Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-94fs2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-19T14:54:08.444Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Shady Business: Corruption in the Brazilian Army before 1954

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 October 2022

Shawn C. Smallman
Shawn C. Smallman*
Affiliation:
Portland State University
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

An enduring paradox lies at the heart of Brazilian politics. The Brazilian Army has long suffered from corruption at the highest levels so extreme as to create disquiet throughout the institution. Yet the Brazilian military, like other armed forces in Latin America, has justified its involvement in politics and society by accusing civilians of corruption. Despite repeated revelations of military corruption, soldiers and civilians as well have sometimes accepted the armed forces' use of this moral discourse. For example, an anonymous businessman wrote General Pedro Aurélio de Góes Monteiro on 30 November 1954: “The country is on the brink of financial and economic ruin. This state of things is the result of the abuses of past governments and of the deceased President Vargas and the generalized corruption. … The only solution for the reestablishment of confidence in the exterior would be the delivery of the government to a military dictatorship” (emphasis in the original).2 Thirty years later, at the close of authoritarian rule in Brazil, a daring journalist named Carlos Alberto de Carli exposed rampant corruption within the military's intelligence services. Yet Carli himself dedicated his book in part to “the armed forces—the moral reserves of our people” (cover page, Carli 1985).

Type
Research Article
Information
Latin American Research Review , Volume 32 , Issue 3 , 1997 , pp. 39 - 62
Copyright
Copyright © 1997 by the University of Texas Press

Footnotes

∗

I wish to thank Gil Joseph and the anonymous LARR referees whose thoughtful comments greatly improved this article. My research in Brazil was funded by a Henry Hart Rice Advanced Research Fellowship and a MacArthur Fellowship for Dissertation Research granted through the Yale Center for Security Studies. Frank McCann and Daryl Williams made useful suggestions on sources. Most of all, I wish to thank Margaret Everett for her advice and support.

