Académique Documents
Professionnel Documents
Culture Documents
Oral arguments in the case Wolf v. CIA and FBI will be tomorrow,
August 14th, at 3:00 PM at the Federal Courthouse at 3rd and
Constitution, Washington DC, in courtroom #6 on the second floor,
with Judge Richard J. Leon presiding. (Civil Action No. 01-0729)
"Gaitan ... and others like him, will come and go. The
soil, happily, is not very fertile for foreign and remote
ideologies, if they imply dictation and discipline.
Communist cadres will not, over the years, hold together.
But the native version of the leader, in new and native
garments, with Agitprop-Fascist mimicry, will swagger and
perhaps momentarily dominate. He will try to pluck the
feathers from our Eagle and soar on the wings of claptrap."
The excerpts below are from the beginning and ending of CAVE
GAITANUM. The complete Spanish translation can be found in
Douglas Osher Sofer's section of Grandes Potencias, El 9 de
Abril y La Violencia, edited by Gonzalo Sanchez G. (2000)
The original document in English is available upon request.
Paul
The story of Latin America is curious and not quite clear from
its written history. The Spanish conquest was an adventure in
which the hardy conquistadores sought, in many instances, the
seductive but non-existent figments of an acquisitive imagination.
The conquistadores, perhaps the most valiant, certainly the most
resistant men in history, reached and held strategic points, but
the priest who followed along was the one who achieved the
Conquest. It was he who accomplished everything that lastingly
counted: the introduction of Spanish culture, the Catholic faith
and then, finally and most important, the Spanish language. He,
the priest, made and consolidated the "Conquest" of the Americas.
The ancillary arm was the strong arm. It was the arm of Conquest
and of frank and unabashed exploitation.
Their Gaitan and other caciques (now they have trained demagogues
of their own), are entering the scene. They will bring with them
the artful techniques of totalitarianism, defeated abroad but
perhaps triumphant at home.
Ideological Background
The Liberal defeat in the May 1946 elections was the necessary
and logical result of the "incorporation of Colombia in the
contemporary reality". Colombian Liberalism had completed the
job of closing the 19th century cycle, placing us at the doors
of the 20th. Liberal politicians now look back and are static.
The old Liberal leaders lost power in spite of their traditional
reforming impetus and revolutionary sentiments. In the face of
the violent currents sweeping the world today Colombia has the
choice of "living" or "dying". The latter alternative means
becoming the the intellectual and economic colony of Russia
or the United States. The new world situation springs from a
revolution and two wars. "Our world now does not turn around
the individual, but society and the multitude". There is a
collision of national masses who are spilling out over their
borders. The state is converted into an expression of society;
it is no longer a protection for the individual. Systems,
legislations and customs appropriate to an individualistic and
romantic world are being overpowered by the social reality
which places group interest before the right of an individual.
New societies tend to organize not on the rights of man but on
the principle of the "social function". We see the application
in new political, economic and social forms of the self-evident
fact of the primacy of the social over the individual. The old
order, based on the individualistic concept of the State, has
given way to a world which is being reconstructed on a
socialistic order. Thus, Colombian parties should propose new
programs, new problems, new solutions. The reform movement of
Gaitan is inspired by these realities and ideas. Eyes should
be turned toward Leo XIII with clear, present-day vision,
since he stood for socialism of the right. It is said that
Colombia has not reached the stage of development which in
other countries had produced genuinely proletarian and
oligarchic classes. I answer that they have not attentively
observed the problem of America, which is our problem. If we
let things slide, there will be produced a situation similar
to Bolivia and Peru, with a rich oligarchy dominating a
"melancholy sea of illiterates". Our situation is different
from the European in the sense that, because of the poverty
of the intellectual medium, we do not have a veteran
proletariat which defends and organizes itself, but the
progressive debasement of the people. In the United States
the individual effort of every citizen has great bearing,
but in these countries the people tend to depend more on
governments. "If this continent does not hold together,
building on a plan of common purposes and realizations its
foreign economy, its tariff policy, its international
transport and foreign immigration, our countries will fall
one by one into the jaws of the wolf; and it seems to me
that there is no need to name him." Each nation should
organize itself internally on a socialistic concept. Let us
orient ourselves toward the left, united in the economic
field and on a socialistic plan.
The United States should watch him with care and tact. He
might turn the right way and be helpful, with, of course,
more maturity and security of position. He could easily
prove to be a menace, or at least, a thorn in our flank.
------------------------------
PASADO IDEOLÓGICO
The U.S.¶s
Portrayal of the
Bogotazo
:
Its Meaning,
Consequences,
Implications, and
RelevanceToday
Deivid
RojasProfessor
WeinbergHistory
091
:
History Research
Seminar 18
December 2010
Rojas 2
To the memory
of Jorge Eliecer
Gaitan.To the
millions of
Colombians that
have died and
continue to suffer
because of the
conflict.To the
millions that are
currently
internally-
displaced.Special
thanks to Paul
Wolf
1
who made most
of the
government
documents cited
hereavailable for
public use.
1
http://www.icdc.com
/~paulwolf/
Rojas 3
³No hand from the
people will rise up
against me and the
oligarchy will not
kill me,because
they know that if
they do so the
country will turn
and the waters will
take fiftyyears to
return to their
normal state´
--Jorge Eliecer
Gaitan³
S
uddenly a mob,
brandishing guns,
knives and
machetes,
swarmed into the
Plaza, rushedthe
entrances of the
building itself and
swarmed inside,
wrecking and
looting.
Colombiawas
having a
rebellion²a
rebellion that at
another time
might have got
only passing
noticefrom non-
S
outh Americans,
but which now,
because of the
conference,
diverted
attentionfrom
pressing problems
elsewhere in the
world´
--New York
Time.
F
ocus on Bogota
.
April 11,1948
³The
S
treets of Bogota
resemble the
bombed streets of
London in that last
war´
--British
Journalist, April
12, 1948
³WHAT WENT
WRONG IN
BOGOTA?´
--
Samuel Guy
Inman.
The
Nation
. June 5, 1948
"Backing up the
findings of the
Colombian
Government,
Secretary of
State
Marshalland
other delegates
to the Inter-
American
Conference have
now likewise
accusedSoviet
Russia, and its
tool, international
communism, of
instigating the
riots
that wrecked
Bogotá and cast
a pall over the
whole Western
Hemisphere.
Basing
theirjudgment on
first-hand
information and
personal
observation on
the spot, they
seein the tragic
events, which
interrupted their
deliberations the
same powers,
andpatterns at
work as in the
attempted
insurrections in
France and Italy.
And that makes
Bogotá, as Mr.
Marshall said, not
merely a
Colombian or
Latin
Americanincident
but a world affair,
and a particularly
lurid illustration
of the length to
whichRussia is
willing to go in
its no longer
(cold war)
against the
democracies."--
Ne
w York Tim
e
s Editorial. April
14, 1948
³
El Bogotazo
would impede the
world from
recognizing the
existence of true
Colombianculture´
--Luis Lopez de
Mesa³
April 9 inserts
Colombia in a
negative light in
the great world
debates´--
Gonzalo Sanchez