A Balance of the Latin American Guerrilla

Abstract

Providing a balance of the legacy of the guerrilla after 70 years is a complex undertaking. We start with the triumphs. In Cuba and Nicaragua, the insurgents built comprehensive, urban-rural, multiclass, revolutionary coalitions that were key to mobilizing broad sectors of society against regimes that, in their final stages, lacked solid social and political support at home and military and financial backing from abroad. In El Salvador where a military stalemate was reached, the guerrilla had constructed a similar structure and could negotiate from a position of strength. Then we analyze the reasons of failure in the three consecutive guerrilla waves we mentioned and in the peculiar case of Colombia where after the demobilization wave in 1989/90 the guerrilla became the cradle of the democratic Left. We also devote a section to the forces of counterinsurgency and the overwhelming efforts of crushing the rebellions, generally with the assistance of paramilitary structures. We also see how if and how during the postwar period former guerilla members succeeded in formal political structures, new or already existing. The final section of this chapter presents contrasting countries where the originally utopian ideas of the guerrilla were transformed in leftist-reformist democracies and other nations where the revolutionary Left was distorted in dystopic regimes.