Unusually Cruel
Punishment
Some of
the bloodiest years in Latin American history were seen after the many coups
orchestrated by the United States in Latin America. Left in charge were
ruthless military leaders chosen by the US to protect the “free world”. These
military leaders that were in charge did anything their power to keep any
rebellions suppressed and often took drastic measures to accomplish this.
Backed with support and training by the United States the death tolls
drastically increased.
The
Latin American Armies were taught in the United States, and their training is
summed up as Counterinsurgency. This types of training was used to defend
against guerilla warfare. Latin American soldiers were taught many techniques that
were successful at keeping guerilla units from forming, but were also very
cruel as well. Some of the tactics that were used were secret kidnappings,
torture, and murder. The results were disastrous when the military decided who
seemed like someone who held Marxist beliefs, or were aiding guerillas armies.
Many innocent people lost their lives due to the Latin American armies killing
anybody that got in their way of protecting the “Western civilization”. According
to John Charles Chasteen in his book titled, Born in Blood and Fire, the goals of the Armies that were in the
control of the countries was to “eliminate the revolutionary threat, hold down
wages, and encourage foreign investment”. All of these goals cause negative results
for the people who were in the lower class due most of the money going to
people of higher status and to foreign countries.
Even though
it was publicly known that the government was killing of countless amounts of
people, nobody stepped in to help. The reason for this is that the military was
so ruthless that it killed off anybody that decided to stand up about and speak
against it, so many people just decided to turn their head to these injustices.
One group of people that was able to stand up to the government was the mothers
of the missing people. The mothers would protest in the main square of downtown
Buenos Aires, and since the Argentine military respected motherhood they could
not quiet them. These protest brought attention to the missing people from the
whole world. Another way that people learned about the atrocities done by the military
is through Rigoberta Menchu’s book titled, I,
Rigoberta Minchu. The book provided firsthand accounts of the killings that
the military were responsible for.
Decisions
that were made by governments run by militaries showed that they don’t always have
the best interest of the people. For example, the Brazilian military let new
industries make money at the expense of the poor majority, and borrowed a lot of
money in form of petrodollars. When the interest on the loans Brazil took out
rose dramatically the country was left in with world’s largest foreign debt.
Another example is seen when Nicaragua’s military senselessy killed innocent
people. When the army killed people in the village of Mozote thinking it was a
guerrilla war base, they killed almost everybody there. The sad part was that
the people in the village were converted into US-oriented evangelical
Protestantism and had no interest in the guerillas.(http://www.markdanner.com/articles/the-truth-of-el-mozote)
John
Charles Chasteen in his book titled, Born
in Blood and Fire, wrote “Bureaucratic authoritarian governments collapsed
in the late 1970s and 1980s because of their own mistakes and excesses-the creation
of colossal debts and hyperinflation.” In other words he is saying that the
downfall of militaries being in charge of running countries came by their own
hand.
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