, and government forces. The new junta promised to destroy "subversion." What followed became known as the Dirty War. People suspected of involvement with the revolutionary left were abducted and taken to secret detention centers. Many were tortured. Thousands disappeared. Some prisoners were murdered without trial, including victims thrown alive from aircraft into the Atlantic in what became known as "death flights."

Chile's Secret Prisons

My own government had already developed an extensive system for crushing opposition. DINA operated detention and interrogation centers where prisoners were tortured, and some disappeared permanently. The regime did face armed revolutionary opponents, including the Movement of the Revolutionary Left, known as MIR. But repression was not limited to people carrying weapons. Political activists and other perceived opponents were also targeted. Chile's later official investigations documented thousands of deaths and disappearances and tens of thousands of cases of political imprisonment and torture during military rule.

Assassination Reaches Washington

Operation Condor demonstrated just how far this campaign could reach. Orlando Letelier, who had served as a minister and ambassador under Salvador Allende, became one of my government's most prominent opponents abroad. On September 21, 1976, a bomb exploded beneath his automobile as he drove through Washington, D.C. Letelier and his American colleague Ronni Moffitt were killed. Investigations established the involvement of DINA personnel and associates in the assassination. An operation supposedly designed to protect Chile from foreign-supported subversion had carried political murder into the capital of the United States.

Washington Knows of Condor

The United States faced an uncomfortable contradiction. American officials wanted Latin American governments to resist communist movements and had relationships with many anti-communist military regimes. Yet U.S. intelligence and diplomatic officials increasingly learned about Condor and the abuses committed by participating governments. The Carter administration, beginning in 1977, placed greater emphasis on human rights and pressured governments such as mine over repression. Cold War alliances were becoming harder to defend when the methods of America's anti-communist partners were exposed to the world.

The Missing

The word desaparecido—"the disappeared"—became one of the darkest additions to Latin America's political vocabulary. Families sometimes did not know whether relatives were imprisoned, murdered, or still alive. In Argentina, the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo began publicly demanding information about their missing children. Similar families throughout the region searched for answers. Governments could conceal prisoners, but they could not permanently erase the questions left behind by thousands of empty chairs at family tables.

Condor Begins to Unravel

By the late 1970s and early 1980s, Operation Condor's most aggressive phase weakened as international scrutiny increased and political conditions changed. Argentina's military dictatorship collapsed after the Falklands/Malvinas War in 1982, and democratic government returned there in 1983. Uruguay and Brazil also moved toward civilian rule. Documents discovered decades later—particularly Paraguay's "Archives of Terror"—would help historians reconstruct how extensively South American security services had cooperated.

Nicaragua: The Sandinistas Overthrow Somoza - Told by Che Guevara

1979 - I had been dead for nearly twelve years when revolutionaries marched triumphantly into Managua in July 1979. Yet Nicaragua became something close to the Latin American uprising I had imagined. The Sandinista National Liberation Front, or FSLN, had fought for years against the Somoza dynasty, survived imprisonment and military defeat, and finally helped bring down a government supported for decades by the United States. But Nicaragua's revolution would also demonstrate that overthrowing a ruler is easier than deciding what should replace him.

The Somoza Dynasty

Nicaragua had been dominated by the Somoza family since the 1930s. Anastasio Somoza García established the dynasty, and eventually his sons Luis and Anastasio Somoza Debayle continued it. The family accumulated enormous wealth while the National Guard protected the regime and suppressed opponents. The United States maintained a close relationship with the Somozas for much of this period because they were strongly anti-communist and generally supportive of American interests. To revolutionaries, Nicaragua became another example of a Latin American dictatorship protected partly because it stood on Washington's side of the Cold War.

The Sandinistas Take Their Name

The revolutionaries chose a name with deep roots in Nicaragua. Augusto César Sandino had fought against the U.S. military presence in Nicaragua during the 1920s and 1930s before being murdered in 1934 by National Guard officers acting under Somoza García's authority. In 1961, Carlos Fonseca, Tomás Borge, Silvio Mayorga, and other revolutionaries helped create the FSLN. They combined Marxist ideas with Sandino's nationalism and opposition to foreign domination. Cuba's revolution strongly influenced them, and Cuba later provided assistance to the Sandinista movement.

