Customer Reviews

Searching for Everardo: A Story of Love, War, and the CIA in Guatemala

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The "Kirkus" review above criticizes Harbury for being unwilling to recognize that her husband Everardo was a combattant, indeed a commander, in a war and therefore subject to the consequences of war. Firstly, the accusation is false; Harbury was well aware that her husband was fighting a war, and she never demanded that the Guatemalan government release him. Her constant demand was that the Guatemalan authorities acknowledge his capture, treat him humanely and try him in a public and fair manner. One almost has to wonder if the "Kirkus" reviewer read the book or only someone else's synopsis! Secondly, Harbury's emotional attachment to the subject of her book might allow her to be less than analytical and reserved in the language she uses to describe the events she lived through and her love for the man whom the Guatemalan authorities brutally tortured for months on end. Torture, whatever the "Kirkus" reviewer might think, is not a morally acceptable practice which we just must expect without protest in wartime. This book probably does not have the enduring classic value of "I, Rigoberta Menchu", but it is significant and powerful reading for anyone who cares about Guatemala or justice.

Searching for Everardo is an emotionally moving book that tells the story of not just one man - but an entire race of people during a very violent period for their country. The Kirkus Review condemns the author for not acknowledging that her husband was a commander of the guerilla forces and therefore,they imply, somehow deserving of his capture, torture and death. Harbury clearly recognizes her husband's position in the war throughout the book and the Kirkus Review makes one see how necessary his struggle, the struggle of class and race, has been throughout history. We still have a long way to go in ending racism - the world over.

... and was left with a deep gratitude to Jennifer Harbury for so vividly and compellingly giving us Everardo, for so intimately letting us into their intimacies and love, for revealing to us a Guatemala few know, for having the courage to go there, deep into the mountains, and to bring out so vibrantly all these people who live precipitously on the edge in their quest for freedom - and for daring to love so deeply in such a dangerous situation, for holding fast to that love in her search for Everardo. Her speaking to him throughout the book reminds me, the reader, over and over, that this is not simply story, but real life. I found Jennifer's language to be utterly absorbing and her telling of this real life to be striking, commanding. It's a book I can't push away from, it keeps following me around weeks after I've finished reading.

I have to say, Jennifer Harbury is a inspirational figure to me in this modern world. The strength is must have took to live the life that she did and to rehash it through documentation...amazing.

The "Kirkus" review criticizes her for "flowery" language. I just want to say that there's no such thing as an unbiased historical account. Harbury presents the book as a memoir of what she lived through in the search for her HUSBAND, and the truth of his disappearance and death, not as an objective outsiders look at the US and Guatemalan military/government relationships. If her words tend to become laced with emotion, it's because she's human and she's talking about a human relationship.

Overall, Harbury doesn't claim to be a literary giant. She is a woman telling her story, from her perspective, as it happened to her. It's a compelling and tragic adventure that inspires us all to be a little more aware, a little more concerned, a little stronger, and a little more determined.

This book was recommended to me in 1997 while traveling to Guatemala for the first time. The book is very captivating and interesting, providing not just a love story between the author and Everado, her husband, but inside info about the 36 year civil war in Guatemala that "ended" with a Peace Treaty in 1996. This book is very sad, disturbing, and yet, empowering. Jennifer Harbury stands firm in the face of adversity and intense opposition from the US (CIA) and Guatemalan governments. She pursued justice at all cost, for the sake of the poor in Guatemala and her beloved Everado. Tragic story, yet very enlightening.

Searching for Everardo is one of the most touching books I've read in awhile. This book truly opened my eyes to a world I've never really seen. Harbury's writing is eloquent, natural, and most of all honest. Not only do you learn about a history that isn't told in school books, but you also learn about human nature -- both good and bad. I would highly recommend Searching for Everardo to anyone who wants his/her eyes opened a little bit. This book might not change the world or its politics, but it will change the reader, and we can only cause change to happen one step at a time.

Harbury's book is magnificent. It allows readers to glimpse the truth, the agony, behind civil war in Central and South America; and it explores every inch of the tear-stained emotions of the author. It has eyes that see the entire circle of human affairs, exploding into a grisly flow of blood that allows for no escape. The author paints a world of pain and joy, and of irrevocable loss; I cried at its conclusion. The book lodged itself into my soul and has not ever left.

Harbury's book tells a griping and human story about a woman's search for the truth. A "Reader" who left a negative review is mistaken in his/her accusation that Harbury and Bamaca were never married, sadly this is one of the lies that the Guatemalan Government has spread in a attempt to discredit Harbury. As to attrocities committed by the Guerillas, its true 3% of all human rights abuses were committed by the Guerillas (this figure is from the UN truth commission the Committee for Historical Clarification). And while there is no excuse for these violations of human rights it must be put into the perspective and compared to the 93% of human rights violations committed by the Guatemalan Army. Harbury's story puts a human face to this effects of a very violent and tragic civil war. However if you want to know more I would recommend " Guatemala: Never Again" by
the archdioses of Guatemala.

