Liberal Party Chief Jorge Gaitan was shot and killed about 1:15 p.m. today on Carrera Septima and Jimenez de Quesada in central Bogota. Mob seized and killed assassin, dragged corpse to front Presidential Palace, then hanged it on public street. Mob invaded Capitolio, seat of Pan American Conference, ransacking building and attempting set fire at least one wing. Within one hour after Gaitan's assassination, armed individuals and bands began looting shops, with determined attacks on hardware shops to obtain weapons, including machetes, iron pipes, guns, etc. Bomb was thrown into ground floor Edificio Americano where offices U.S. delegation housed on seventh floor.
Telegram #190 from US embassy in Bogotá, April 9, 1948Revolutionaries control all remaining radio stations issuing constant nation-wide appeals to public join in revolution. Radio Difusora Nacional announced it now in hands of "liberal students", and broadcast ultimatum to President Mariano Ospina Perez to abandon palace within next two or three hours "if you would save your life and lives of members of your family". It reported army tanks now advancing against presidential palace.
Telegram # 193 from US embassy in Bogotá, April 9, 1948
Telegram #197 from Ambassador Beaulac to Secretary of State, April 9, 1948
City in hands of mobs, armed with firearms, machetes, iron bars, et cetera. No signs of police or soldiers.
Looting generally. Conservative newspaper EL SIGLO on fire.
Reference my previous revolutionary liberal group backed by army and police have taken over Cali. All
Americans well.
Telegram #203 from Ambassador Beaulac to Secretary of State, April 10, 1948
Telmar #41 from Bogotá Embassy to Secretary of State, April 10, 1948
Unnumbered Telegram from Ambassador Beaulac to Secretary of State, April 10, 1948
Unnumbered Telegram from Ambassador Beaulac to Secretary of State, April 11, 1948
UP requests following msg given Shackford: 12141 stop we generally up to date but urgently need direct
from you govt announcing break relations Russia stop ... Best regards and congrats all stop signed McCann.
Marshall Blames World Communism for Bogota Revolt, The Philadelphia Inquirer, April 13, 1948
"TASS" has been empowered to make known that all rumors concerning the participation of some Soviet or
Russian agents in the events in Bogota are an absurd invention and are being spread for purposes inimical
to the Soviet Union.
Unconfirmed report states that communists have taken over and have complete control of refinery
at Barranca Bermeja. Same report states El Ceatro fields under control of communists. Ferry at Comboa
destroyed. Communists blowing up railway bridges and ferries vital to supply of food to Bogota. Communist
radio station still operating. Bogota generally quiet since noon. At press conference today, Marshall indicated
desire for conference remain Bogota.
Yankee imperialism wants to convert us into military and economic colonies. For each free country they
have a candidate for dictator. For ours, they have the old Nazi Laureano Gomez.
Here in Colombia the Communists are waiting for a crisis and the growth of the inflationary process
as a devil's broth for their doctrines. They think that Gaitán is a Perón who has not
yet gained power and it is necessary to remain on his side so as not to lose contact with the degenerates
who are with him. They fear that all this will end in a military dictatorship, which the Liberals are stirring
up with their demand for "military men at the points of control", to block the Conservatives' fraud.
Unconfirmed Avianca reports airfields at Honda, Cartago, Barranca Bermeja and Turbo are in hands of
rebels. Avianca PBY fired on at Puerto Berrio while attempting to land govt troops. Troop train reported
derailed by Communists at Caracol. ... Gaitan scheduled to be buried 14th April, however his wife
announced on govt radio today that Gaitan would not be buried as long as President Ospina Perez in office.
Memorandum from Lt. Col. Walsh to Ambassador Beaulac, April 15, 1948
The Communist maneuver had aimed at destroying scandalously the constructive continental work
which was accomplished by the Bogota Conference which would take specific measures against the
Red Soviet wave which is invading America. These specific anti-Communist means had begun to be
sabotaged by Romulo Betancourt, Chief of the Venezuelan delegation, who is an old and proven
agent of Moscow.
The informant stated that in February 1948 he had occasion to talk to Pedro Albizu Campos in Puerto Rico. Campos stated that the next Pan American Conference could not possibly be successful and that it was intended that the Americans would be given a lesson at the Conference.
Mrs. Frank Linder ... mentioned the fact that her husband, an expert radio man who
worked for the Coordinator's Office during the past hostilities, had noted not only that
Gaitan's assassination was carried out while the Army was holding maneuvers in the
interior but that when the radio stations were seized to incide mob violence the
speaker's voice came from a recording. Both facts convinced him that the whole affair
had been premeditated.
Telegram #324 from Ambassador Beaulac to Secretary of State, April 22, 1948
Memorandum from William Wieland to Ambassador Beaulac, April 22, 1948
Gaitan's murder fanned into intense flame the smoldering social and political discontent and
class hatred which the Communist party of Colombia (PCC) had long stimulated and exploited.
It is known the the Communists had incited their party members and labor organizations to
sabotage the Inter-American Conference in Bogota. Although they were planning disorders to
embarrass and, if possible to overthrow the Conservative government, it is not known that the
local Communists had advance information on the murder of Gaitan. However, they quickly
rallied their forces and took immediate advantage of the situation that arose.
According to a controlled American source, 4 Cuban students arrived during the first week of
April to agitate anti-United States and anti-Conference sentiment among Colombian students.
... Ovares and Guevara also worked closely with two other Cubans, Rafael Del Pino and
Fidel Alejandro Castro, who ... admitted that they had obtained arms from the Bogota police, (which
had rebelled against the government) but asserted that their purpose was to aid in restoring
order to the city.
Gaitán's demagogic attacks on the oligarchy, the administration, the vested interests
and the ANDO, and his frequent threats to resort to force to attain his ends, fostered mob
violence and class hatred as much as the assertions of the Communists -- and influenced
a great many more people.
I should here like to emphasize a distinction between communist activities directly organized from the Kremlin and those sprouting from seeds sown by the Cominform. It is in the second aspect that Communism in this country must be regarded in the absence of proof of direct Soviet intervention. Whilst the directives given to communist cells in Colombia may well come from abroad, it may not be necessary to go beyond neighbouring countries to find their origin. Nevertheless, it need not be ignored that in other South American countries, preparations for outbreaks on communist lines appear to have been planned to synchronize with similar disturbances in Colombia, which, as I have attempted to show, may have been set off prematurely by the fortuitous murder of Dr. Gaitán. The efficient concentration on the radio network; the prompt appearance of brigades of students, technicians and speakers competent to operate it; the previous undermining of police morale so that in a crisis they proved treacherous; the expressed aim of the unseating of President Ospina and his Conservative Government; the prompt recourse to the weapon of a general strike; the anti-clerical turn which events took at an early stage - all these reactions are common either to Gaitanist Liberal or Communist technique. Report of British Ambassador Gilbert MacKereth, April 28, 1948, document provided by Maria Valencia