Years of Failure and Survival

The Sandinistas did not simply march from one victory to another. During the 1960s and early 1970s, their guerrillas repeatedly suffered defeats. Some were killed; others disappeared into prison or exile. Carlos Fonseca himself was killed in 1976. The movement also divided over strategy. Some wanted prolonged rural guerrilla warfare, while others believed revolution required alliances with students, workers, business leaders, clergy, and political opponents of Somoza. That broader approach would become crucial. Nicaragua was not going to be won by a handful of guerrillas acting alone.

An Earthquake Shakes the Regime

Then disaster exposed the government's weaknesses. A devastating earthquake struck Managua in December 1972, killing thousands and leaving much of the capital destroyed. International relief poured into Nicaragua, but widespread accusations of corruption and misuse of aid damaged Somoza's government further. Business leaders, church figures, students, and ordinary citizens increasingly turned against the dictatorship. Opposition to Somoza was becoming much broader than Marxist revolutionaries alone.

A Murder Changes Everything

On January 10, 1978, Pedro Joaquín Chamorro, editor of the opposition newspaper La Prensa and one of Somoza's most prominent critics, was assassinated. Although Somoza denied ordering the killing, many Nicaraguans blamed his regime or people connected to it. Protests and strikes erupted. Business owners who had little interest in Marxist revolution joined the opposition. The Sandinistas suddenly found themselves fighting alongside a much larger national movement determined to remove Somoza.

The Country Erupts

During 1978 and 1979, uprisings spread through Nicaragua. Sandinista fighters battled the National Guard in cities including León, Estelí, and Masaya. The Guard responded with heavy firepower, and civilians suffered terribly. President Jimmy Carter's administration increasingly criticized Somoza's human-rights record and eventually distanced the United States from his regime. Meanwhile, Cuba and other foreign supporters assisted the Sandinistas. Nicaragua's civil conflict had become entangled with the wider Cold War.

Somoza Runs

By July 1979, Somoza's position had become impossible. His international support was collapsing, his domestic opponents were multiplying, and Sandinista forces were advancing. On July 17, he resigned and fled Nicaragua. Two days later, Sandinista forces entered Managua. Crowds celebrated in the streets. After years of dictatorship, rebellion, imprisonment, and war, the Somoza dynasty was finished.

Victory Creates Another Struggle

The Sandinistas initially governed alongside non-Sandinista members of a broad revolutionary coalition, but the FSLN increasingly dominated the new political order. The government expanded literacy, health, and land-reform programs while nationalizing important economic interests. It also developed close relations with Cuba and the Soviet bloc, restricted some opposition activity, and faced accusations of political repression. Washington's fear of another communist-aligned government soon contributed to American support for the Contra rebellion, turning Nicaragua into a major proxy battlefield of the 1980s.

The Revolution's Hardest Question

Had I lived to see Managua in July 1979, I would have celebrated Somoza's defeat as proof that revolution in Latin America had not died with me in Bolivia. Yet Nicaragua also revealed something revolutionaries too easily forget. Many different people can unite against a dictator without agreeing about what freedom should look like afterward. Removing oppression does not automatically create liberty. The true test of a revolution begins the morning after victory, when those who fought in the name of the people must decide whether they will also allow the people to disagree with them.

Nicaragua, the Contras, and the Proxy War - Told by Henry Kissinger

1979–1990 - I had left government two years before the Sandinistas entered Managua in July 1979, so the decisions that followed belonged to Presidents Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan, not to me. Yet the strategic problem was familiar. The Somoza dictatorship had collapsed, and the Sandinista National Liberation Front emerged as Nicaragua's dominant political force. Washington now faced an uncomfortable question: had Nicaragua merely overthrown a dictator, or was another government aligned with Cuba and the Soviet Union taking shape in the Western Hemisphere?

The Sandinistas Build a New Nicaragua

The Sandinistas inherited a devastated country and initially governed with members of the broader anti-Somoza coalition. They launched ambitious literacy and health campaigns, pursued land reform, nationalized portions of the economy, and promised political change. But the FSLN increasingly concentrated political and military power, developed close relations with Cuba and the Soviet bloc, restricted some opposition activity and media, and supported revolutionary movements elsewhere in Central America. To American strategists, Nicaragua appeared to be becoming an important Cold War ally of Cuba.