This is a courageous book about the struggle of a woman who was in the best position to fight and write, being Everardo's wife, a US-citizen and a lawyer, and above all, a great woman. Noone else could have written it and for this reason the book should not be compared to "I, Rigoberta Menchœ". Its power comes from Harbury's personal involvement and the clarity of her demands: to know the truth and international conventions to be respected. Regardless of one's opinion on Guatemalan guerilla, it must be admitted that her husband was tortured and killed and this fact has been covered-up. All the attempts to minimize this are ridiculous.

This is one of multiple books by this author, and a huge bargain as a used book--I got the used hardcopy. This book is a book-end to Secret History: The CIA's Classified Account of Its Operations in Guatemala, 1952-1954.

The author wrote Bridge of Courage: Life Stories of the Guatemalan Companeros & Companeras first, and then a book that Amazon lists but does not offer for sale nor does it appear easily when trying to insert the product link: Seeds of Rage: CIA Torture Practices from Vietnam to El Salvador to Abu Ghraib.

See also her Truth, Torture, and the American Way: The History and Consequences of U.S. Involvement in Torture. In selecting this title, I see also GUATEMALA: HUMAN RIGHTS LAWYER JENNIFER HARBURY LOSES SUPREME COURT CASE AS FORMER OFFICIALS CLAIM RIGHT TO LIE.: An article from: NotiCen: Central American & Caribbean Affairs which is depressing--the "right to lie" just astounds me.

As a former case officer (spy) with the CIA, in the Latin American area from 1979 to 1988, and now on my way out of Guatemala, this book is one that I am going to rate as beyond 5 stars, 6 stars and above, because it is a phenomenal vortex that brings together genocide (called "the patriotic wars" by the white minority "conquistadores" seeking to keep the 80% indigenous in slave status), CIA complicity in genocide and torture, and the deep, deep honor and courage and intelligence of the indigenous people. See 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus for the larger treatment.

Highlights for me:

Tens of thousands in unmarked graves, but the villagers in each vicinity KNOW the details and have maps [the peace process included truth & reconciliation, a lot of information came out and the process continues to this day, but reconciliation has never occurred--nothing in the vital Socio-Economic Accord of the Peace Agreement has actually been implemented].

Court orders useless in confronting Army (this was before the International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala, CICIG, where I worked for three months, but the reality is that CICIG has focused on high impact cases revolving around corruption, and not on the daily corruption associated with the placement of 80% of the population in servitude)

Mayans who fled to the US were rejected by the Reagan-Bush Administrations that found them "lacking in credibility"--overall this book is an indictment--distilled objective outrage--at the lies that the US Embassy in Guatemala and the US Departments of State and Defense, and the White House back to Tony Lake and Leon Fuerth--has sanctioned. The "right to lie" on the part of the government is in my view both treason and a crime against humanity.

--big lie number one: nationalists and Mayans fighting for human rights were communists

--big lie number two: Army was pursuing a "patriotic war" against communists, rather than a genocidal campaign replete with many other atrocities against an entire civilization that was here centuries before the Conquistadores [as a side note, I believe Spanish intelligence in Guatemala is out of control and probably influenced the first Commissioner of CICIG--a Spaniard--in a very destructive manner).

--big lie number three: Mayans killed prisoners and committed all the atrocities ascribed to common criminals. In fact we now know that with the exception of the Maras who are killing bus drivers as part of their extortion racket, virtually every homicide and most femicide in Guatemala is committed on the orders of the white minority, the "intellectual authors" behind the 147 private security companies with 36,000 registered weapons.

WHAT THE US IS DOING TODAY AGAINST VENEZUELA IS A PRECISE REPEAT OF THESE BIG LIES.

In a conference at a major university here in Guatemala, I pointed out that an honest assessment of what the white minority and the rising business class pay in extortion and in private security is probably three to five times what they would pay in legitimate taxes that would enable the social and security safety nets for all. Guatemala lacks a strategic "net assessment" of where all the money is going and how the United Nations might better use its "Deliver As One" concept to harmonize how all incoming funds (investors, aid, repatriated funds) are spent--this latter point is covered in generic terms in my new book, INTELLIGENCE for EARTH: Clarity, Diversity, Integrity, & Sustainaabilty whose intellectual foundation is the preceding book with 55 authors, Collective Intelligence: Creating a Prosperous World at Peace--both are free online as well as sold at cost at Amazon (which takes 55% off the top).

