# Client dictators: the strongmen the powers kept The strongmen the great powers installed or sustained in the Global South: the coups that made them, from Iran 1953 and Guatemala 1954 to Mobutu and Chile 1973; the clients kept in place, Suharto, Marcos, the Somozas, and Mubarak; and the machinery of Operation Condor and the School of the Americas. *This story part of: Covert operations, coups, and blowback* *This story part of: The Cold War* *This story parallel: Neocolonialism: independence without economic freedom* *This story parallel: Paramilitaries: the armed force between soldier and police* *This story parallel: The Congo: from Leopold to the resource wars* *This story parallel: Banana republics: corporations and the coup* *This story part of: Media, education, and information* *The resource curse: how the South fed the North parallel this story* *The Free World's clients: the West's unfree allies part of this story* *South America: from the Inca to independence parallel this story* *Oil: the industry that fueled the modern world parallel this story* *British troops never left: garrisons, bases, and the leash after empire parallel this story* *Françafrique: how France kept its African colonies after independence part of this story* *Moi's Kenya: the Western-backed one-party state part of this story* *Weaponized incompetence: was the weak state built to be weak? parallel this story* ## June 1936 — The Somoza dynasty rules Nicaragua Anastasio Somoza Garcia seizes power and founds a family dynasty that ran Nicaragua as a private estate for over four decades. Backed by the US-trained National Guard, the Somozas relied on long American support during the Cold War. The often-quoted line that a US president called Somoza "our son of a bitch" is likely apocryphal, but it captured how Washington tolerated the dictatorship. ## March 1951 — Mossadegh nationalizes Iran's oil Iran's parliament votes to nationalize the British-owned Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, and Mohammad Mossadegh becomes prime minister on a wave of popular support. Britain, which had drawn huge profits from Iranian oil, responded with an embargo and a naval blockade. The standoff set the stage for the covert campaign that would remove him two years later. ## 19 August 1953 — The Anglo-American coup topples Mossadegh Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh is overthrown and Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi restored to full power. The operation, code-named TPAJAX by the CIA and Operation Boot by Britain's MI6, funded street mobs and bribed officers to force Mossadegh out. The CIA publicly acknowledged its leading role in documents declassified in 2013. ## June 1954 — The CIA overthrows Arbenz in Guatemala Elected president Jacobo Arbenz, whose land reform had seized unused United Fruit Company holdings, is forced out by a CIA operation code-named PBSUCCESS. The agency armed and directed a small exile force under Colonel Carlos Castillo Armas and backed it with a propaganda and air campaign. Declassified files confirm the operation, which opened decades of military rule and civil war. ## 1957 — SAVAK builds the Shah's police state With his throne secured by the 1953 coup, the Shah creates SAVAK, a secret police force that jailed, tortured, and killed dissidents for two decades. Accounts widely credit the CIA and Israel's Mossad with helping train and organize the agency in its early years. SAVAK's repression built the resentment that later fueled the revolution. ## October 1957 — The Duvaliers rule Haiti with the Tontons Macoutes Francois "Papa Doc" Duvalier takes the presidency and builds a reign of terror enforced by a militia known as the Tontons Macoutes, later handing power to his son Jean-Claude. The dynasty killed tens of thousands and drained the treasury while the country stayed the poorest in the hemisphere. The United States, wary of another Cuba, kept aid flowing to the anti-communist regime for most of its rule. ## September 1960 — Washington targets Patrice Lumumba in the Congo Congo's first elected prime minister, Patrice Lumumba, is dismissed in a power struggle months after independence and placed under threat. The US Senate's Church Committee later found that the CIA had plotted to assassinate him, including a scheme to poison him, though he was ultimately killed in January 1961 by Katangan separatists with Belgian involvement. His removal cleared the path for army chief Mobutu. ## 1963 — The School of the Americas trains Latin American officers The US Army's School of the Americas trains thousands of Latin American soldiers, many of whom returned to serve in militaries that carried out coups and repression. Graduates included figures later tied to abuses, and manuals released in 1996 were found to have described coercive interrogation. Critics link the training to later atrocities, while defenders argue the school's curriculum did not cause them; the causal claim is disputed. ## October 1965 — The Indonesian mass killings of 1965 to 1966 After a failed