FILE HF-0018
Guatemala 1954
Guatemala City, Guatemala · June 1954
In June 1954, the CIA organized and armed a small rebel force, backed by an extensive psychological warfare campaign, that overthrew Guatemala's democratically elected President Jacobo Árbenz, following his government's land-reform program that had expropriated uncultivated land from large landowners, including the U.S.-based United Fruit Company. The coup opened nearly four decades of military-dominated rule and contributed to conditions leading to a 36-year civil war.