Radio Liberacion

When I went to Guatemala I was lucky enough to sit in on a lecture about La Voz Popular, a radio station run by the guerrillas during the country's civil war. They were able to update indigenous people about the war, offer medical advice for people living in rural areas, and play nuevas canciones (protest music) to keep up the spirits of the soldiers.

But recently, I learned about another way that radio was used in Guatemala in the form of Radio Liberacion, a radio station created by the CIA. This broadcast in the 1950s during Guatemala's "Democratic Spring" when President Arbenz initiated land reforms that pissed off US businessmen (the United Fruit Company).

Nancy Updike does a great job in piecing this story together with a powerful ending, reminding us the role that the US played in the hundreds of thousands of people murdered and the thousands of people disappeared.