Guatemala as Cold War History

Bibliographic Data

ID4286768
AuthorsRichard H Immerman (corresponding author)
Year1980
Volume95
Issue4
Pages629-653
Publication date1980-12-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenuePolitical Science Quarterly (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0032-3195 • E-ISSN: 1538-165X
PublisherOxford University Press (OUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.2307/2150608
OpenAlexW2321197140
LanguageEN
Citations received7

With the increasing accumulation of interpretive scholarship on international relations following World War II, most episodes in the cold war have been written and rewritten, evaluated and reevaluated. One striking exception, however, is the 1954 American intervention in Guatemala, which led to the overthrow of Jacabo Arbenz Guzman's constitutionally elected government. This article studies the antecedents, events, and consequences of that coup. Analyses of hitherto unavailable archival data and of interviews with American participants in the coup who were privy to the covert aspects of the operation suggest that this event was a significant link in the unfolding chain of cold war history. Writings to date on the overthrow of Arbenz tend to be short on detailed documentation and analysis and to treat the coup illustratively. These accounts depict the United States intervention in Guatemala either as a background incident in the escalating cold war, as an example of the inordinate influence of economic interests (in this case the United Fruit Company [UFCOI) on American foreign policy, or as a way station in the evolution of the Central Intelligence Agency. These treatments fail to emphasize sufficiently that the coup typified the foundations of cold war diplomacy, providing a model to be emulated, and resisted, in subsequent years.'

Cold war · Economic history · Political science · Politics · History · Law · Political and Social Dynamics in Chile and Latin America

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