The Guatemalan Civil War was fought from 1960 to 1996 between the government of Guatemala and various leftist rebel groups. The Guatemalan government forces committed genocide against the Maya population of Guatemala during the civil war and there were widespread human rights violations against civilians. The context of the struggle was based on longstanding issues over land distribution. Wealthy Guatemalans, mainly of European descent, and foreign companies like the American United Fruit Company had control over much of the land leading to conflicts with the rural, disproportionately indigenous, peasants who worked the land.
Democratic elections in 1944 and 1951 which were during the Guatemalan Revolution had brought popular leftist governments to power, who sought to ameliorate working conditions and implement land distribution. A United States-backed coup d'état in 1954 installed the military regime of Carlos Castillo Armas to prevent reform. Armas was followed by a series of right-wing military dictators.
The Civil War began on 13 November 1960, when a group of left-wing junior military officers led a failed revolt against the government of General Ydígoras Fuentes. The officers who survived created a rebel movement known as MR-13. In 1970, Colonel Carlos Manuel Arana Osorio was the first of a series of military dictators who represented the Institutional Democratic Party or PID. The PID dominated Guatemalan politics for twelve years through electoral frauds favoring two of Colonel Arana's protégés (General Kjell Eugenio Laugerud García in 1974 and General Romeo Lucas Garcia in 1978). The PID lost its grip on Guatemalan politics when General Efraín Ríos Montt along with a group of junior army officers, seized power in a military coup on 23 March 1982. In the 1970s social discontent continued among the large populations of indigenous people and peasants. Many organized into insurgent groups and began to resist government forces.
During the 1980s, the Guatemalan military assumed close to absolute government power for five years; it successfully infiltrated and eliminated enemies in every socio-political institution of the nation including the political, social, and intellectual classes. In the final stage of the civil war, the military developed a parallel, semi-visible, and low profile but high-effect control of Guatemala's national life. It is estimated that 40,000 to 200,000 people were killed or "disappeared" forcefully during the conflict including 40,000 to 50,000 disappearances. Fighting took place between government forces and rebel groups, yet much of the violence was a very large coordinated campaign of one-sided violence by the Guatemalan state against the civilian population from the mid-1960s onward. The military intelligence services coordinated killings and "disappearances" of opponents of the state.
In rural areas, where the insurgency maintained its strongholds, the government repression led to large massacres of the peasantry and the destruction of villages, first in the departments of Izabal and Zacapa (1966–68) and in the predominantly Mayan western highlands from 1978 onward. The widespread killing of the Mayan people in the early 1980s is considered a genocide. Other victims of the repression included activists, suspected government opponents, returning refugees, critical academics, students, left-leaning politicians, trade unionists, religious workers, journalists, and street children. The "Comisión para el Esclarecimiento Histórico" estimated that government forces committed 93% of human right abuses in the conflict, with 3% committed by the guerrillas.
In 2009, Guatemalan courts sentenced former military commissioner Felipe Cusanero, the first person to be convicted of the crime of ordering forced disappearances. In 2013, the government conducted a trial of former president Efraín Ríos Montt on charges of genocide for the killing and disappearances of more than 1,700 indigenous Ixil Maya during his 1982–83 rule. The charges of genocide were based on the "Memoria del Silencio" report–prepared by the UN-appointed Commission for Historical Clarification. It was also the first time that the court recognized the rape and abuse which Mayan women suffered. Of the 1465 cases of rape that were reported, soldiers were responsible for 94.3 percent. The Commission concluded that the government could have committed genocide in Quiché between 1981 and 1983. Ríos Montt was the first former head of state to be tried for genocide by his own country's judicial system; he was found guilty and sentenced to 80 years in prison. A few days later, however, the sentence was reversed by the country's high court. They called for a renewed trial because of alleged judicial anomalies. The trial resumed on 23 July 2015, but the jury had not reached a verdict before Montt died in custody on 1 April 2018.
Background
After the 1871 revolution, the Liberal government of Justo Rufino Barrios escalated coffee production in Guatemala, which required much land and many workers. Barrios established the Settler Rule Book, which forced the native population to work for low wages for the landowners, who were Criollos and later German settlers. Barrios also confiscated the common native land, which had been protected during the Spanish Colony and during the Conservative government of Rafael Carrera. He distributed it to his Liberal friends, who became major landowners.
In the 1890s, the United States began to implement the Monroe Doctrine, pushing out European colonial powers in Latin America. Its commercial interests established U.S. hegemony over resources and labor in the region. The dictators that ruled Guatemala during the late 19th and early 20th centuries were very accommodating to U.S. business and political interests, because they personally benefitted. Unlike in Haiti, Nicaragua, and Cuba, the U.S. did not have to use overt military force to maintain dominance in Guatemala. The Guatemalan military/police worked closely with the U.S. military and State Department to secure U.S. interests. The Guatemalan government exempted several U.S. corporations from paying taxes, especially the United Fruit Company. It also privatized and sold off publicly owned utilities giving away huge swaths of public land.
Societal structure
In 1920, the prince Wilhelm of Sweden visited Guatemala and described Guatemalan society and Estrada Cabrera government in his book Between Two Continents, notes from a journey in Central America, 1920. He analyzed Guatemalan society at the time, pointing out that even though it called itself a "republic", Guatemala had three sharply defined classes:
Criollos: A minority made up of descendants of the Spaniards who conquered Central America; by 1920, the Criollos made up much of the members of both political parties and the elite in the country. For centuries they had intermarried with indigenous peoples and other people of European ancestry. The great majority had some indigenous ancestry but largely identified with European culture. They led the country both politically and intellectually, partly because their education was far superior to that of most of the rest of the residents. Only criollos were admitted to the main political parties; their families largely controlled and for the most part owned the cultivated parts of the country. Ladinos: Descendants of peoples of mixed indigenous and European or criollo ancestry, so called because they spoke Spanish as a first language. They were typically middle class, but held almost no political power in 1920. They made up the bulk of artisans, storekeepers, tradesmen, and minor officials. In the eastern part of the country, they worked as agricultural laborers. They sometimes had African ancestry. Indigenous peoples: The majority of the population at the time was composed of native or indigenous Guatemalans, most of whom were Mayan peoples. Many had little to no formal education and were illiterate. Indigenous people served as soldiers for the Army and they were often raised to positions of considerable trust. They made up most of the agricultural workers.
The prince classified them into three categories: "Mozos colonos" (farmer-servants) settled on the plantations and were given a small piece of land to cultivate on their own account, in return for work in the plantations a certain number of months a year, similar to sharecroppers or tenant farmers in the US. "Mozos jornaleros" (day laborers) were contracted to work for certain periods of time. They were paid a daily wage. In theory, each "mozo" was free to dispose of his labor as he or she pleased, but they were bound to the property by economic ties. They could not leave until they had paid off their debt to the owner. They were often victimized by owners, who encouraged them to get into debt by granting credit or lending cash. The owners recorded the accounts and the mozos were usually illiterate and at a disadvantage. If the mozos ran away, the owner could have them pursued and imprisoned by the authorities. Associated costs would be added to the ever-increasing debt of the mozo. If one of them refused to work, he or she was put in prison on the spot. The wages were also extremely low. The work was done by contract, but since every "mozo" starts with a large debt, the usual advance on engagement, effectively they became servants indentured to the landowner. "Artesanos independientes" (independent tillers) lived in the most remote provinces. Often Mayan, they survived by growing maize, wheat, or beans. They tried to cultivate some of the excess to sell in the market areas of the towns. They often carried their goods on their back for up to a day to reach such markets.
Jorge Ubico regime