Month: October 2022

Where we left off in my previous post, my father at the time was being trained to become a child soldier for the guerillas, also known as the FMLN. Again, THANKFULLY, he escaped (or else I would not be here lol).

After experiencing what he went through, he came back to his grandmother, Mamá Santo, who was waiting for him, worried that she would never get to see her child again. Although he had hoped that the situation in his homeland would get better, it did not–thanks to the U.S. The U.S. always had a relationship with El Salvador since 1963, but since the start of this war, Reagan and the U.S. government were pouring millions and a result of more that 4.5 BILLION dollars were spent on this conflict. Aiding the Salvadoran government, the U.S. was giving them military equipment and training in order to fight back the guerillas who were pushing for communism. In doing all this, the U.S. ended up making things worse and fueling even more violence into a country whose people were already begging for mercy.

“Central America Wars, 1980s.” Peace History, 18 July 2022, http://peacehistory-usfp.org/central-america-wars/.

The U.S. had no business involving themselves in a war that did not affect them in any way, shape, or form. What they thought was helping was actually making things worse for the people of El Salvador by feeding into the violence.

One of the biggest massacres that we have experienced is the “Masacre de Tanango y Guadalupe” (“Massacre of Tenango and Guadalupe”). It occured in Suchitoto, Cuscatlán and it was the killing and disappearance of thousands of women and children–those presumed to be the most vulnerable in society. Many of the victims were kidnapped by the Army and molded into soldiers, about 250 who died during the war. A majority of the children were also put up for adoption to foreign families, most in the U.S. (of course). This was all in an effort to terrorize the families into compliance. In the mural below, the words read “THEY PLUCKED THE FLOWER, BUT THE ROOTS ARE SPROUTING BETWEEN US”.

“Masacre De Tenango y Guadalupe.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 19 Feb. 2022, https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masacre_de_Tenango_y_Guadalupe.

The BIGGEST massacre during the civil war is El Masacre del Mozote (“The Mozote Massacre”), in El Mozote, Morazán. Between 800 to 1,000 lives were lost during this tragedy, all caused by  the Salvadoran Army’s Atlácatl Battalion (created by the U.S. Army’s School of the Americas). The Atlácatl Battalion was the first unit to be trained by the U.S. and their mission was to go in and eliminate the FMLN camps in that area. The town of Mozote has been neutral during the whole period of the war, so the people were advised to stay in their homes as the army marched through. Unfortunately, once the battalion arrives, they separated the women and children from the men. The next day they began torturing, interrogating, and killing the men, and raping and killing the women and children. In the plaque is states: “THEY HAVE NOT DIED, THEY ARE WITH US, WITH YOU AND WITH ALL OF HUMANITY”.

JCM, teleSUR - lsl -. “Ordenan a Presidente Salvadoreño Abrir Archivos De Matanza El Mozote.” Sitio, TeleSUR, 2 Nov. 2019, https://www.telesurtv.net/news/juex-ordena-bukele-desclasificar-matanza-mozote-20191102-0007.html.

Although it is a bit of a heavy post, I hope you guys learned a bit of lost history. For my next post I will talk about the immigration due to the civil war and hopefully get my father to speak on it again.

Thank you! 🙂

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It was December 25th, 1969, my father, Jesus Manuel Alvarez, was born into a country that could barely keep it’s head up. Throughout his childhood he has seen his homeland develop into a warzone, one of which he could never escape of even after immigrating.

Mendoza, Por Insy. “Negocios De Santa Rosa De Lima Afectados Por Hurtos: Noticias De El Salvador.” Elsalvador.com, 19 Apr. 2018, https://historico.elsalvador.com/historico/472712/negocios-de-santa-rosa-de-lima-afectados-por-hurtos.html.

My father was born in Santa Rosa de Lima, El Salvador in the department of La Unión. It was a very poor neighborhood, where ten years later in 1979, it was controlled by guerillas led by the communist movement (FMLN) in an effort to combat the government of El Salvador. My father’s father, Esteban Alvarez, was a business man, who unfortunately died during an earthquake in Nicaragua during the time that the Civil War was going on. My father was then raised by his grandmother, Mamá Santo, because his mother, Mamá Julia, was reliving her life with his step-father, Papá Toño.