Mayans "not worth teaching to read" according to the landed aristocracy, but they are worth pressing into service as slaves and common soldiers. No lands, no money, no representation, no rights, but they do have 26 languages that hang on.

Blown away to see the connection between Eduardo the guerrilla and Rodrigo Asturias, whose son Sandino Asturias carries on today with the politically neutral Center for the Study of Guatemala, and is every bit the proven son of a warrior and grand-son of one of two Nobel Laureates from Guatemala.

Rodrigo Asturias and Efrain Bamaca Velaquez shared one bottom line goal that I also share: equal rights for Mayans and the development of Mayan leaders. What the oligarchs and military "hidden powers" do not yet understand is that this is a NON-VIOLENT objective that does NOT confiscate or redistribute wealth. It creates infinite wealth and turns Guatemala into the paradise it would be without the narrow-minded and homicidal views of the white minority.

Eduardo knew his generation's fight was doomed, he was laying a foundation for the next generation.

The author spent two years waiting to climb the volcano with permission.

The level of detail is not only just right, it "frames" the entire matter in such a striking way that one can feel and appreciate the "ground truth" in Guatemala during this period (1990's).

I learn that Mayans refuse foreign fighters and that Eduardo taught and ordered the freeing of all prisoners after they were disarmed.

A large portion of the book is a detailed account of how she was able, with no salary, only contributions, to visit, inform, and mobilize all manner of organizations and a wide variety of US Members of Congress--by tying US aid to resolution of this case, and adding a couple of hunger strikes, she was able to confront two imperial powers--her own in the US and her husband's in Guatemala.

The big insights for me come at the end of the book, and although I am disappointed that discussion of the CIA's role in all this is limited to the fact that CIA was paying the intellectual author of the torture and murder of Eduardo the grand sum of $44,000 a month, the only thing we really learn is that CIA knew Eduardo was captured and alive within weeks of his 1992 capture.

Big Insight #1: Army and Oligarchy thought that simply signing the peace accord would make all the international pressure go away. They think the Mayans, the reformers, and the rest of the world are stupid.

Big Insight #2: The Army--and I have seen unclassified documents closely tying the Army to Israel and to Taiwan, inclusive of deep training in Psychological Operations (PSYOP)--has for over two decades now mounted a very effective anti-foreigner campaign by spreading rumors of foreigners stealing Mayan babies.

The book ends with a reconstruction of Eduardo's final months of torture and exploitation during which he evidently did not give up a single name and in one instance led the Army into an ambush.

I already knew the US Government lacks ethics at all levels, so this was not a big insight for me, but for those who still harbor any view that the US Government is honorable, well-informed, and thoughtful in how it represents the US citizen-taxpayer, get over it. The US Government is OUT OF CONTROL and a crime against humanity on a scale that most simply cannot imagine.

CORRUPTION starts in the US Government as a captive of Wall Street and the banks and the military-industrial-intelligence-congressional complex. It is possible for Guatemala to get its own house in order, but first it must disconnect itself from the source of all corruption in foreign affairs and national security in Latin America, the US Government. Central America must make its own way, become its own region, and eschew all financial and other incentives to "go along" with NAFTA, the IMF, the World Bank, and all the other SUBVERSIVE and morally despicable "initiatives" of the traditional West.

With my two remaining authorized links I recommend:
The Global Class War: How America's Bipartisan Elite Lost Our Future - and What It Will Take to Win It Back
SAVAGE CAPITALISM AND THE MYTH OF DEMOCRACY: Latin America in the Third Millennium

For 1600 reviews in 98 categories supporting the above statement, please visit Phi Beta Iota, the Public Intelligence Blog, where each review leads back to its Amazon page, but they can be browsed in clusters, e.g. Empire, Pathology of Power, US Secret Intelligence, etcetera.

One afterthought relevant to Guatemala and the 5,000 secessionist movements world-wide (at least ten of those within the USA): indigenous people are like cockroaches in their survivability. Now armed with cell phones, they are BOTH everywhere AND well-informed. Trying to put down the indigenous peoples is like trying to machine gun a hoard of cockroaches, or fire ants, or a swarm of bees. IT DOES NOT WORK. Guatemala has one chance to become paradise, to become a country that is prosperous for all and at peace: by restoring land rights to the indigenous peoples, by coming together as one nation (all eight tribes including the cartels in the commercial tribe), and by recognizing that this is not about wealth redistribution, it is about redirecting Guatemala so it can create infinite wealth for all. The human brains of the indigenous, and their cultural heritage, are the ONE infinite resource Guatemala has. Teach them to read, give them all free cell phones, and get out of the way of their entrepreneurial initiative.

Eduardo was the norm, not the anomaly.