In 1954, the CIA executed Operation PBSuccess to overthrow democratically elected President Jacobo Arbenz after he introduced land reform threatening United Fruit Company's holdings. The CIA created a phantom rebel army of fewer than 200 men, broadcast fake radio reports claiming 5,000 invaders were advancing, and maintained detailed assassination lists of targets. The operation had a $2.7M budget (estimated $5-7M total) and involved over 100 CIA agents. Declassified documents, including CIA assassination manuals, confirmed the operation.
“The CIA planned and directed the overthrow of the Guatemalan government, including the preparation of assassination lists.”
What they said vs. what the evidence shows
“The people of Guatemala have liberated themselves from the shackles of Communist infiltration.”
— President Eisenhower · Jun 1954
SourceFrom “crazy” to confirmed
The Claim Is Made
This is the moment they called it crazy.
When Guatemalan President Jacobo Arbenz introduced a land reform program in 1951, he was trying to address one of Central America's most glaring inequalities. A handful of wealthy landowners, many connected to the American fruit trade, controlled vast territories while peasants worked in poverty. Arbenz's modest redistribution threatened the holdings of the United Fruit Company, a Boston-based corporation that had shaped Guatemalan politics for decades.
By 1954, the Eisenhower administration had decided Arbenz had to go. The official justification was straightforward: he was a communist threat during the Cold War, a domino waiting to fall in America's backyard. This was the story told to Congress, the press, and the American public. For decades, it held.
What actually happened was far more calculated and duplicitous than any public statement acknowledged. The CIA, under authorization from President Eisenhower and Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, launched Operation PBSuccess—a covert action designed to topple a democratically elected government using methods that would seem more at home in a spy thriller than in official U.S. foreign policy.
The operation's tools were propaganda, intimidation, and preparation for assassination. The CIA assembled a phantom rebel force of fewer than 200 men, commanded by an exiled Guatemalan colonel. This ragtag group was never intended to win a military victory. Instead, the agency's psychological warfare specialists broadcast false radio reports claiming that an invading army of 5,000 was sweeping across the country. Guatemalan listeners heard tales of military defeats and advances that never happened. The broadcasts were so effective that Arbenz's own military commanders, believing they faced an overwhelming force, lost the will to fight.
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Confirmed: They Were Right
The truth comes out. Officially documented.
Confirmed: They Were Right
The truth comes out. Officially documented.
Running parallel to the radio deception was something darker: assassination planning. Declassified CIA documents, including assassination manuals recovered by the National Security Archive, revealed that operatives maintained detailed lists of Guatemalan officials and political figures marked for elimination. These weren't idle contingencies—they were operational tools prepared in advance of the coup.
The operation cost $2.7 million officially, though historians estimate the true total approached $5 to $7 million when all expenses are calculated. Over 100 CIA agents were deployed to execute the plan. By August 1954, facing psychological defeat and believing he faced military annihilation, Arbenz resigned. He fled Guatemala, eventually dying in exile in Mexico in 1971.
For years, the U.S. government denied or minimized its role. The official story blamed internal Guatemalan politics, communist agitation, or a homegrown rebellion. It wasn't until decades later, after congressional investigations and the declassification of CIA documents, that the full scope of the operation became undeniable. The National Security Archive's collection of declassified materials provided the paper trail: memos, plans, budget documents, and operational details that confirmed what critics had long alleged.
The Guatemala operation matters because it wasn't an anomaly—it was a template. It demonstrated that the CIA was willing to overthrow elected governments, orchestrate propaganda campaigns, and prepare assassination rosters, all in service of corporate and geopolitical interests. That precedent would echo through the Cold War and beyond, shaping covert operations for decades.
When the official story crumbles under declassified evidence, it forces a reckoning. It reveals not just what happened in one country in 1954, but raises a fundamental question: how many other official narratives await similar deconstruction?
Unlikely leak
Only 15.8% chance this would come out. It did.
Conspirators
~1,000Large op
Secret kept
42.9 years
Time to 95% exposure
500+ years