The Contras Take Up Arms

Opposition to the Sandinistas became armed. Former members of Somoza's National Guard joined with other anti-Sandinista fighters, including peasants and political opponents dissatisfied with the revolutionary government. These forces became collectively known as the Contras, from contrarrevolucionarios—counterrevolutionaries. When Ronald Reagan became president in 1981, his administration viewed the Sandinistas as part of a larger Soviet-Cuban challenge. The CIA began supporting, training, equipping, and financing Contra forces. Nicaragua was becoming a textbook proxy war: Nicaraguans would do most of the fighting, while larger powers supplied money, weapons, intelligence, and political backing.

A Brutal War in the Countryside

The war was not fought neatly between armies. Contra forces attacked military positions, infrastructure, government facilities, and rural targets. They were also responsible for serious abuses against civilians, including killings, kidnappings, and torture. Sandinista forces committed abuses of their own, including forced relocations and mistreatment of suspected opponents, particularly among some Indigenous communities along Nicaragua's Caribbean coast. Farmers and villagers often found themselves trapped between two armed sides demanding loyalty. As happens so often in proxy wars, the strategic objectives belonged partly to governments, but much of the suffering belonged to ordinary people.

Washington's Secret War

American involvement became increasingly controversial. In 1984, Nicaragua's harbors were mined in an operation involving the CIA and Contra forces, provoking international condemnation. Nicaragua brought a case against the United States before the International Court of Justice. In 1986, the court ruled that the United States had violated international law through certain actions supporting the Contras and mining Nicaragua's harbors. Washington rejected the court's jurisdiction over aspects of the case and did not comply with the judgment. The struggle was no longer simply about Nicaragua; it had become a debate over how far the United States should go to contain communism.

Congress Tries to Stop the Contras

Many members of the U.S. Congress believed the Reagan administration had gone too far. Beginning in 1982, Congress adopted a series of restrictions known as the Boland Amendments, limiting American assistance intended to support Contra efforts against the Nicaraguan government. The administration continued searching for ways to sustain the Contras. That effort eventually produced one of the greatest political scandals of the 1980s.

The Iran-Contra Affair

Officials within the Reagan administration secretly facilitated arms sales to Iran, despite the extraordinary political sensitivity of dealing with Tehran, and some proceeds were diverted to support the Contras. When the operation became public in 1986, Washington erupted. Congressional hearings exposed secret diplomacy, destroyed documents, disputed presidential knowledge, and an attempt by officials to pursue foreign-policy objectives despite congressional restrictions. Several officials were convicted of offenses, though some convictions were later overturned or vacated and others received presidential pardons. Containment had collided with constitutional government at home.

Peace Begins to Replace War

By the late 1980s, the international environment was changing. Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev was reducing Cold War confrontation, and Central American governments sought negotiated solutions. Costa Rican President Óscar Arias played a major role in regional peace efforts and received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1987. Nicaragua agreed to political reforms and elections while negotiations sought to demobilize the Contras. The battlefield was slowly giving way to ballots.

1990: The Voters Decide

In February 1990, Nicaragua held internationally monitored elections. Sandinista leader Daniel Ortega expected to win, but voters instead chose opposition candidate Violeta Barrios de Chamorro, whose husband Pedro Joaquín Chamorro had been assassinated during the Somoza era. The FSLN accepted the electoral result and transferred presidential power. After a decade of revolution, foreign intervention, economic hardship, and war, Nicaragua experienced a peaceful change of government.

My Name is Óscar Romero: Archbishop of San Salvador

I was born Óscar Arnulfo Romero in Ciudad Barrios, El Salvador, in 1917. My family was modest, and as a boy I learned that ordinary life was built through work, family, faith, and sacrifice. I entered the seminary while still young and eventually continued my studies in Rome. In 1942, I was ordained a Catholic priest. I did not imagine myself becoming a political figure. I wanted to serve God, preach the Gospel, administer the sacraments, and care for the people entrusted to me.

