1. Introduction
Since 1948, the debate on genocide has grown in breadth and depth, but still there is no common definition. While many groups started to use the term in order to mobilize international support, scholarly reactions to persistent patterns of mass killings have been contra-dictory. For Steven T. Katz (1994), the Holocaust had been the only genocide in history. On the other hand, various scholars suggested alternative criteria for defining genocide and, thus, resolving the problem of exclusive classifications of potential victim groups. Outlining key issues in the field of genocide research, Frank Chalk and Kurt Jonassohn proposed the following definition:
"Genocide is a form of one-sided mass killing in which a state or other authority intends to destroy a group, as that group and membership in it are defined by the perpetrator” (1990: 23).
The notion of the construction of the "other” has been instructive for scholars examining the process of group differentiation and stigmatization linked to genocidal acts. In her attempt to overcome the exclusiveness of victim classifications, sociologist Helen Fein noted that genocide is
"sustained purposeful action by a perpetrator to physically destroy a collectivity directly or indirectly, through interdiction of the biological and social reproduction of group members, sustained regardless of the surrender or lack of threat offered by the victim” (Fein 1993: 24).
Within genocide studies, some scholars now place particular emphasis on the concept of ethnocide understood as "cultural genocide”. According to Jean-Michel Chaumont, "Ethnocide does not primarily target individuals, but the constitutive elements of group identity” (Chaumont 2001: 183). While Helen Fein makes no distinction between direct or indirect destruction (or: between biological and social reproduction of group members, this distinction is central to Chaumont’s definition.
"Ethnocide means the intentional destruction of a group which does not necessarily imply murder or bodily harm. But an ethnocide can be genocidal, if the perpetrators believe that killing a significant part of the group’s members, e.g. the elite, is a more effective form of destruction.” (Chaumont 2001: 186)
Thus, the intention is not the physical destruction of a group but the destruction of the cultural values that ensure cohesion, collective identity and collective action of a group. And, as "civilization” or nationalistic re-education are often encouraged, an ethnocidal policy implies the possibility of individual change (Chaumont 2001: 181). Separating genocide and ethnocide by definition seems to be of key significance for our understanding of certain dynamics of genocide. If we focus on the perspective of the perpetrators, it is important to recognize that "massacres are the product of a joint construction of will and context, with the evolution of the latter being able to modify the former” (Semélin 2003: 202). The Guatemalan case, which received little scholarly attention, demonstrates the importance of this line of interpretation. In general, it is said
"that agents of the State of Guatemala, within the framework of counterinsurgency operations carried out, between 1981 and 1983, acts of genocide against groups of Mayan people who lived in the four regions analysed” (Commission for Historical Clarification, § 122).
In this paper, I will focus on the moment in which a policy of genocide became, from the point of view of the perpetrators, the "best solution” for the problem of insurgency. Moreover, I will discuss the transformation of the policy of physical annihilation (genocidal option) into a policy of restructuring the socio-cultural patterns of the Guatemalan highlands (ethnocidal option). Due to a change of the national and international context, the initiators of the Guatemalan genocide varied their initial policy of annihilation.
2. Military Responses to Guerrilla Challenge in Guatemala
The so-called armed confrontation in Guatemala, fought between several guerrilla groups and the State, lasted for 35 years. In the early 1960s, a movement called Revolutionary Armed Forces (FAR) – founded by young nationalist military officers – came to pose the first armed challenge to the political order. After the military defeat of the FAR in the eastern parts of the country in the late 1960s, a nucleus group of survivors retreated to Mexico and the capital to regroup. In the early 1970s, new guerrilla groups emerged and moved their operations to the indigenous regions of the country. The Guerrilla Army of the Poor (EGP) began to operate in the lowland jungles of northern El Quiché, and the Organization of the People in Arms (ORPA) began to organize in the isolated mountains in the south-western coastal part of Guatemala. While the regrouped FAR concentrated its operations in the jungle area of El Petén, the military wing of the communist party PGT pose an armed threat to state institutions in the capital. In 1982, the four guerrilla groups merged into the Guatemalan National Revolutionary Unit (URNG). It is important to note that the insurgent groups never had the "military potential necessary to pose an imminent threat to the State” (CEH, conclusions, § 24).
