A Revolution In Mexico Essay Research Paper — страница 2

same year Zapata denounced Madero as president and took the position for himself. In the course of his campaigns, Zapata distributed lands taken from the haciendas. Zapata and his guerrillas adopted the slogan “Tierra y Libertad” (”Land and Liberty”). It was during this time that the country broke into many different factions, and guerilla units roamed across the country destroying and burning down many large haciendas and ranchos. The lands not destroyed were left for the peasants. Madero was taken prisoner and executed and the entire country existed in a state of disorder for several years. Pancho Villa rampaged through the north, and different factions fought for presidential control. Francisco Villa (l877-1923), Mexican revolutionary; and bandit in Northern Mexico was

a slightly different version of Emiliano Zapata. Both revolutionaries were revered by the peasants they fought for. In l910 Villa joined the rebels and fought vigorously for Pres. Madero and later against Gen. Huerta and Pres. Carranza. Both Villa and Zapata occupied Mexico City in 1914 and 1915. Villa was defeated in 1915 by General Alvaro Obregon. After Villa’s men killed some American citizens in Columbus, New Mexico in 1916 a U.S. army expedition pursued Villa in Mexico for 11 months without success. Villa became a national hero despite his destructive and often undirected rebel ways. Eventually, Venustiano Carranza rose to the presidency, and organized an important convention whose outcome was the Constitution of 1917, which is still in effect today. Pleasing the lower

class peoples of Mexico, Carranza made land reform an important part of that constitution. This resulted in the ejido, or farm cooperative program that redistributed much of the country’s land from the wealthy land holders to the peasants. The ejidos are still in place today and comprise nearly half of all the farmland in Mexico. The United States interest in Mexican affairs, aside from any other considerations, was heavily influenced by investments by American businesses, worth more than $1 billion, which had taken place under pro-US dictator Porfirio Diaz. He was overthrown in a revolution in 1910 led by Francisco Madero, promising democratic reforms. This caused concern among the American investors, and Madero in turn was overthrown by the US-backed General Victoriano Huerta

in 1913. Huerta, however, had Madero murdered, and this was too much for Wilson. Pancho Villa made raids into the United States hoping to provoke an American counterattack that would lead to the fall of Carranza. In 1916, Carranza agrees to allow an American military force, led by General J. Perhsing, to enter northern Mexico to crush Villa’s rebel army. American troops advanced 500 km into Mexican territory, and never did find Villa, but they attacked some regular Mexican army units. Villa’s plan had worked as this misunderstanding almost led to open war between the US and Mexico. Talks were held to settle the problems, but by April 1917, the United States had entered the First World War and their troops were withdrawn from Mexico. Villa continued his guerrilla activities

until Carranza was finally overthrown in 1920. Villa then agreed to retire from politics all together. On June 20, 1923, Villa was assassinated on his ranch in Parral. President Woodrow Wilson’s foreign policy continued and expanded US military intervention in the Caribbean and Central America, invading the Dominican Republic in 1916, Haiti in 1915 (American troops stay until 1934), and Nicaragua twice, once in 1912-1925 and again in 1927-1933. American marines landed in Cuba between 1906 and 1908, invaded again in 1912, and in 1917 (the last time to prevent Cuba from increasing sugar prices). Honduras was invaded by US troops in 1905, the first of five interventions over the next 20 years. In 1921, the then US president, Calvin Coolidge, supports the overthrow of President

Herrera of Guatemala, to protect the US-owned United Fruit Company. In El Salvador in 1932, the United States sent a naval force to help put down a communist rising there. All of these countries have a dislike for the United States that was demonstrated in the article. Everyone, Zepeda recalled, hated the U. S. soldiers. He said he heard stories that the tortilleras, the women who made tortillas, had even killed a few American soldiers.