References

Abbot, Michael H. 1988 “The Army and the Drug War: Politics or National Security?” Parameters: U.S. Army War College Quarterly 8, no. 4 (Dec.):95–122.Google Scholar
Alexius, Robert Martin 1976 “The Army and Politics in Porfirian Mexico.” Ph.D. diss., University of Texas at Austin.Google Scholar
Andreas, Peter 1993 “Profits, Poverty, and Illegality: The Logic of Drug Corruption.” NACLA Report on the Americas 27, no. 3 (Nov.–Dec.):22–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Andreas, Peter, and Youngers, Coletta 1989 “‘Busting’ the Andean Cocaine Industry: America's Counterproductive War on Drugs.” World Policy Journal 4, no. 3 (Summer):529-62Google Scholar
Azevedo, Asdrubal Gwaier De 1932 Discurso pronunciado no Clube Militar no dia 25 de junho de 1922. Recife: n.p.Google Scholar
Baldessarini, Hugo 1957 Crônica de uma época: Getúlio Vargas e o crime de Toneleros. São Paulo: Companhia Editora.Google Scholar
Belluzzo, Luiz Gonzaga De Melo, and Grau, Eros Roberto 1995 “A corrupção no Brasil.” Revista Brasileira de Estudos Políticos, no. 80 (Jan.):7–20.Google Scholar
Booth, John A. 1985 The End and the Beginning: The Nicaraguan Revolution. Boulder, Colo.: Westview.Google Scholar
Booth, John A., and Walker, Thomas W. 1993 Understanding Central America. 2d ed. San Francisco, Calif.: Westview.Google Scholar
Cardoso, Fernando Henrique 1975 “Dos governos militares a Prudente-Campos Sales.” In História geral da civilização brasileira, edited by Boris Fausto, 3:15–50. São Paulo: Difel.Google Scholar
Carli, Carlos Alberto De 1985 O escândalo-rei: O SNI e a trama Capemi-Baumbarten. São Paulo: Global.Google Scholar
Coelho, Edmundo Campos 1976 Em busca da identidade: O exército e a política na sociedade brasileira. Rio de Janeiro: Forense-Universitária.Google Scholar
Comblin, Joseph 1978 A ideologia da securança nacional: O poder militar na América Latina, translated by Filho, A. Veiga. 2d ed. Rio de Janeiro: Civilização Brasileira.Google Scholar
Diacon, Todd A. 1991 Millenarian Vision, Capitalist Reality: Brazil's Contestado Rebellion, 1912–1916. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
Drummond, Jose Augusto 1986 O movimento tenentista: A intervenção política dos oficiais jovens, 1922–1935. Rio de Janeiro: Graal.Google Scholar
ESTADOS UNIDOS DO BRASIL, CONGRESSO NACIONAL, CAMARA DO DEPUTADOS 1953a Anais da Câmara dos Deputados.Vol. 42, Sessions of 14–17 November. Rio de Janeiro: Serviço do Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística.Google Scholar
ESTADOS UNIDOS DO BRASIL, CONGRESSO NACIONAL, CAMARA DO DEPUTADOS 1953b Anais da Câmara dos Deputados.Vol. 43, Sessions of 18–20 November. Rio de Janeiro: Serviço do Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística.Google Scholar
Forjaz, Maria Cecilia Spina 1977 Tenentismo e política. Rio de Janeiro: Paz e Terra.Google Scholar
Geddes, Barbara, and Neto, Artur Ribeiro 1992 “Institutional Sources of Corruption in Brazil.” Third World Quarterly 13, no. 4:641–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goodman, Louis W., and Mendelson, Johanna S. R. 1990 “The Threat of New Missions: Latin American Militaries and the Drug War.” In The Military and Democracy: The Future of Civil-Military Relations in Latin America, edited by Louis W. Goodman, Johanna S. R. Mendelson, and Rial, Juan, 189–95. Lexington, Mass.: Lexington Books.Google Scholar
Hahner, June 1966 “Officers and Civilians in Brazil, 1889–1898.” Ph.D. diss., Cornell University.Google Scholar
Hayes, Robert 1976 “The Formation of the Brazilian Army and the Military Class Mystique.” In Perspectives on Armed Politics in Brazil, edited by Keith, Henry H. and Hayes, Robert, 1–26. Tempe: Arizona State University.Google Scholar
Laguerre, Michel S. 1993 The Military and Society in Haiti. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lewis, Paul H. 1980 Paraguay under Stroessner. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.Google Scholar
Loveman, Brian 1991 “‘¿Misión cumplida?‘ Civil-Military Relations and the Chilean Political Transition.” Journal of Inter-American Studies and World Affairs 33, no. 3 (Fall):35–74.Google Scholar
Mccann, Frank D. 1984 “The Formative Period of Twentieth-Century Brazilian Army Thought, 1900–1922.” Hispanic American Historical Review 64, no. 4 (Nov.):737-65CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mccann, Frank D. 1989 “The Military.” In Modern Brazil: Elites and Masses in Historical Perspective, edited by Coniff, Michael L. and Mccann, Frank D., 47–80. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.Google Scholar
