Higuch, Hélio/ Fracchia, Antonio Luis Sapienza Operation Power Pack. Volume 1: Civil War in the Dominican Republic, 1965

One volume in the series Latin America @ War. During the 1950s and 1960s, during the rule of Rafael Trujillo over the Dominican Republic, the armed forces of the Dominican Republic experienced a major military upsurge. In particular, the Dominican Air Force (FAD) grew stronger and stronger. This pattern was followed by short-lived governments of Rafael's brother Héctor, then Joaquin Balaguer and Rafael Bonnelly. On 27 February 1963, Juan Emilio Bosch Gaviño was sworn in as the first democratically elected president of the Dominican Republic. He attempted to implement a series of social reforms, but immediately incurred the wrath of the business magnates and the military, who began spreading rumours that Bosch was a communist. On 25 September 1963, the president was overthrown in a coup d'état by a group of 25 military officers led by General Elias Wessin y Wessin, who installed Donald Reid Cabral as the new president. Unsurprisingly, Reid failed to find support among the population and several factions became embroiled in a power struggle. The so-called Lealistas (loyalists), led by Generals Pedro Benoit and Antonio Imbert, sought to maintain a military dictatorship. The Constitutionalistas (constitutionalists), led by General Francisco Caamaño and allied with the Dominical Revolutionary Party, supported Bosch. On 24 April 1965, three non-commissioned officers demanded a meeting with President Reid. When he refused and sent the chief of staff Riviera Cuesta instead, he was arrested. A group of military constitutionalists then took over the radio station Radio Santo Domingo and called for an uprising, while other officers began distributing weapons to their civilian sympathisers. The calls on the radio prompted several units to defect and abandon their position. Reid appointed General Wessin y Wessin as the new Chief of Staff and tried to rally the remaining forces around him and quash the rebellion. However, the constitutionalistas stormed the presidential palace in Santo Domingo and arrested him. The lealistas responded by launching air strikes against numerous constitutionalista positions and deployed a warship to bomb the National Palace. Fearing that the mob that had gathered in front of the palace might lynch Reid, and since Bosch had already lost the support of the loyalists, the rebel leader Francisco Caamaño who by now commanded over 6,500 armed men released the president. At this point, the United States of America became active. Initially, US diplomats planned to evacuate some 3,500 US citizens, and in the early morning of 27 April, over 1,100 expatriates were flown out of the country. However, when Lealista's troops marched on the capital, while the rebels occupied further positions, executed a number of police officers and a US Marine Corps soldier was killed by a rebel sniper, the US ambassador declared the insurgents communists and called on US President Lyndon B. Johnson to act immediately. Against the advice of his advisors, Johnson ordered the evacuation to be transformed into a full-scale military intervention: Operation Power Pack. The first open U.S. military intervention in Latin America in more than 30 years was launched in the early morning of 30 April 1965 and involved 22,500 troops, two aircraft carriers, and over 200 aircraft and helicopters. After weeks of often chaotic fighting and two failed ceasefires, a truce was brokered by the Organization of American States (OAS). US troops were replaced by 1,500 OAS troops and began a gradual withdrawal at the end of May 1965, but the civil war did not end until 31 August with a ceasefire agreement. Operation Power Pack is the first military history of the civil war and the interventions of the United States and the OAS in the Dominican Republic in 1965 and is richly illustrated with authentic photographs and specially produced colour profiles.