Central America, the Caribbean and South America become the battleground for a test of wills between the United States and the U.S.S.R. -- as the Cold War comes to America's "backyard."

After World War II, growing nationalism in Central and South America led to greater resentment against the United States, whose government and business interests dominated the region. At that time in Guatemala, the railroad, the main port, telecommunications and about 500,000 acres of land were owned by the United Fruit Company of Boston.

In 1950, Jacobo Arbenz was voted Guatemala's president. Arbenz wanted to modernize Guatemala's backward society and started a land reform program, nationalizing thousands of acres of land -- some of it owned by United Fruit. Officials in Washington were alarmed and suspected communist infiltration of the Arbenz government. Arbenz wasn't a communist, but some of his allies were.

The CIA organized an operation code-named "PB Success," which mobilized disaffected Guatemalan exiles and peasants into action. The PB Success campaign brought down Guatemala's government and drove Arbenz and his wife into exile. Some 9,000 of his supporters were arrested. Among those who fled Guatemala was a young Argentine doctor, Che Guevara -- who went to Mexico, where he met Cuban rebel leader Fidel Castro.
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