Chapter 11 Self-assessment

. The statement "We need to go up the hill before they come down" represents

a) The belief among anticommunist Latin American military officers that it was necessary to drive the leftist guerrillas out of their rural sanctuaries by force.

b) The belief among Latin American leftist revolutionaries that the conservative elites would never surrender power without a fight.

c) The belief among anticommunist Latin American reformists that it was necessary to relieve poverty in order to prevent violent revolution by the masses.

d) The belief among US policymakers that Latin American conservatives would not and could not fight communism effectively without training and support from the US.

. Latin America did not receive any US assistance under the Marshall Plan.

a) True.

b) False.

. The Alliance for Progress' most significant and lasting benefits came in the form of

a) Its support for democratic government.

b) Its implementation of land reform.

c) Its funding of infrastructure projects in sectors such as transportation, health, education, water, and power.

d) Its impact on the sophistication of Latin America's finance and credit mechanisms.

. The Rio Treaty of 1947 committed the United States and the Latin American countries to

a) Jointly uphold standards of civil and human rights in the hemisphere, and impose consequences on governments that violated them.

b) Eradicate communism from the Western Hemisphere and if possible the rest of the world.

c) Contribute funds to an Inter-American Development Bank that would fund projects throughout the Americas.

d) Provide military assistance to each other in the event of an armed attack or threats of aggression against any of them.

. Which of the following statements about the School of the Americas is FALSE?

a) The US military trained thousands of Latin American soldiers and officers in counterinsurgency, irregular warfare, surveillance, interrogation, and other techniques.

b) In response to criticism, it was shut down in 1984.

c) Its graduates included the most egregious human rights violators among Latin American militaries.

d) Its curriculum included required courses on human rights and democratic values.

. Which of the following statements is TRUE?

a) Because of its excessive human-rights abuses, the Guatemalan military government eventually lost the support of the United States.

b) Guatemala's military government failed to increase agricultural yields through its agrarian development programs.

c) The commander of the brutal counterinsurgency campaign in Zacapa province ascended to the presidency of Guatemala in 1970.

d) In the late 1960s Guatemala's government arrested and prosecuted the worst of the death-squad commanders in order to repair the damage to its public image at home and abroad.

. Which of the following statements about the Brazilian coup of 1964 is FALSE?

a) João Goulart had moved his economic policies rapidly leftward in the months before the coup plotters struck.

b) General Humberto Castelo Branco, the regime's first president, was himself later deposed from within and replaced by a more moderate figure.

c) United States officials gave their approval of the coup in advance, and Washington immediately recognized the new military regime and provided financial assistance.

d) The urban middle classes of Brazil's major cities had been publicly marching for Goulart's ouster.

. "Operation Condor" was

a) The Argentine military regime's plan for winning the soccer World Cup on home soil.

b) The international network of anticommunist espionage and counterinsurgency cooperation among the military regimes of the Southern Cone.

c) The term used by the Argentine military for "disappearing" people by dropping them from cargo planes into the Atlantic Ocean.

d) The term used by the Argentine military regime for taking the infant children of "disappeared" women and giving them to loyal families to raise as their own.

. Which of the following statements about the killing of Orlando Letelier is FALSE?

a) It also claimed the life of an American citizen.

b) It showed that political moderates, not just radicals, were risking their lives if they opposed Pinochet's regime.

c) It exemplifies the transnational reach of the dirty wars of the Southern Cone dictatorships.

d) It helped turn the Reagan administration against the Pinochet regime.

. The "Chicago boys" were

a) A group of University of Chicago-trained neoliberal economists trained who advised the Pinochet regime.

b) Pinochet's infamous team of international hitmen.

c) Marxist Chilean university students radicalized during their study abroad years.

d) The left-wing terrorist cell that unsuccessfully tried to assassinate Pinochet in 1986.

. Which of the following was NOT a consequence of Pinochet's economic reforms?

a) Deregulation and consolidation in the banking sector exposed savers and small investors to greater financial risk.

b) The economic and political influence of organized labor was greatly reduced.

c) The re-privatization of copper mining created new opportunities for major foreign investment.

d) Chile experienced both recovery and bust during Pinochet's long dictatorship, but overall saw respectable economic growth rates.

. From the 1940s through the 1960s Mexico experienced the highest economic growth rates in Latin America and some of the highest in the world.

a) True

b) False

. Mexico's long-serving President Adolfo López Mateos of the PRI routinely won re-election with over 90% of the vote.

a) True.

b) False.

. Which of the following statements is FALSE?

a) Urban and middle-class Mexicans generally acquiesced in the military's violent repression of rural unrest.

b) One major consequence of the "Green Revolution" in Mexico was rising migration of campesinos from the countryside to Mexico's cities and to the United States.

c) The contrasting fates of campesino activists Rubén Jaramillo, Genaro Vázquez, and Lucio Cabañas show how the PRI was willing to tolerate rebelliousness within the Mexican Revolutionary family but not from the Cuban-inspired Mexican Left.

d) Mexico's security forces benefitted from easy access to US weaponry and equipment.

. The use of cruise ships as accommodation for ecotourism in the Galápagos Islands (and elsewhere) reduces the impact on the local environment but also reduces the economic benefits available to local residents and workers.

a) True.

b) False.

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