Table 1: Ethnic boundaries in Guatemala
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Guatemalaś population of 12 million is considered to be divided into two principle groups: Indians and ladinos. Around 60% of the population is indigenous. There are more than 20 separate Mayan languages spoken, being Kíche´, Mam, Qéqchiánd Kaqchiquel the biggest Mayan language groups. Moreover, there are small populations of Xinca and garífuna. The ladinos are defined as the non-indigenous population. The social category "ladino” does not refer to color, but to cultural identities. The ethnic dichotomy is perceived by most Guatemalans as the main ethnic boundary. Nevertheless, there is an underlying pigmentocratic system, which dominates social stratification: The ideology of blanqueamiento ("whitening”) plays an important role in social life. People recognize themselves as ladinos, Indians, Maya, whites, ladinos blancos, ladinos pardos, Europeans, mestizos, or chapines. Moreover, many Guatemalans distinguish themselves as members of specific communities or municipios.
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During the first stage of the armed confrontation (1962 to 1977), insurgent and counterinsurgent practices were concentrated in the eastern hinterland, the capital and the south coast. Repression was selective and directed towards members of campesino and trade unions, uni-versity and school teachers, peasants and guerilla sympathizers. Nevertheless, the military began to target civilians and to implement a policy of massacres. Between 1966 and 1968, the army bombed villages in the eastern region of the country, resulting in thousands of deaths and disappearances (Ball 1999).
As the social movement got stronger and extended over the remote parts of the country, in the 1970s, repression became geographically disperse. Between 1978 and 1985, the military operations were carried out with extreme brutality, resulting in tens of thousands of deaths and over 626 massacres. Identifying indigenous communities with the insurgency, the military concentrated its operations in the western highlands (departments of El Quiché, Huehuetenango, Chimaltenango, Alta and Baja Verapaz), the south coast and Guatemala City. During this period, the guerilla support base and the area of insurgency expanded over the western highlands. Especially ORPA and EGP sought to gain support in indigenous communities. The military used this insurgent strategy to justify its repressive response. As a key part of the counterinsurgency strategy of the 1980s, the State forced large sectors of the male population to commit atrocities. It is estimated that 80% of the male population in the western highlands were organized into local paramilitary groups (Civil Defense Patrols)1. They had to keep their neighbors under surveillance, and were forced to participate in crimes such as torture, rape and massacres. "An uncontrolled armed power was created, which was able to act arbitrarily in villages, pursuing private and abusive ends." (CEH, conclusions, § 51). Following the scorched earth operations, the military started to resettle the displaced population in model villages ( aldeas modelos) and highly militarized villages. The military intended to integrate the indigenous population into both the fight against subversion and the "new Guatemalan nation”. During the peak of violence, the victims were principally indígenas and to a lesser extent ladino (non-indigenous). After 1986, the armed confrontation continued at a lower level and repressive operations were again selective and geographically disperse. After ten years of peace negotiations, the Guatemalan government and the URNG signed the so-called Firm and Lasting Peace in December, 1996.
3. Structures of Violence
The CEH came to the conclusion that
"The magnitude of the State’s repressive response, totally disproportionate to the military force of the insurgency, can only be understood within the framework of the country’s profound social, economic and cultural conflicts. [...] Faced with widespread political, socio-economic and cultural opposition, the State resorted to military operations directed towards the physical annihilation or absolute intimidation of this opposition, through a plan of repression carried out mainly by the Army and national security forces.” (CEH, Vol. V, § 24-25).
In the following paragraph I will briefly outline the structural causes, which determined the outbreak of the so-called civil war. The underlying cause of political violence is a dynamic of multiple economic, cultural and social exclusions, resulting in racist and authoritarian practices. After independence in 1821, an authoritarian State evolved, serving the interests of a small – powerful and wealthy – minority (white, later ladino). Social relations in Guatemala are characterized by a long history of struggle for social inclusion and against denial of civil and political rights.