A Priest in a Troubled Country

When I returned to El Salvador, I found a nation of striking contrasts. A relatively small number of families controlled much of the country's wealth and agricultural land, while many rural laborers lived in poverty. Political power was frequently dominated by military governments, and opposition could bring intimidation or violence. I was cautious. I feared that priests could become too involved in political ideologies and lose sight of their spiritual mission. I believed the Church should speak clearly about morality without becoming the servant of either revolution or government.

Becoming Archbishop

In February 1977, I became Archbishop of San Salvador. Some government officials and wealthy Salvadorans considered me a safe choice because I was regarded as conservative and restrained. Yet the country around me was becoming increasingly violent. Elections were disputed, demonstrations were attacked, guerrilla organizations were expanding, and security forces and armed groups were killing their opponents. I did not seek this confrontation. It came to my door.

The Murder of Father Rutilio Grande

Only weeks after I became archbishop, my friend Father Rutilio Grande was assassinated along with two Salvadorans traveling with him. Grande had worked among poor rural communities and had spoken against injustice. His death affected me profoundly. I saw that remaining quiet while innocent people were murdered could itself become a moral choice. I began speaking more forcefully, not because I had abandoned my faith for politics, but because I believed my faith required me to defend human dignity.

A Voice for Those Without One

My Sunday homilies were broadcast by radio throughout El Salvador. I spoke about Scripture, but I also named people who had disappeared, described killings, condemned torture, and demanded that prisoners be treated justly. Poor families listened because many believed that few powerful institutions would speak for them. I condemned abuses by government security forces and right-wing organizations, but I also rejected violence and hatred from revolutionary movements. Christianity, as I understood it, could not justify murder simply because the murderer claimed to serve a righteous cause.

Caught Inside the Cold War

By the late 1970s, El Salvador was being drawn into the wider Cold War. Marxist guerrilla organizations believed armed revolution could overthrow the existing system, while military officers and right-wing groups warned that El Salvador could become another Cuba or Nicaragua. The United States feared communist expansion in Central America and supported the Salvadoran government, while revolutionary movements looked toward Cuba and other leftist allies. But from where I stood, these grand struggles often looked different. I saw mothers searching for missing sons, farmers frightened by armed men, and families burying the dead.

My Appeal to the Soldiers

As the violence worsened, I spoke directly to Salvadoran soldiers. On March 23, 1980, I pleaded with them not to obey orders that violated God's law and urged an end to repression. These were dangerous words in a country approaching civil war. I knew there were people who wanted me silenced, yet I believed a shepherd could not abandon his people because speaking had become dangerous. If they killed me, I hoped that my voice would continue through the Salvadoran people.

The Bullet at the Altar

On March 24, 1980, I celebrated Mass in the chapel of the Hospital of Divine Providence in San Salvador. As I stood near the altar, an assassin shot me. I fell mortally wounded and died at the age of sixty-two. Investigations later linked my assassination to a right-wing death-squad network associated with Roberto D'Aubuisson. My death became one of the defining moments preceding El Salvador's long civil war, which would take tens of thousands of lives.

El Salvador: Revolution, Death Squads, and Civilians Caught - Told by Romero

1979–1992 - I did not live to see the end of El Salvador's civil war. An assassin's bullet took my life in March 1980, just as our country was descending into its darkest years. But I had already seen the fear in our villages. Political killings, disappearances, guerrilla attacks, government repression, and death squads were tearing El Salvador apart. Powerful men spoke of communism and revolution. Ordinary Salvadorans spoke of sons who had vanished and fathers who had not returned home.

Why El Salvador Was Exploding

Our conflict did not suddenly appear because Washington and Moscow commanded it. El Salvador had profound problems of its own. Land and wealth were concentrated among a relatively small elite, many rural laborers lived in poverty, political participation had repeatedly been restricted, and elections were often surrounded by accusations of fraud and repression. Left-wing organizations concluded that peaceful reform had failed and increasingly embraced armed revolution. Conservatives and military officers feared that these movements would transform El Salvador into another Cuba or, after 1979, another Nicaragua.

