Rafael Trujillo
Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina (24 October 1891 – 30 May 1961), nicknamed El Jefe (Spanish: [el ˈxefe])), was a Dominican military commander and dictator who ruled the Dominican Republic from August 1930 until his assassination in May 1961.[2] He served as president from 1930 to 1938 and again from 1942 to 1952, ruling for the rest of his life as an unelected military strongman under figurehead presidents.[Note 1] His rule of 31 years, known to Dominicans as the Trujillo Era (Spanish: El Trujillato or La Era de Trujillo), was one of the longest for a non-royal leader in the world, and centered around a personality cult of the ruling family. It was also one of the most brutal; Trujillo's security forces, including the infamous SIM, were responsible for perhaps as many as 50,000 murders. These included between 12,000 and 30,000 Haitians in the infamous Parsley massacre in 1937, which continues to affect Dominican-Haitian relations to this day.
This article is about the former dictator of the Dominican Republic. For the Spanish sailor, see Rafael Trujillo (sailor).
Rafael Trujillo
Position established
None
Rafael Estrella Ureña (1930–1932)
Vacant (1932–1934)
Jacinto Peynado (1934–1938)
Rafael Estrella Ureña (Acting)
30 May 1961 (aged 69)
Ciudad Trujillo, Dominican Republic
Assassination by gunshot
- Héctor Trujillo (brother)
- Alma McLaughlin (sister-in-law)
- Soldier
- Politician
- businessman
1916–1961
Generalissimo
(1934–1961)
During his long rule, the Trujillo government's extensive use of state terrorism was prolific even beyond national borders, including the attempted assassination of Venezuelan President Rómulo Betancourt in 1960, the abduction and disappearance in New York City of the Basque exile Jesús Galíndez in 1956,[3] and the murder of Spanish writer José Almoina in Mexico, also in 1960.[4] These acts, particularly the presumed murder of Galíndez, a naturalized US citizen, the attempted murder of Betancourt, a staunch critic of Trujillo, and the murder of the Mirabal sisters, who were among his most notable opponents, in 1960, eroded relations between the Dominican Republic and the international community and ushered in OAS sanctions and economic and military assistance to Dominican opposition forces. After this momentous year, large segments of the Dominican establishment, including the military, turned against him.
On 30 May 1961, he was assassinated by a group of conspirators led by general Antonio Imbert Barrera. In the immediate aftermath, Trujillo's son Ramfis took temporary control of the country, executing most of the conspirators. By November 1961, the Trujillo family was pressured into exile by the titular president Joaquín Balaguer, who introduced reforms to open up the regime. The murder ushered in civil strife which concluded with the Dominican Civil War and a US-OAS intervention, eventually stabilised under a multi-party system in 1966.
The Trujillo era unfolded in a Hispanic Caribbean environment particularly susceptible to dictators.[Note 2] In the countries of the Caribbean Basin alone, his dictatorship overlapped with those in Cuba, Nicaragua, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Venezuela and Haiti. In perspective, the Trujillo dictatorship has been judged more prominent and more brutal than its contemporaries.[6] Trujillo remains a polarizing figure in the Dominican Republic, as the sheer longevity of his rule makes a detached evaluation difficult. While his supporters credit him for bringing long-term stability, economic growth and prosperity, doubling life expectancy of average Dominicans and multiplying the GDP,[7] critics denounce the heavy-handed and violent nature of his regime, including the murder of tens of thousands, his open racism and xenophobia towards Haitians, as well as the Trujillo family's nepotism, widespread corruption and looting of the country's natural and economic resources.
Early life[edit]
Rafael Leónidas Trujillo y Molina was born on 26 October 1891 in San Cristóbal, Dominican Republic, into a lower-middle-class family.[8]
His father was José Trujillo Valdez, the son of Silveria Valdez Méndez of colonial Dominican origin and José Trujillo Monagas, a Canary Islander sergeant who arrived in Santo Domingo as a member of the Spanish reinforcement troops during the annexation era.