By the end of the nineteenth century, the Guatemalan State had developed a pattern of coer-cive mechanisms integrating large sectors of the indigenous population into the plantation economy (Smith 1990). While violent uprisings had characterized the relations between indigenous communities and the state throughout the nineteenth century, indigenous resistance was transmuted into more evasive channels in the 20th century. In general, community relations in the western highlands remained strong
Since independence, the Guatemalan State had resorted to repression in order to maintain social control. In the western highlands, local elites built up a system of paramilitary security, fostered by impunity. In the capital, the elite maintained power structures through fraudulent elections and an extensive repressive apparatus. The creation of an anticommunist counterinsurgency state dates back to the 1950s. Following the CIA-led coup d´état in 1954, which led to the overthrow of the first democratic government in the history of the country, political spaces were closed. The framework of Cold War provided the clarity of purpose needed to restrict political participation by legal and repressive means. The U.S. promoted repressive counterinsurgency policy within the framework of the National Security Doctrine (DSN), which defined all opponents as "internal enemies”. Thus, the militarization of the state began even before the first generation of the guerrilla movement emerged in the 1960s. The Catholic Church, which had supported the overthrow of president Arbenz in 1954, strongly promoted anticommunism. So did some fundamentalist protestant sects, which felt threatened by the expansion of atheistic communism in the backyard of the United States.
It is important to note that the Catholic Church experienced fundamental doctrinal and pas-toral changes in the second half of the 20th century. The Catholic Action, that was initially started in order to "re-conquer Indian souls” (Le Bot 1995: 36), created a new generation of foreign priests, promoting social change and civil rights. Ideologically, this new generation was strongly influenced by the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965) and the Episcopal Conference of Medellin (1968). Thousands of catechists and lay activists began to work with the excluded (Falla 2001).
During the late-1970s, social, political and cultural opposition to the established order spread throughout the country. The CEH concluded:
"In the years when the confrontation deepened (1978-1983), as the guerrilla support base and area of action expanded, Mayans as a group in several different parts of the country were identified by the Army as guerrilla allies. Occasionally this was the result of the effective existence of support for the insurgent groups and of pre-insurrectional conditions in the country’s interior. However, the CEH has ascertained that, in the majority of cases, the identification of Mayan communities with the insurgency was intentionally exaggerated by the State, which, based on traditional racist prejudices, used this identification to eliminate any present or future possibilities of the people providing help for, or joining, an insurgent project.” (CEH V, § 31)
The notion of intentional exaggeration is fundamental to the proof of genocide. But are there any statements on intentional exaggeration which can be made with fair certainty? With which intention was the threat exaggerated?
By the late-1970s, the EGP controlled significant parts of the Ixil triangle. The May 1 demonstration in 1978 was widely perceived as a symptom of pre-insurrectional conditions. For the first time in national history, indigenous campesinos formed a contingent several blocks long. Few weeks later, the military killed 150 Kéqchiín response to a peaceful demonstration in Panzós, Alta Verapaz. As the army’s presence was growing throughout the highlands, large sectors of the indigenous population became radicalized and started to join the guerilla movement. A significant number of CUC members and catechists joined the Guerilla Army of the Poor (EGP), and fewer the other guerilla organizations, ORPA, FAR and PGT. It was estimated that 250,000 to 500,000 indígenas "participated in the war in one form or another” (Arias 1990: 255). In February, 1980, two weeks after the military massacred an indigenous delegation of CUC in the Spanish Embassy, indigenous leaders produced the "Declaration of Iximché”, which was perceived as a declaration of war. Acts of protest, resistance and even insurrection took place in the entire country.
"For the military and latifundistas, with their historic fears of Indian rebellion, the very fact that the Indians were being drawn into any vision of struggle was an ex-traordinary frightening prospect” (Schirmer 1998: 40).
At this point, the army opted for genocidal practices.
