History Of The Banana Republic

Introduction In the beginning, bananas could not make its way to the United States or anywhere internationally without getting spoiled. Bananas were mainly sold within Latin America, until refrigeration came along to help maintain the produce’s freshness, allowing it to be sold in the international market. The United States is one of the trading partners to the fruit companies selling bananas. These fruit companies in the early 1900s were called The United Fruit Company, Cuyamel Fruit Company, and the Vaccaro Bros (O’Nella). The fruit companies brought off plantations and expanded their land, profiting greatly in the process of selling, growing, and trading. Their success led the Latin American government to ask the fruit companies to help
However, the workers of the companies were unhappy with their working conditions and wages, which brought upon a democratic revolution in Guatemala. The elected presidents decreased the profit of the fruit companies with reforms, so the fruit companies manipulated their trading partner, The United States of America, in using their resources to overthrow the Guatemalan government for the company to maintain their profits. The Banana Republic took the effects of the cold war to use the United States’ government resources to aid in overthrowing the Guatemalan elected president Jacobo Arbenz to maintain profit for its company, using propaganda. This paper will first discuss the matter of why the fruit company made the decision on overthrowing the Guatemalan government, then how they went onto proceeding with their plan using the United States’ Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Next, it will discuss the actions of the CIA in overthrowing Arbenz using the Honduras militia and how the United Fruit Company was controlling the entire overthrow using the United States as a weapon. Mainly focusing on what the United Fruit Company did to maintain its wealth and
Power comes from owning land, being wealthy enough to control an army, and manipulative enough to have others work. The United Fruit Company had those features, which allowed them to successful overthrow president Jacobo Arbenz and control Guatemala. Using their connections with the Dulles brothers to allow themselves to be partners with the United States, allowed easy access to the White House. The ideology of communism being bad by the United States was what the United Fruit Company used to bring the powerful United States on their side. The United Fruit Company’s propaganda campaign was led by Edward Bernays to elude that Guatemala might turn communist caused the United States to take actions on their own to try to prevent a country in the western hemisphere from turning red (Morey). The United Fruit Company ruled over the Banana Republic for decades, controlling the people in Latin America. The military killed people who rebelled or who were thought to be part of an insurgency. The company distorted the development of the middle class, who are the core of democracy and equality (Coha). United Fruit is the main controller the banana industry and it protected it from Arbenz reforms that challenged the control of the United Fruit