coup blamed on the Communist Party, the army under General Suharto led a purge that killed an estimated half a million to more than a million people. Declassified US cables released in 2017 show American officials welcomed the destruction of the party, and a US embassy official has said he passed lists of suspected communists to the army. Western governments largely acquiesced as the slaughter unfolded. ## 25 November 1965 — Mobutu seizes power in the Congo Army commander Joseph-Desire Mobutu takes full control of the Congo in a coup, ending years of turmoil after independence. Declassified records and the Church Committee's findings show the CIA had cultivated and funded Mobutu since the crisis around Lumumba. Washington backed him as a reliable anti-communist anchor in central Africa, a relationship that lasted three decades. ## March 1967 — Suharto consolidates the New Order Suharto sidelines President Sukarno and takes power himself, launching an authoritarian order that lasted more than thirty years. He opened Indonesia to Western investment and aid and became a favored anti-communist partner of the United States and its allies. Political freedoms stayed tightly restricted for the length of his rule. ## c. 1969 — US military aid sustains a belt of Cold War clients Under the Nixon Doctrine, Washington leaned on friendly regional strongmen to police their own areas, backed by American arms, training, and money rather than US troops. The pattern spread across the Global South, from the Shah's Iran to Mobutu's Zaire and Suharto's Indonesia. Aid and diplomatic cover often continued regardless of a client's record on freedom or human rights. ## September 1970 — Nixon orders covert action against Allende After Salvador Allende's election win, President Nixon instructs the CIA to block him from taking office and to "make the economy scream." The Church Committee documented this covert track, including support for a plot to kidnap the army commander General Rene Schneider, who was killed in a botched attempt. The direct US role in the later 1973 coup remains debated, but the campaign to destabilize Allende is on the record. ## October 1971 — Mobutu turns Zaire into a Cold War client and personal treasury Mobutu renames the Congo as Zaire and himself as Mobutu Sese Seko, tightening a one-party state built on looting the country's wealth. Estimates of his personal fortune ran into the billions while the state collapsed, a pattern that gave rise to the term kleptocracy. The United States, France, and Belgium kept up aid and diplomatic cover for decades, valuing him as an anti-communist ally in the region. ## 21 September 1972 — Marcos declares martial law in the Philippines Ferdinand Marcos suspends the constitution and rules by decree, jailing opponents and censoring the press. Washington kept up military and economic support, prizing the vast Clark and Subic bases and Marcos's anti-communist stance. His family and allies amassed enormous wealth while the economy sank into debt. ## 11 September 1973 — The coup against Allende brings Pinochet to power The Chilean military overthrows the elected socialist president Salvador Allende, who dies in the presidential palace as it is bombed. General Augusto Pinochet takes charge of a junta that ruled for seventeen years. Declassified US documents show years of covert action to undermine Allende and Washington's quick embrace of the new regime, though whether the US organized the coup itself is contested. ## November 1975 — Operation Condor unites the Southern Cone dictatorships The military regimes of Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Bolivia, and Brazil formalize Operation Condor, a network to track and kill exiled opponents across borders. Declassified US documents show Washington knew of the plan and provided communications and other support. The network is blamed for tens of thousands of deaths and disappearances. ## 7 December 1975 — Indonesia invades East Timor Suharto's forces invade the newly independent territory of East Timor, beginning an occupation that killed an estimated 100,000 to 200,000 people. Declassified records show US President Ford and Secretary of State Kissinger met Suharto in Jakarta the day before and signaled approval. The United States and Australia continued to arm and support Jakarta through the occupation. ## 21 September 1976 — Condor assassinates Orlando Letelier in Washington Chilean agents of Pinochet's secret police kill former minister Orlando Letelier with a car bomb in the US capital, also killing his American colleague Ronni Moffitt. It was the deadliest act of foreign state terrorism on US soil at the time and showed Condor's reach beyond Latin America. US investigations later traced the plot to Chile's DINA and its chief, Manuel Contreras. ## December 1976 — Bokassa crowns himself emperor of Central Africa Jean-Bedel Bokassa, who had seized power a decade earlier, declares himself emperor and stages a lavish coronation while his country stayed desperately poor. France bankrolled the ceremony