4. Diagnosing Genocide
Within genocide studies, the mass atrocities committed in Guatemala in the early 1980s receive little attention. Of the 137 abstracts submitted for presentation at the 6th Conference of the International Association of Genocide Scholars (June 4-7, 2005), none referred to the Guatemalan experience2. Only fairly recently, research into the history and practices of genocide has also been fuelled by the Guatemalan case. Why did scholars exclude the Guatemalan case for so long? And why do scholars now start to consider the "hitherto little-known or long-denied” (Gellately/Kiernan 2003: 8) Guatemalan genocide? The case became relevant for genocide studies when the Guatemalan Truth Commission ("Commission for the Historical Clarification of Human Rights Violations and Acts of Violence which have caused Suffering to the Guatemalan People” [CEH]) handed over its final report on February 25th 19993. The CEH estimated that 200,000 people were killed or disappeared between 1962 and 1996.4 Based on the United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, which had been ratified by Guatemala in 1949, the CEH came to the conclusion
"that agents of the State of Guatemala, within the framework of counterinsurgency operations carried out, between 1981 and 1983, acts of genocide against groups of Mayan people who lived in the four regions analysed”5 (CEH, § 122).
By late February 1999, Human Rights activists and scholars started to refer to the Commission’s findings as the first officially sanctioned analysis of the Guatemalan genocide. While a number of anthropologists had extensively written about the history of terror in Guatemala in the 1980s and 1990s (Carmack 1988, Falla 1992, EAFG 1997, Zur 1998), it was this notion of genocide, which led the Guatemalan case rise to some prominence in recent years6. The CEH pointed out that acts of genocide ("actos de genocidio”) are different from policy of genocide ("política genocida”).
"There is a policy of genocide if the acts are committed with final intent ("objetivo final”) to exterminate, in part or in whole, a group. The perpetrators commit genocidal acts if the final intent is not the extermination of the group but other political, economic, military or other ends. The extermination, in part or in whole, of the group is a means to these ends.” (CEH 1999, Vol. III: 316, § 3205; own translation)
Which was the victim group?
The CEH underlined that the Accord on the Identity and Rights of Indigenous Peoples, signed as part of the peace accords in 1995, recognized Guatemala to be a multicultural nation. The accord defines Guatemala as being "multi-ethnic, multicultural and multilingual in nature”. Moreover, it points out that
"the indigenous peoples include the Maya people, the Garifuna people and the Xinca people, and that the Maya people consist of various socio-cultural groups having a common origin” (Accord on the Identity and Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Preamble).
Being very restricted in time and resources, the commission analyzed in detail the counterinsurgency practices in four geographical regions. The commission stated that it analyzed four ethnic groups in four regions: 1. Maya-Q’anjob’al and Maya-Chuj, in Barillas, Nentón and San Mateo Ixtatán in North Huehuetenango, 2. Maya-Ixil, in Nebaj, Cotzal and Chajul, Quiché, 3. Maya-K’iche’, in Joyabaj, Zacualpa and Chiché, Quiché, and 4. Maya-Achi, in Rabinal, Baja Verapaz. (CEH, Vol. III: 317, § 3208). Few pages later, the CEH points out that it analyzed "four ethnic groups, which are: the group maya-ixil, the group maya-achi, the group maya-kaqchikel, the group maya-qánjobál, the group maya-chuj and the group maya-kíche´”. Four groups, five groups or six groups? The indigenous population, some 60% of the overall population of twelve million, comprises more than 22 different linguistic groups, being defined as different ethnic groups by the CEH. (The CEH merged linguistic and geographic items into one concept of ethnicity; Oettler 2004). It is important to note, however, that official politics and indigenous organizations both consider Guatemalaś population to be divided into two principal ethnic groups: the indigenous and non-indigenous (ladino) population. This division was the main starting point for the commissioners. Right from the beginning, Otilia Lux de Cotí, the female and indigenous member of the CEH, insisted on investigating genocidal practice and ideology. And according to the report of the Catholic Project for the Recovery of Historic Memory, which appeared in April, 1998, the Guatemalan mechanisms of terror had "certain characteristics of genocide” (ODHAG 1998, Vol. IV: 490; own translation).
As genocide is a difficult crime to define, we have to ask, which definition of genocide was used by the CEH. The commission, headed by German Law professor Christian Tomuschat, noted that the killings committed in the early 1980s were covered by the UN Convention on Genocide.
The convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, which was adopted on December 9, 1948, stated that
"genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:
(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group."7
The commission took up the two elements of genocide incorporated into the Convention: the intent to destroy and the acts committed.
While it was obvious that the elimination of subversion was the motive for the crimes, a genocidal policy could not be proven directly from military orders. There was some evidence of planned genocidal action, but not sufficient evidence. The commission presented a series of statements making genocidal intentions explicit. In 1982, Francisco Bianchi, secre-tary of de-facto president Ríos Montt, openly stated:
"The guerillas won over many Indian collaborators, therefore the Indians were subversive, right? And how do you fight subversion? Clearly you had to kill Indians because they were collaborating with subversion.” (The New York Times, July 20, 1982, quoted in: CEH, Vol. III: 323, § 3233)
The statements quoted in the Truth Commissionsŕeport are derived from military plans or manuals8, and from newspapers9. As the commissioners could not verify the extent to which these were programmatic and strategic statements, they decided to prove genocidal intent from the pattern of repressive acts. They found sufficient evidence of a systematic pattern of coordinated acts, which were committed with the intent to destroy Mayan groups.
Through an analysis of the pattern of mass atrocities in the four regions mentioned above, the CEH demonstrated that a campaign of massacres was carried out during the regimes of Lucas García and Ríos Montt. The policy of annihilation was begun by Lucas García and further systematized by Ríos Montt (Sanford 2003: 54). Identifying the local population with the guerilla, the military first sought to kill community leaders. Increasingly, entire communities became target groups and massacres the cornerstone of repressive operations. The commission’s investigation revealed that a large number of children and women were direct victims of torture, rape, arbitrary execution, forced disappearance and massacres. Between 1981 and 1982, the military carried out scorched earth operations, often with helicopter support, killing community leaders, raping women, massacring entire communities, burning the fields and destroying sacred places. In the Ixil region, being one of the areas most affected by the scorched earth operations, between 70% and 90% of all communities were destroyed (the number is estimated, because the total number of communities had never been registered (CEH, Vol. III: 345, § 3311). According to the CEH, the percentage of Mayan victims was significantly higher than the percentage of the indigenous population in the regions analyzed: in the Ixil region, 97,8% of the victims were Maya (Rabinal: 98,8%, northern Huehuetenango: 99,3% and Zacualpa: 98,4%) (CEH, Vol. III: 417-418, § 3581).
It is particularly necessary to recognize, however, that the politico-military elite of Guatemala chose mass murder to solving the problem of insurgency already in the late 1960s. The strategy of draining the water that supported the fish was first implemented when the military directed repression against civilians and entire communities in response to guerrilla operations in the eastern parts of the country. But it was not until the 1980s that the military began its infamous scorched earth policy in the western highlands. "The imperatives of war, both civil and class, accelerated nationalism, anticommunism, and racism into a murderous fusion” (Grandin 2005, § 31).
5. A Closer Look at the Actors Involved
A closer look at the corporate entities and high ranking military officers planning and implementing counterinsurgency operations in the 1970s and 1980s reveals that the atrocities committed throughout the western highlands were a scientific means. Guatemalan military officers were utterly convinced that they were facing a permanent internal war, and a permanent struggle over hearts and minds. Their mission was the total extermination of subversion or communism.