1979: The Government Falls

On October 15, 1979, reform-minded military officers overthrew President Carlos Humberto Romero, who was not related to me. A Revolutionary Government Junta promised land reform, economic changes, and greater political freedom. There was hope that reform might prevent civil war. Instead, violence accelerated. Radical leftist groups believed the reforms were insufficient, while powerful right-wing interests resisted changes. Security forces and death squads continued killing suspected opponents. Moderates found themselves trapped between forces increasingly convinced that guns would decide El Salvador's future.

The Guerrillas Unite

In 1980, five major leftist organizations came together as the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front, or FMLN. Its guerrillas sought to overthrow the government and establish a revolutionary political order. They received important assistance from Cuba and Nicaragua and carried out attacks, assassinations, kidnappings, sabotage, and military operations. The government and its supporters presented the FMLN as part of an international communist offensive. But not every poor Salvadoran was a revolutionary, just as not every opponent of communism supported the government's methods.

The Death Squads

On the other side stood security forces and right-wing death squads that hunted suspected leftists, labor organizers, students, clergy, and political activists. Bodies appeared beside roads and in fields. People were taken from their homes and disappeared. One prominent figure associated with the extreme right was Roberto D'Aubuisson, a former intelligence officer whom a United Nations-sponsored truth commission later linked to the ordering of my assassination. Terror was being used deliberately: kill enough opponents, and perhaps everyone else would become too frightened to resist.

My Last Appeal

On March 23, 1980, I spoke directly to soldiers during my Sunday homily. I appealed to them as Christians and as Salvadorans not to obey orders requiring them to kill innocent people. "In the name of God," I pleaded, "stop the repression." The following evening, while celebrating Mass in the chapel of the Hospital of Divine Providence, I was shot through the heart. My death did not stop the violence. It became another sign that El Salvador was crossing into full-scale war.

The Massacre at El Mozote

I did not live to see what happened in December 1981 at El Mozote and surrounding villages. Soldiers from the U.S.-trained Atlácatl Battalion killed hundreds of civilians, including large numbers of women and children. The massacre became one of the most infamous atrocities of the war. For years its scale was disputed or denied, but investigations, survivor testimony, and forensic evidence established the horror. The episode demonstrated what happens when civilians become classified not as human beings to protect, but as possible supporters of an enemy.

The United States Enters the Struggle

The Reagan administration feared an FMLN victory would strengthen Cuba, Nicaragua, and ultimately Soviet influence in Central America. The United States therefore provided billions of dollars in military and economic assistance to the Salvadoran government during the 1980s while pressing at various times for elections and reforms. American advisers trained Salvadoran forces but generally did not fight as conventional combat troops. Washington believed it was containing communism. Critics argued that American assistance helped sustain security forces implicated in terrible abuses.

Neither Side Could Win

The war continued through the 1980s. The FMLN could inflict serious damage but could not overthrow the government. The Salvadoran armed forces could control major cities and launch enormous operations but could not eliminate the guerrillas. Civilians remained between them. Approximately 75,000 people were killed during the conflict, and thousands more disappeared. A United Nations-sponsored truth commission later attributed the overwhelming majority of documented serious abuses to state forces and allied death squads, while also documenting serious crimes committed by the FMLN.

1992: The Guns Finally Fall Silent

The Cold War itself was ending when Salvadorans finally found a path out of theirs. Negotiations mediated by the United Nations produced the Chapultepec Peace Accords, signed on January 16, 1992. The FMLN laid down its weapons and became a political party. Military and security institutions were reformed, and political competition moved increasingly from the battlefield to elections. The agreement did not erase poverty, grief, or injustice, but it demonstrated something the previous decade had denied: enemies could negotiate without exterminating one another.

The People Between the Armies

If I could speak after those twelve years of war, I would ask students not to remember El Salvador merely as another contest between communism and anti-communism. Remember the farmer trying to protect his children, the mother searching for someone who disappeared, the soldier ordered to commit an injustice, and the frightened villager pressured by armed men from either side. Ideologies promise great futures, but human beings live with their consequences. No cause becomes righteous merely because its followers call their enemies evil. Peace begins when we recognize that the life of the person standing across from us possesses the same dignity as our own.