Book Description

In 1954 the United States government actively intervened in Guatemala toppling a democratically elected government. Thus these documents from the State Department show how U.S. foreign policy toward Guatemala took form in the period leading up to the 1954 coup that overthrew president Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán and they show how that policy shifted after that year toward reshaping the Guatemalan government's domestic policies in a way that coincided with U.S. commercial interests. Some scholars have argued that the 1954 coup directly resulted in the deadly Guatemalan civil war of the 1970s and 1980s. The diplomatic cables, memoranda, and correspondence from the United States State Department provide insight on how these events were shaped in the context of the Cold War.