The U.S. government & its history of political violence

Political violence has no place in our democracy.

In our collective delusions, we repeat this mantra to sleep peacefully at night. We affirm that America is inherently good. That it has no systemic barriers to democracy because democracy was the very concept of our founding. And we’ve carried democracy out so well until now.

 Now, we like to say that “we’re more divided than ever” and shake our fists at Congress. We sigh and ask, “how did we get here?” when another act of political violence occurs (but only when someone famous stares down the barrel of a gun, not a student). It’s times like these that we use this phrase to obsess over what America is and isn’t. Even when the answer is right in our face, we scramble to look elsewhere. 

I’m here to tell you to remove your rose colored glasses and spare the world this tripe. Political violence is what we are. This is all that we do– globally and in our own backyard. And it is only when we recognize itwe can even attempt to change. 

Historically, the United States has invaded sovereign nations and disrupted democratic elections for the purpose of regime change. Most often, the United States ousted leaders who prioritized the well-being of their own people rather than lining the pockets of American corporations. 

In 1953, Central American nations were dubbed “banana republics” due to the dominance of the United States over their economy, society, and government. How was this control achieved? Through the United Fruit Company, a multinational American corporation. Nicaragua was ruled by the corrupt General Anastasio Somoza Garcia, who came to power after America urged the assassination of nationalist leader Augusto Cesar Sandino in order to “restore order.” El Salvador was ruled by rich coffee growers, while the majority of its people- peasants- lived in feudal conditions on United Fruit Company plantations. Next door, underdeveloped Honduras also had a government subservient to United Fruit.

In contrast, there was Guatemala, which had undergone a reformist “revolution” after overthrowing the Ubico dictatorship in the 40s. By the 1950s, Guatemala was led by former colonel Jacobo Arbenz, who pushed forth numerous policies that caught the attention of Washington. The most egregious of all was a land reform decree which ended the “oligarchic latifundia system” and nationalized the unused land owned by the United Fruit Company. 

I want to pause here and take a moment to explain what this means. Nationalizing a corporation refers to taking over “privately owned corporations, industries, and resources” with or without compensation. The reason why this is done is most often to prevent corruption and exploitation of workers, hence why this action ended the former oligarchy. What United Fruit was doing in Guatemala, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Panama, Cuba, Colombia, Jamaica, and elsewherewas maintaining the exploitation we tend to associate with early colonization. Most of these countries were ruled by an elite class of Europeans (or their descendants), while those indigenous to the land labored on plantations in conditions akin to slavery. Prior to nationalizing, the bulk of the work being done by poor Guatemalans ended up solely serving America. By nationalizing, Arbenz created a system where the labor of Guatemalans could benefit Guatemala. How do you think America reacted? Was Washington happy to see a government taking steps to award liberty and justice for all?

By March of 1953, the CIA was involved in the United Fruit Company’s plan to overthrow the new Guatemalan government. To justify this, Americans working for United Fruit (Spruille Braden, President Truman’s former Latin emissary, to name one) began to scream from the rooftops that there was an issue of “communists in Guatemala.” This, of course, was completely unfounded because Arbenz was not a communist. Nonetheless, “communist” was often a buzzword used for any person/government that dared to even slightly threaten American interests, so the CIA’s plan plowed onwards with the help of the neighboring dictators they installed. By April, Eisenhower could openly lie that “the Reds” were in control of Guatemala. 

The Arbenz government was placed in a difficult predicament. Earlier on, America had thwarted their attempts to upgrade army equipment even when they directly appealed for help from Washington. With a looming invasion, the Arbenz government attempted to arm itself with weapons provided by the Soviet Bloc. Despite America provoking the Guatemalan government to do this, they still used it as the final justification for invasion. On June 18th, the US-backed far-right “Liberation” Army led by Castillo Armas staged a coup-d’etat, establishing an authoritarian dictatorship in Guatemala. Washington was satisfied.  

One example among many, the United States-backed regime change in Guatemala, helps us deconstruct the myth that America is a benign force for good. However, you might still be asking yourself the question of how this involved political violence, particularly in our glorious democracy.

