of a deeply popular, successful progressive Presidential Candidate, and the onset of "La Violencia":
Wikipedia:
La Violencia (Spanish pronunciation: [la βjoˈlensja], The Violence) was a ten-year civil war in Colombia from 1948 to 1958, between the Colombian Conservative Party and the Colombian Liberal Party, fought mainly in the countryside.[1][2][3]
La Violencia is considered to have begun with the assassination on 9 April 1948 of Jorge Eliécer Gaitán, a Liberal Party presidential candidate and frontrunner for the 1949 November election.[4] His murder provoked the Bogotazo rioting, which lasted ten hours and resulted in around 5,000 casualties.[4] An alternative historiography proposes the Conservative Party's return to power following the election of 1946 to be the cause.[4] Rural town police and political leaders encouraged Conservative-supporting peasants to seize the agricultural lands of Liberal-supporting peasants, which provoked peasant-to-peasant violence throughout Colombia.[4]
La Violencia is estimated to have cost the lives of at least 200,000 people, almost 2% of the population of the country at the time.[5][6][7]
The La Violencia conflict took place between the Military Forces of Colombia and the National Police of Colombia supported by Colombian Conservative Party paramilitary groups on one side, and paramilitary and guerrilla groups aligned with the Colombian Liberal Party and the Colombian Communist Party on the other side.
The conflict caused millions of people to abandon their homes and property. Media and news services failed to cover events accurately for fear of revenge attacks. The lack of public order and civil authority prevented victims from laying charges against perpetrators. Documented evidence from these years is rare and fragmented.[citation needed]
More:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Violencia
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It got progressive worse, and the U.S. right-wing was wildly supportive of the feudal, racist, fascist ruling party which also has been the staunch supporters of the AUC paramilitary death squads, which have disposed of so many bodies they've used mass graves, mobile crematoria, or simply slit them open, filled them with stones so they wouldn't float, and pitched them into rivers.
Unbelievably ruthless. You may recall during the O.J. Simpson murder trial, the defense loudly contended it was probably Nicole Simpson's Colombian drug dealers who slit her throat right down the the spine and left it in her yard! Without a doubt they were far more vicious than the Mexican Cartels, as they would massacre entire villages when prompted by mega-landowners, corporations, etc.
The country's military was discovered to have lured young farm boys to seek a job with the military, then simply killed them, dressed them in guerrilla clothing, put guns in their hands, took photos for "proof" they had been killed attacking the military, and were given credits for enemy kills, and rewards! The process was called "Double Positives" and it was a huge story in the Washington Post when it finally was covered in the US, after it had been happening for years.
If you start researching this astounding violence in Colombia, you may well nearly have nightmares about it. They even murdered women town elders disliked for being town drunks, or otherwise embarrassing, or even vendors who made the town look shabby.
Thank you for your post, Goddessartist.
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