and propped up his rule, valuing access to uranium and a foothold in central Africa. His reign grew notorious for brutality, including the killing of schoolchildren who protested. ## 16 January 1979 — The Iranian Revolution topples the Shah Mass protests drive Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi into exile, and Ayatollah Khomeini returns to lead a new Islamic republic. Decades of repression under SAVAK and resentment of foreign backing, dating to the 1953 coup, fed the uprising. The revolution turned a close Western client into one of America's fiercest adversaries. ## 17 July 1979 — The Sandinistas overthrow Somoza in Nicaragua A broad revolt led by the Sandinista movement forces Anastasio Somoza Debayle to flee, ending more than four decades of family rule. The fall came after the National Guard's brutality, including the on-camera killing of a US journalist, drained the regime's remaining support. Washington's later backing of the Contra rebels against the new government fueled a long and bloody conflict. ## 20 September 1979 — France overthrows its own client Bokassa French paratroopers depose Emperor Bokassa in Operation Barracuda while he is abroad, installing a former president in his place. Paris had bankrolled him for years but moved against him after the massacre of schoolchildren drew international outrage. The episode showed how a patron could discard a strongman once he became a liability. ## October 1981 — Mubarak becomes America's anchor in Egypt Hosni Mubarak takes the presidency after Anwar Sadat's assassination and rules under emergency law for nearly thirty years. Egypt became one of the largest recipients of US military and economic aid, a reward for keeping the peace with Israel after Camp David. Successive American administrations backed his stability while his security services jailed and tortured opponents. ## c. 1982 — The United States tilts toward Saddam Hussein During the Iran-Iraq war, Washington quietly sides with Saddam Hussein's Iraq against revolutionary Iran, removing Iraq from its list of state sponsors of terrorism and restoring ties. Declassified records show intelligence sharing and agricultural credits, and envoy Donald Rumsfeld visited Baghdad in 1983. The scale of this backing is contested, and it reversed sharply after Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990. ## 7 February 1986 — Baby Doc Duvalier flees Haiti Amid mounting protests, Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier leaves Haiti aboard a US-arranged flight, ending twenty-nine years of family dictatorship. The regime had killed and exiled thousands and left the country impoverished. His fall opened a long and unstable struggle to build a democratic order. ## 25 February 1986 — People Power ousts Marcos in the Philippines A peaceful uprising known as People Power, sparked by a fraudulent election and the earlier murder of opposition leader Benigno Aquino, forces Ferdinand Marcos to flee. The United States, long his backer, finally withdrew support and flew him into exile in Hawaii. Corazon Aquino took office and restored democratic rule. ## 5 October 1988 — Chile votes No to Pinochet In a plebiscite meant to extend his rule, Chileans vote No and force Augusto Pinochet to accept a return to elections. The peaceful campaign broke the fear that his secret police had spread for fifteen years. Pinochet left the presidency in 1990, though he kept command of the army and a seat in the senate. ## February 1991 — Chile's truth commission counts the dead Chile's Rettig Commission publishes an official account of killings and disappearances under Pinochet, naming more than two thousand victims. It followed Argentina's earlier Nunca Mas report of 1984, which documented the crimes of that country's junta. These commissions set a model for reckoning with dictatorship through documented truth rather than silence. ## 17 May 1997 — Mobutu is overthrown in Zaire A rebellion led by Laurent-Desire Kabila, backed by Rwanda and Uganda, drives the ailing Mobutu from power after thirty-two years. With the Cold War over, his Western patrons no longer needed him and let him fall. He died in exile months later, leaving a hollowed-out state that soon plunged into a devastating regional war. ## 21 May 1998 — Suharto resigns amid the Asian crisis After the Asian financial crisis wrecked Indonesia's economy and mass protests filled the streets, Suharto steps down after more than three decades in power. His fall opened the way for democratic reform and, later, independence for East Timor. Investigations put the wealth taken by his family and circle among the largest of any modern ruler. ## 16 October 1998 — Pinochet is arrested in London British police detain Augusto Pinochet on a Spanish warrant seeking his extradition for torture and murder. Though he was eventually sent home on health grounds, the arrest established that a former head of state could be pursued abroad for human rights crimes. It marked a turning point in the idea that such rulers might one day face justice.