Washington
Unmakes Guatemala, 1954
by
Matthew Ward, COHA Research Fellow
The analysis of the U.S. government in arriving at a policy towards Guatemala has highlighted a number of national, organizational
and personal factors. Predominantly, it was a geopolitical motive that was
the most appropriate means of preventing the spread of Communist ideology
and influence. Supporting this impulse were the intellectual, nationalist
sentiments of U.S. statesmen, who sought to raise America’s prestige and power by creating an international
order that redounded to their nation’s interest and glory and to create a
nationalistic mood among the populace to generate domestic consent for this
process. Finally, the U.S. imperialist drive was given a sharp edge by the
organizational ambitions and aims of a body whose sole purpose was the implementation
of imperialism and defense of the U.S. empire: the CIA.
The Cold War was the twentieth century’s great power
struggle between the United States on one hand and the Soviet Union on the other. Each had created its own sphere of
influence: the Pax Americana and
the Socialist bloc. The imperialism of both these powers was driven by the
global balance-of-power game, but the specifics of this competition were dictated
by the nationalist, separatist and neutralist movements in the nations of
the periphery, such as the one that manifested itself in Guatemala. As hesitant imperialists wary of the costs of imperial
ventures, Western statesmen were content to encourage favorable economic and
political relations with indigenous cliques, who in turn were eager to reap
the benefits of modernization and the security of political affiliation. However,
if the position of these Western-supported indigenous regimes were to become
threatened—by internal or external forces—the dominant state might then be
compelled to employ more direct and forceful means to maintain the status
quo so beneficial to the imperialist state itself. The explanatory power of
this conceptualization is considerable. We can see this dynamic at work throughout
Latin American history and in many of the twentieth century’s major interventions
such as Korea, Vietnam and Czechoslovakia. While in Guatemala the United States was prepared
to condone the fall of Ubico, when it became clear that the revolutionary
government which had replaced him was not a collaborative regime, the United
States was then prepared to use force to restore the status quo, installing
first Castillo Armas and then continuing to support the long list of venal
but cooperative regimes that ruled Guatemala in the wake of his death. This
theory also accounts for the state of dependency in which Guatemala and other Latin American nations found themselves.
Rather than being a function of the deliberate and systematic collaboration
between the U.S. government and private economic interests, the state of dependency
can be viewed as being a structural one, resulting from the maintenance of
outdated and non-progressive regimes whose value to the United States was
their willingness to comply with Washington’s will.
Finally, in highlighting the CIA’s role in generating
a policy of imperialism towards Guatemala, we are granted a clear illustration of Schumpeter’s
conception of the role of anachronistic social structures in pursuing imperialist
policies as a means of reinforcing their domestic position.
[1]
Comprising a blend of wartime intelligence functions
whose purpose was spent, the CIA at its inception was in a position of weakness
in which its very existence was threatened by internal forces. By securing
a policy of regime change in Guatemala and proving itself a useful tool in imperialist
processes, the CIA was thus able to preserve its status and influence. By
recognizing the confluence of peripheral causes—in Communism and neutralism—as
well as endogenous motives—in the balance of power, nationalism and the role
of elitist social structures—the evidence in our study of Guatemala lends
credence to the idea of a pluralistic model based both on peripheral and Western
factors such as the one that Robinson espouses.
[2]
In Guatemala, we find a paradigm of imperialism that is driven
chiefly by balance of power considerations. The creation of a mood of nationalism
and the role of marginal groups and elitist social structures such as UFC
and the CIA in generating such nationalist fervor; and the target of the imperialist
policy dictated by conditions in the periphery. Finally, we see the preferred
means of control to be informal in the establishment of a collaborative indigenous
regime whose maintenance in power perpetuated a form of structural dependency.
In addition to the lack of theoretical development,
the main critique of the power politics paradigm has been its lack of explanatory
power. As Mommsen argues:
The weakness of this theoretical approach is shown clearly
by the fact that power-political and strategic motives generally do not come
into play until the manifold forms of indirect or informal imperialist penetration
have proved to be unavailing
[3]
Clearly, this argument has some validity. The means
and methods of post-war U.S. imperialism have varied greatly and not always resulted
in direct imperialist incursions. Indeed, even in Guatemala, where the imperialist response was forceful and
direct, the means of control following the intervention were indirect: the
installation and maintenance of a collaborative indigenous regime. However,
this critique seems to mistake the means for the ends. If the ultimate aim
of U.S. imperialist policy was to create a favorable balance
of power situation, it matters little how this was accomplished. Indeed, there
is considerable evidence to suggest that in these terms informal imperialism
is the more profitable means of long-term control. As Robinson and Gallagher
argued, formal imperialism is only deemed necessary if indirect means fail.
[4]
This is recognition of the costs of direct imperialism
on the part of ruling elites. Informal imperialism is both more efficient
and less costly, therefore, it is the preferred method.
Political imperialism need not necessarily be destructive
in nature in practice the U.S. variant implemented in the Third World has
fairly consistently been negative in nature, intent on dismantling regimes
that challenge the U.S. system, rather than constructing or supporting political
systems which are beneficial to members of the affected polity. While overt
statements of intent have often espoused “nation-building,” “institution-building”
and “democratization,” U.S. policy in practice has rarely evidenced any real
commitment to following through on these lofty promises.
Nowhere is this clearer than in Guatemala, where a constructive democratic regime for a short
period of time worked to improve the economic, social and political lives
of its citizens. However, the nature of this administration was antithetical
to U.S. imperial designs, and it was replaced with a regressive
reactionary regime, which proceeded to dismantle the foundations laid by its
predecessor. While the United States gave its support for this regime with
presumably honorable intention of ensuring that the new regime continue to
register respect for human rights, democracy and fundamental freedoms, and
contributed large amounts of financial assistance towards realizing this goal,
ultimately this did not transpire. Some have credited this to a lack of leverage
resulting from the subject state’s awareness that the United States would now be obliged to support it; “State Department
officials were unable to bargain with the junta on a quid pro quo basis because they knew—and
the Guatemalans knew—the United States would never allow Castillo Armas to fail.”
[5]
While this may indeed have posed a dilemma to U.S. officials at the time, it cannot explain the prevailing
U.S. attitude towards Guatemala over the following 40 years. Following Castillo
Armas’ assassination in 1957—after three years of corruption, repression and
regression—the United States continued to support a number of unsavory right-wing
dictatorships in Guatemala that evinced a total lack of respect for democracy,
fundamental freedoms, human rights or justice. A more fundamental basis for
understanding the failure of U.S. imperialism to deliver on its promises of freedom
and development in the Third
World is a dwindling
reserve of political capital being invested in peripheral nations whose cooperation
has been secured.