Cold War in Latin America

Between the mid-1940s and the end of the 1980s, the United States and Soviet Union are locked in political conflict. It is the Cold War. But the war is not limited to these two main players. Other countries get drawn in as the Soviet Union tries to spread its communist influence and the United States tries to contain it. In the late 1950s, the United States becomes particularly concerned with keeping communism out of Latin America.

The United States starts trying to get rid of leaders in the region with communist leanings, and to prop up leaders they approve of. Leaders receiving US backing soon feel untouchable, above the laws of their own lands. Many grow rich by stealing land from their people and misusing foreign aid, while ordinary citizens suffer in poverty. Over time, this leads to unrest among citizens and sometimes to revolution. One country where this chain of events plays out is Guatemala.

In the 1950s, the United States helps a group of military rebels overthrow Guatemala’s communist president, Jacobo Arbenz. The new military rulers abuse their power, causing a devastating 36-year civil war. In Nicaragua, meanwhile, the United States helps Anastasio Somoza Garcia defeat a leftist-leaning rebel, Augusto Sandino. In 1950, Somoza becomes the official leader of Nicaragua. Through bribery and corruption, he grows his own wealth at the expense of his people.

In response, leftist rebels organise and go to war against the Somoza regime. The rebels name themselves Sandinistas after Augusto Sandino. After much violence, the Sandinistas gain control of the government in 1979. They remain in charge until the end of the Cold War, when US-backed rebels take power. Across the Caribbean Sea in Cuba, in the 1950s, Fidel Castro leads a group of revolutionaries to topple US-backed military dictator, Fulgencio Batista.

Castro promises freedom for the Cuban people. The revolution is successful, and Castro takes power. His promise of freedom, however, becomes more complicated when he allies himself with the communist Soviet Union. The United States is determined not to have a communist regime so close to their territory. They back a failed attempt to overthrow Castro in an area of Cuba called the Bay of Pigs.

Tensions build further when Soviet missiles are found in Cuba and the United States blockades the island. Tensions between Cuba and the United States cool with the end of the Cold War, but they are not resolved entirely. In Chile, the US policy of containment relies less on violence than money. In the late 1950s, the US government secretly sends millions of dollars to support the presidential campaign of conservative politician Jorge Alessandri. Once elected, he brings in trade policies that benefit America but devastate Chilean businesses.

He is seen by many as no more than a puppet of the American government; Chileans grow to despise him. So, when a communist sympathizer, Salvador Allende, runs for president in the 1960s, he gains widespread support. But the United States spends millions on propaganda to keep him from winning. A few years later, Allende returns and wins the presidency, but the US is ready with a plan to overthrow him. They back a military coup, led by the head of the Chilean armed forces, Augusto Pinochet.

Pinochet seizes power in 1973 and rules Chile until 1990. Under his dictatorship, tens of thousands of Chileans are imprisoned, abducted, or executed. The United States’ policy of containment meets with varying success in different countries across Latin America. But in every case, its interventions bring political, economic, and social upheaval that lasts well beyond the end of the Cold War.