My father tells me that he “lived in fear and was afraid to go to school because [he] knew that the guerillas would look for recruits, even though [he] was only a child”. He saw “dead bodies of women, children, and men on [his] way to school and would not dare to look at the soldiers and rebels in the eyes of fear that [he] too, would be next”. But let’s backtrack… why did this Civil War even start? Well for starters, the government of El Salvador (at the time called the Revolutionary Government of Junta) promised the Salvadoran people an improvement in their living and working conditions. Time and time again, the people were disappointed by the governments efforts and caused the FMLN to take matters into their own hands.

My father recalls both sides, the government military and the guerillas, looking to recruit people into their forces. Whereas the government was focused on recruiting men, the FMLN was interested in getting the women and children to join them. They would often threaten them with the death of a loved one or even their own lives. My father has been recruited by both sides since the age of nine, he did not even get to experience a regular childhood. He recalls the government snatching him up from the street and explaining to him what his responsibility to his country was, thankfully he escaped. Not long after, my father remembers the FMLN coming to the elementary, middle, and high schools to look for children in order to transform them into child soldiers. My father was one of the few children that they had picked out and he recalls “having no fear, for he was so used to the daily trauma that [he] had to experience.

“A Civil War in El Salvador Tore Them Apart. Their High School Reunion Brought Them Back Together.” Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Times, 9 Jan. 2020, https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-01-09/el-salvador-war-high-school-reunion.

I hope you guys enjoyed, it took a while for me to be able to get my father to talk about this topic. For the next blog I will continue talking about the civil war and the result that it had for people like my father and how it left the people of El Salvador.

Thank you! 🙂

When we think of communism, the first thing that comes to mind for most people is the Soviet Union. Communism also made its way into other countries like El Salvador.

“Search Media.” Wikimedia Commons, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?search=%2BSalvadoran%2BCommunist%2BParty&title=Special%3AMediaSearch&go=Go&type=image.

The Salvadoran Communist Party was founded in 1930, but it truly came to fruition through Augustín Farabundo Martí leadership in 1932. The party was in favor of the campesinos (farmers), who were getting their land taken without being paid a livable wage. This lead to a revolt against the militaristic dictatorship that El Salvador was in at the time; the lower class citizens in El Salvador attacked military barracks and property of the rich in an attempt to make their voice heard. In retaliation, the president, Hernández Martínez, ordered for the killing of at least 10,000 people who were suspected in participating, or even people who were just indigenous-looking. This is one of the biggest events that has happened in Salvadoran history, it is now know today as “La Matanza” (“The Slaughter”).

Orr, Katie. “Jan. 22, 1932: La Matanza (‘The Massacre’) Begins in El Salvador.” Zinn Education Project, 23 Jan. 2021, https://www.zinnedproject.org/news/tdih/la-matanza.

Skipping forward to 1967, this was the year when Col. Fidel Sánchez Hernández was elected president in El Salvador. At this point in time, the country was facing some economic difficulties, especially in regards to Honduras; known as “La Guerra del Fútbol” (“The Football War”) or “Guerra de Cien Horas” (“100 Hour War”). The name comes from the football matches that El Salvador has had against Honduras in the World Cup; although it may seem insignificant, the conflict was way deeper than this and the situation only got more tense with FIFA (1970). Honduras is three times the size of El Salvador and even though both countries were under a similar government dictatorship, the Salvadoran people thought that they would have a better chance of making a living in Honduras. Unfortunately, Hondurans did not receive the Salvadoran people warmly, in fact they established a land reform act to place blame on the immigrants and began to deport them. Everything really went down on the last match that El Salvador and Honduras had, on July 14th, 1969, El Salvador beat Honduras 3-2, the war began. El Salvador invaded Honduras and more than 6,ooo Hondurans and 100,000 Salvadorans died at the result of this conflict. It did not last long, hence the name 100 Hour War, but it is unfortunate to see so many lives lost and the tension between these two countries that still exist today.

MiPatria. “Resumen De La Guerra De Las 100 Horas.” MIPATRIA.NET, 10 Nov. 2019, https://mipatria.net/guerra-de-las-100-horas/.

I hope y’all learned something interesting from this because I definitely did. For the next blog I will be going into depth about the civil war that occurred in El Salvador.

Thank you! 🙂