Monday, November 20, 2006
Recalling and Rethinking the Mexican
Revolution
By Allan Wall
A nation and its people need shared historical
experiences, what Abraham Lincoln called “the mystic chords of memory.”
Annual commemorations help to reinforce a nation’s historical identity.
In Mexico, Revolution Day, November 20th,
is one such civic observance.
What is its significance?
The Mexican Revolution began November 20,
1910 as an uprising against longtime dictator Porfirio Diaz, who resigned and left the country in 1911. But the abdication of Porfirio Diaz did not usher in an era of peace and prosperity.
Francisco I. Madero, who started the Revolution
and served as president, was overthrown by Victoriano Huerta, who in turn was overthrown by a coalition, which then broke
up into warring factions.
The two most colorful revolutionary leaders
were Pancho Villa, the “Centaur of the North,” and Emiliano Zapata, leader of the “Liberation Army of the
South.” They too have made the deepest impression on the collective psyche
of Mexican identity.
Pancho Villa was defeated in 1915 at Celaya,
the biggest battle of the Revolution, by Alvaro Obregon. Villa’s cavalry
troops were dashing, but proved no match for Obregon’s methodical placement of entrenched defenses and machine guns. Obregon had been following developments across the pond on Europe’s Western
Front, and he successfully applied those lessons to the Mexican Revolution.
After the Venustiano Carranza/Obregon faction triumphed over the Villa/Zapata alliance, a new Constitution was drafted
under Carranza’s leadership in 1917. It’s still in use today, though
with many amendments.
An interesting bit of trivia is
that the Mexican Revolution was the first war anywhere in which an airplane dropped a bomb on a ship.
Foreign powers also intervened in the war.
Germany supported Huerta, and later tried to make a deal with Carranza.
The United States supported Pancho Villa
for a time, then after switching support to Carranza the “Centaur of the North” launched a raid on Columbus, New
Mexico. This in turn provoked John J. Pershing’s “Punitive Expedition”
into northern Mexico, the first U.S. military operation to include the use of aircraft in a combat capacity.
On Mexico’s east coast, the U.S.
military briefly occupied the port of Veracruz. Mexican writer Arnaldo Cordova
wrote that the Mexican Revolution “has wound up identifying us as a people and a nation.”
Nevertheless, the Revolution also has its
critics and detractors.
The long-ruling PRI glorified the Mexican
Revolution. That’s because the faction that eventually won the Revolution
organized itself into a political party that is known today as the Institutional Revolutionary Party.
The party title (Institutional plus Revolutionary)
might sound like a strange juxtaposition. What it meant was that the PRI presented
itself as the heir of the Mexican Revolution, continuing to grant the benefits of the people’s struggle for justice.
But times have changed and the PRI is no
longer in control. What’s more, in recent years some Mexicans have criticized
the Revolution for not being all it was cracked up to be. It’s been belittled
from the right end of the spectrum, and on the left end for not having gone far enough.
The Mexican revolutionaries represented
different interests and ideologies. Zapata’s major cause was restoration
of confiscated property in his region. As for Pancho Villa, it’s not at
all clear what his ideology was.
The long-vilified image of Porfirio Diaz
has slightly improved. His accomplishments include economic development, a low crime rate, and a peso on par with the pound
sterling.
Madero was mostly in agreement with Diaz’s
policies, but he thought the old dictator had been in office too long. To this
day Mexican congresspersons and senators aren’t allowed to succeed themselves.
Is that policy still relevant? Some say no and want it changed to allow
Mexican lawmakers to stand for reelection, which might make them more accountable to constituents.
Some have gone so far as to repudiate the
Mexican Revolution altogether. Mexican pundit Sergio Sarmiento calls the Revolution
a “monumental failure,” which “destroyed a regime of poverty, inequality and authoritarianism” but
also “constructed another regime of poverty, inequality and authoritarianism.”
It looks like the legacy of the Mexican
Revolution will continue to be debated and reinterpreted. Will a new consensus
be achieved? How will future generations view the Revolution in the context of
Mexico’s historic national identity? And what lessons should be drawn from
it?
____________________
Allan Wall, a MexiData.info columnist,
recently returned from a tour of duty in Iraq. He currently resides in Mexico,
where he has lived since 1991. He can be reached via e-mail at allan39@prodigy.net.mx.