Trujillo's mother was Altagracia Julia Molina Chevalier, later known as Mamá Julia, daughter of peasant Pedro Molina Peña, also of colonial Dominican origin, and teacher Luisa Erciná Chevalier, whose parents were of creole Haitian origin.[9][10]
Chevalier, Trujillo's maternal grandmother, was the daughter of Justin Victor Turenne Carrié Blaise, who was of French descent, and Eleonore Juliette Chevallier Moreau, who was part of Haiti's mulatto class. From her mother's side, Chevalier was granddaughter of Louise Moreau and her husband Bernard Chevallier L'Ouverture, a mulatto Haitian high-ranking officer and politician that established in San Cristóbal with the Haitian occupation, from whom countless Dominican families descend, who was the son of French nobleman Jean Baptiste Chevallier, Marquis de Pouilboreau and his wife Marie-Noëlle L'Ouverture, the sister of Toussaint L'Ouverture, the Father of the Nation of Haiti.[9][10]
Trujillo was the third of eleven children;[8][Note 3] he also had an adopted brother, Luis Rafael "Nene" Trujillo (1935–2005), who was raised in the home of Trujillo Molina.[9]
In 1897, at the age of six, Trujillo was registered in the school of Juan Hilario Meriño. One year later, he transferred to the school of Pablo Barinas, where he was educated by disciples of Eugenio María de Hostos and remained there for the rest of his primary schooling. As a child, he was obsessed with his appearance and would place bottle caps on his clothes that mimicked military decorations. At the age of 16, Trujillo got a job as a telegraph operator, which he held for about three years. Shortly after Trujillo, aided by his brother José Arismendy Petán, turned to petty crime: cattle rustling, check counterfeiting, and postal robbery. He spent several months in prison, which did not deter him, as he later formed a violent gang of robbers called The 42.[11][12][13]
Oppression[edit]
Brutal oppression of actual or perceived members of the opposition was the key feature of Trujillo's rule from the very beginning in 1930 when his gang, "The 42", led by Miguel Angel Paulino, drove through the streets in their red Packard "carro de la muerte" ("car of death").[28] Trujillo also maintained an execution list of people throughout the world who he felt were his direct enemies or who he felt had wronged him. He even once allowed an opposition party to form and permitted it to operate legally and openly, mainly so that he could identify those who opposed him and arrest or kill them.[29]
Imprisonments and killings were later handled by the SIM, the Servicio de Inteligencia Militar, efficiently organized by Johnny Abbes, who operated in Cuba, Mexico, Guatemala, New York, Costa Rica, and Venezuela.[30] Some cases reached international notoriety such as the disappearance of Jesús de Galíndez and the murder of the Mirabal sisters, which further eroded Trujillo's critical support by the US government. After Trujillo approved an assassination attempt on the Venezuelan President Rómulo Ernesto Betancourt Bello, the Organization of American States and the United States blocked Trujillo's access to US sugar quota profits.[31]
In April 1962, after the flight of the Trujillo family from the country, Attorney General Eduardo Antonio Garcia Vasquez reported that in the previous five years, the former regime was responsible for 5,700 deaths, either as known murders, or of those missing but presumed dead.[32] The SIM often denied victims' families the remains of their loved ones, disposing of them clandestinely. In the aftermath of Trujillo's assassination, very few of those arrested and killed in the subsequent crackdown had their remains returned, the majority believed by investigators from Vasquez's office to have been tossed to sharks, or were stuffed into an incinerator at nearby San Isidro airbase.[32]
Immigration[edit]
Trujillo was known for his open-door policy, accepting Jewish refugees from Europe, Japanese migration during the 1930s, and exiles from Spain following its civil war. At the 1938 Évian Conference the Dominican Republic was the only country willing to accept many Jews and offered to accept up to 100,000 refugees on generous terms.[33] In 1940 an agreement was signed and Trujillo donated 26,000 acres (110 km2) of his properties for settlements. The first settlers arrived in May 1940; eventually, some 800 settlers came to Sosúa and most moved later on to the United States.[33]
Refugees from Europe broadened the Dominican Republic's tax base and added more whites to the predominantly mixed-race nation. Trujillo's government favored white refugees over others while Dominican troops expelled illegal immigrants, resulting in the 1937 Parsley Massacre of Haitian migrants.