"[...] it was murder with a scientific purpose and philosophy, not random carnage for its own sake. Benedicto Lucas García had learned his tradecraft at Franceś famous St. Cyr military academy, and had seen it put to good effect in the counterinsurgency war in Algeria. Rios Montt had learned his under US instructors, and had been part of the military generation that saw it work in Guatemala in the brutal successes of the late 1960s.” (Black 1984: 135)
In Latin America, the reign of the National Security Doctrine began with the Brazilian coup d´état in 1965. The DNS bore enormous political influence, since it legitimized all atrocities committed in order to cut the communist cancer out of the nation’s body. Labeling communism a cancer, military strategists throughout the Western hemisphere invited extermination of the "subversive other”. The demonization of all opponents modified the consciousness of local perpetrators and the public, so that people became indifferent to human suffering. Fighting against the spreading cancer of communism implied a dehumanizing effort in order to justify the extermination of potential victims. In general, the National Security Doctrine perceived the military as the last bulwark against moral decay. As Argentine Captain Horacio Mayorga stated:
"Ours is a healthy institution. It is not contaminated by the ulcer of extremism, nor by a Third World adulteration which does not recognize the true Christ, nor by the tortu-ous and demagogic attitudes of hypocritical politicians who adopt an attitude one day and forget it the next.” (quoted in: CONADEP 1984: Part V: The Doctrine behind repression)
Above all, it is necessary to recognize that the National Security Doctrine went beyond traditional repressive strategies. The prototypical version of DNS was produced by Brazilian General Golbery do Couto e Silva, who was particularly influential in the formation of the Advanced War College of Brazil, which was responsible for national security studies. Emphasizing the threat of internal subversion, he stressed the significance of economic development and, thus, the national integrity. In his view,
"it was therefore vitally important to develop the country’s vast uninhabited expanses, which he categorized as ‘paths of penetration’, and it would be eventually desirable ‘to flood the Amazon region with civilization’” (Smith 2000: 203).
In Latin America, development programs and psychological warfare served as fundamental pillars of counterinsurgency strategies.
It is not surprising, then, that the Guatemalan counterinsurgency strategies were guided by external advice. The U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) used its military installations in Panama as the nerve center for its influence on Latin American politics. From 1946 to 1984, thousands of Latin American soldiers received training in military and counterinsurgency practices (in 1984, the School of the Americas was transferred to Fort Benning, Georgia). U.S. intelligence officers were cornerstones of a hemispheric network, which involved Guatemalan as well as other Latin American militaries. A list of high-ranking Guatemalan militaries prepared by the NGO National Security Archive (2000) shows the great influence of the School of the Americas and other military schools (Inter-American Defense College10, military schools in the United States, Venezuela, El Salvador, Argentina, Mexico and France). Efraín Ríos Montt was trained at the School of the Americas in 1950, at Fort Bragg in 1961, in Italy in 1962, and at the Inter-American Defense College in 1973. His successor, Oscar Hum-berto Mejía Víctores, received military training at the Inter-American Air Force Academy in 1955, at Andrews Air Force Base (Maryland) in 1957, and at the Escuela Militar México from 1966 to 1969.
Whilst the National Security Doctrine received firm support from military actors throughout the continent, in Guatemala, it was to merge with racist attitudes into a genocidal fusion.
And it is important to note that the U.S. government was fully aware of the repressive tactics being used by the Guatemalan military. In 1981, Jeane J. Kirkpatrick, Ronald Reaganś am-bassador to the United Nations, stated that "Central America is the most important place in the world for the United States today” (Smith 2000: 182). Thus, Central America was identified as a fundamental battleground of the war against communism. The Reagan administration devoted unequivocal support to the Salvadorean and Guatemalan governments in their fight against the subversive threat. Openly denouncing the communist takeover of Nicara-gua and the destabilizing tendencies in El Salvador and Guatemala, the US-state department opted for a wait-and-see-attitude:
"Recent history is replete with examples where repression has been "successful” in exorcising guerrilla threats to a regime’s survival. Argentina and Uruguay are both recent examples which come to mind.” (US Department of State, Secret memorandum: Guatemala: What Next?, 1981)
6. The Tyrant and the Preacher
The political projects of the generals, who came to power in the late 1970s and early 1980s, hint at the configuration of society and the leadership of certain power blocs.
In the 1970s, Guatemala was ruled by three generals: Carlos Arana Osorio (1970-1974), Kjell Laugerud García (1974-1978), and Romeo Lucas García (1978-1982). During this period, the military became a strong political force, being engaged in key economic sectors such as finance (e.g. Army Bank) and agro-exporting. The government sold hundreds of land titles to high-ranking military officers in the Franja Transversal del Norte – the agrarian frontier in the northern lowlands. Corruption has always been endemic to Guatemalan society, but during this period, it became more pervasive and blatant than ever.
Fernando Romeo Lucas García, who assumed presidency in 1978, was born in Alta Verapaz in 1924. In 1945, he started his military