First, I would like to note that the very idea of invading a country because its regime doesn’t serve you is about as politically violent as it can get. Furthermore, in the decades after America installed Castillo Armas as leader, Guatemalans were subject to government terrorism.

Dissidents were jailed and killed. This witch hunt was often based on the grounds that people were former supporters of Arbenz, associated with Arbenz supporters, or communists and socialists. It seems like we love to kill, imprison, and “disappear” people who disagree with us, no?

A first-hand account of Armas’ violence published by the Zinn Project described the extent of this violence: “In Guatemala City, unlicensed vans full of heavily armed men pull to a stop and, in broad daylight, kidnap another death squad victim. Mutilated bodies are dropped from helicopters on crowded stadiums to keep the population terrified . . . those who dare ask about ‘disappeared’ loved ones have their tongues cut out.”

Another account was written by Ernesto “Che” Guevara in his journal, as he was present in Guatemala during the coup: “Reality is knocking on many doors, and now the sound of gunfire can be heard, the rewards for the more ardent adherents to the ancien regime.”

If you are still unconvinced that this vicious foreign policy would ever turn inwards, I’d like to introduce you to the imperial boomerang. This phenomenon basically refers to the idea that the empire’s outwards violence will eventually turn inwards. Coined by the writings and ideas of Aimé Césaire, poet and former president of Martinique, and his student Frantz Fanon, psychiatrist and political philosopher, the imperial boomerang explains why you cannot compartmentalize political violence abroad from political violence at home– the two are innately connected. According to a paper written by Dallas Jokic and published by the McGill Philosophy Department, Césaire claimed that colonialism worked to brutalize “the colonizer through their violence toward the colonized.” Fanon expanded upon this, viewing colonial society “as a breeding ground” for a variety of fascist affectivities and psychologies. 

As illuminating as those claims seem, they’re worth nothing without proof. Fortunately, the FBI has made this connection extremely easy for me to prove. The American government has been assassinating and sabotaging internal dissidents for decades. 

Launched in 1956, the FBI’s COINTELPRO program actively disrupted activist movements, many led by people of color. These groups include but aren’t limited to the American Indian Movement, the Young Lords, the Gay Liberation Front, the Black Liberation Army, and most significantly, the Black Panther Party. The Black Panther party, an explicitly socialist organization, was formed based on the goals of freedom, justice, equality, and self-determination for black communities within America. Their Ten-Point Program called “for structural change and community empowerment through education, housing, and protection from state violence.” COINTELPRO was responsible for the arrest and assassination of multiple Black Panther members, including the leader of the Chicago chapter, Fred Hampton, in a 1969 police raid on his apartment. 

While I don’t expect everyone reading this to know who Fred Hampton was, this surveillance does still bleed into “mainstream” history. The FBI conducted extensive surveillance and harassment against Martin Luther King Jr. starting in 1962. This was done with the permission of Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy and led by FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover. The American Government was more than fine with letting the FBI’s power to destroy people like King. The revisionist history we are taught about King’s amicable relationship with the American government leads us to largely ignore this.  

This violence didn’t happen in a vacuum or towards specific individuals only. During the infamous War on Crime and War on Drugs, top Nixon aide John Ehrlichman claimed that “the Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people… We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.” Put simply, the government leading our democracy has never had any qualms about political violence in its own interest. So why are we so surprised when it happens today? 

The consistent surveillance of activists within America never ended, and neither has American involvement within other countries. If anything, both of these have become more evident during our lifetime, and will continue to happen whether you choose to pay attention or not. With the national guard in Portland, Chicago, DC, Los Angeles, and Memphis, with the kidnapping of Mahmoud Khalil in broad daylight, do we really see this tension-wrought environment as unprecedented? Or have we just allowed ourselves to forget our own history, beyond sanitized stories that end in us all holding hands and singing Kumbaya? When will we finally stop lying to ourselves and face the music? 

I’ll leave that for you to answer.