Carlos Castillo Armas, Date of Birth, Place of Birth, Date of Death
TweetCarlos Castillo Armas
Guatemalan President
Date of Birth: 
Place of Birth: Escuintla Department, Guatemala
About Carlos Castillo Armas
- Carlos Castillo Armas (locally ['ka?los kas'ti?o 'a?mas]; November 4, 1914 â July 26, 1957) was a Guatemalan military officer and politician who was the 28th president of Guatemala, serving from 1954 to 1957 after taking power in a coup d'Ă©tat.
- A member of the right-wing National Liberation Movement (MLN) party, his authoritarian government was closely allied with the United States. Born to a planter, out of wedlock, Castillo Armas was educated at Guatemala's military academy.
- A protégé of Colonel Francisco Javier Arana, he joined Arana's forces during the 1944 uprising against President Federico Ponce Vaides.
- This began the Guatemalan Revolution and the introduction of representative democracy to the country.
- Castillo Armas joined the General Staff and became director of the military academy.
- Arana and Castillo Armas opposed the newly elected government of Juan José Arévalo; after Arana's failed 1949 coup, Castillo Armas went into exile in Honduras.
- Seeking support for another revolt, he came to the attention of the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
- In 1950 he launched a failed assault on Guatemala City, before escaping back to Honduras.
- Influenced by Cold War fears of communism and the pressure from the United Fruit Company, in 1952 the US government of President Harry Truman authorized Operation PBFORTUNE, a plot to overthrow ArĂ©valo's leftist successor, President Jacobo Ărbenz.
- Castillo Armas was to lead the coup, but the plan was abandoned before being revived in a new form by US President Dwight D.
- Eisenhower in 1953. In June 1954, Castillo Armas led 480 CIA-trained soldiers into Guatemala, backed by US-supplied aircraft.
- Despite initial setbacks to the rebel forces, US support for the rebels made the Guatemalan army reluctant to fight, and Ărbenz resigned on June 27.
- A series of military juntas briefly held power during negotiations that ended with Castillo Armas assuming the presidency on July 7.
- Castillo Armas consolidated his power in an October 1954 election, in which he was the only candidate; the MLN, which he led, was the only party allowed to contest congressional elections.
- Ărbenz's popular agricultural reform was largely rolled back, with land confiscated from small farmers and returned to large landowners.
- Castillo Armas cracked down on unions and peasant organizations, arresting and killing thousands.
- He created a National Committee of Defense Against Communism, which investigated over 70,000 people and added 10 percent of the population to a list of suspected communists.
- Castillo Armas faced significant internal resistance, which was blamed on communist agitation.
- The government, plagued by corruption and soaring debt, became dependent on aid from the US.
- In 1957 Castillo Armas was assassinated by a presidential guard with leftist sympathies.
- He was the first of a series of authoritarian rulers in Guatemala who were close allies of the US.
- His reversal of the reforms of his predecessors sparked a series of leftist insurgencies in the country after his death, culminating in the Guatemalan Civil War of 1960 to 1996.
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