Macaulay, Neill 1974 The Prestes Column: Revolution in Brazil. New York: New Viewpoints.Google Scholar
Maingot, Anthony P. 1994 “Confronting Corruption in the Hemisphere: A Sociological Perspective.” Journal of Inter-American Studies and World Affairs 36, no. 3 (Fall):49–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Manor, Paul 1978 “Factions et idéologie dans L'Armée Brésilienne: ‘Nationalistes’ et ‘Libéraux,‘ 1946–1951.” Revue d'Histoire Moderne Contemporaine 25, no. 4 (Oct.–Dec.):556–86.Google Scholar
Martins, Luciano 1976 Pouvoir et développement economique. Paris: Anthropos.Google Scholar
Miranda, Carlos R. 1990 The Stroessner Era: Authoritarian Rule in Paraguay. San Francisco, Calif.: Westview.Google Scholar
Moraes, JoÃO Quartim De 1991 A esquerda militar no Brasil. Vol. 1. São Paulo: Siciliano.Google Scholar
Moura, Gerson 1986 A campanha do petróleo. São Paulo: Brasiliense.Google Scholar
Nickson, R. Andrew 1995 “Paraguay's Archivo del Terror.” LARR 30, no. 1:125–29.Google Scholar
Nunn, Frederick M. 1972 “Military Professionalism and Professional Militarism in Brazil: Historical Perspective and Political Implications.” Journal of Latin American Studies 4, pt. 1 (May):29–54.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nunn, Frederick M. 1983 Yesterday's Soldiers: European Military Professionalism in South America, 1890–1940. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.Google Scholar
Peixoto, Antonio Carlos 1980 “Le Clube Militar et les affrontements au sein des Forces Armées.” In ROUQUIE, ED., 1980, 65–104.Google Scholar
Perez, Louis A. JR. 1976 Army Politics in Cuba, 1898–1958. Pittsburgh, Pa.: University of Pittsburgh Press.Google Scholar
Potash, Robert A. 1980 The Army and Politics in Argentina, 1945–1962: Perón to Frondizi. London: Athlone.Google Scholar
Rouquie, Alain 1980 “Les processus politiques dans les partis militaires au Brésil.” In ROUQUIE, ED., 1980, 9–24.Google Scholar
Rouquie, Alain 1989 The Military and the State in Latin America, translated by Sigmund, Paul. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Rouquie, Alain, ED. 1980 Les partis militaires au Brésil. Paris: La Fondation Nationale des Sciences Politiques.Google Scholar
Simon G., Jose Luis 1992 “Drug Addiction and Trafficking in Paraguay: An Approach to the Problem during the Transition.” Journal of Inter-American Studies and World Affairs 34, no. 3 (Fall):155–200.Google Scholar
Skidmore, Thomas 1986 Politics in Brazil, 1930–1964. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Smallman, Shawn 1995 “The Parting of the Waters: The Brazilian Army and Society, 1889–1954.” Ph.D. diss., Yale University.Google Scholar
Smith, Peter Seaborn 1976 Oil and Politics in Modern Brazil. Toronto: Macmillan of Canada.Google Scholar
Sodre, Nelson Werneck 1967 História militar do Brasil. 3d ed. Rio de Janeiro: Civilização Brasileira.Google Scholar
Sondrol, Paul C. 1992 “The Emerging New Politics of Liberalizing Paraguay: Sustained Civil-Military Control without Democracy.” Journal of Inter-American Studies and World Affairs 34, no. 2 (Summer):127–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Timerman, Jacobo 1987 Chile: Death in the South, translated by Robert, Cox. New York: Knopf.Google Scholar
U.S. CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY 1982 CIA Research Report: Brazil. Frederick, Md.: University Publications of America.Google Scholar
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE 1972 Papers of the Foreign Relations of the United States: The American Republics, 1947. Vol. 8. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office.Google Scholar
Walker, Thomas W. 1986 Nicaragua, the Land of Sandino. Boulder, Colo.: Westview.Google Scholar
WASHINGTON OFFICE ON LATIN AMERICA 1988 “Misguided Policy: The U.S. ‘War’ against Narcotics Production in the Andes.” Update 13, no. 6 (Nov.–Dec.):1, 5, 6.Google Scholar
Wesson, Robert, ED. 1986 The Latin American Military Institution. New York: Praeger.Google Scholar
Weyland, Kurt 1993 “The Rise and Fall of President Collor and Its Impact on Brazilian Democracy.” Journal of Inter-American Studies and World Affairs 35, no. 1 (Spring):1-37CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wirth, John 1970 The Politics of Brazilian Development. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Woodward, Ralph Lee JR. 1985 Central America, a Nation Divided. 2d ed. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar