Best south america history books according to redditors
We found 275 Reddit comments discussing the best south america history books. We ranked the 122 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.
We found 275 Reddit comments discussing the best south america history books. We ranked the 122 resulting products by number of redditors who mentioned them. Here are the top 20.
In a rather different vein from a lot of the suggestions I'm seeing here, I want to plug Michael Herr's Dispatches as an incredible piece of Vietnam literature. There's also If I Die in a Combat Zone by Tim O'Brien.
If you're willing to consider graphic novels, check out Maus, Persepolis, and Laika.
If you're interested at all in vampires and folklore, I recommend Food for the Dead. Really interesting read.
A history-teacher friend of mine recently gave me The Lost City of Z by David Grann. I haven't gotten around to reading it yet, but it came highly recommended.
By the by, last year I required my students (high school seniors) to select and read a non-fiction book and gave them the following list of suggestions. Columbine was one of the really popular ones, and I had a bunch of kids (and a few teachers) recommending it to me, but, again, I haven't gotten to it yet.
Rebecca Earle has an excellent book on this subject called The Body of the Conquistador. The main thrust of her argument is that the ways in which sixteenth century Europeans, and Spaniards in particular, saw the body was very different than we do today. In those days, notions of well-being were guided by humoral ideas according to which "each individual possessed a particular, characteristic humoral balance, but that balance was always in uneasy equilibrium, subject to the impact of external forces, of which food was the most important." Therefore, consuming the wrong food was thought to produce terrible perturbations in someone's physical and emotional condition. This also had the interesting corollary that bodies were labile, so that, by consuming the wrong foods Europeans could become more like Amerindians, but, conversely, Amerindians could also become more like Spaniards if they consumed the right foods.
With this in mind, it is not too surprising that Europeans were extremely preoccupied with what foods were available in the New World, for themselves and the natives. There was a lot of effort invested in importing wheat bread, wine and olive oil from Europe, as a way to preserve their health. Europeans were suspicious of much of the perceived diet of Amerindians (there was a lot of talk of eating toads, and lizards and insects) though they were enthralled with fruits (especially pineapple which was called the fruit of kings), chili peppers, cocoa and sweet potatoes. They also really liked iguanas which they decided were fish and therefore could be eaten on fast days. New world starches were also held in very high regard, but for the most part, it was recommended that not too many of these were eaten at once, since its excess could be dangerous to the European constitution. Those who did, were often seen with suspicion. In the end it is important to remember that the regard with which Europeans held food in the New World was intimately tied with the regard they held for its inhabitants. The question of whether Amerindians were toad-eating savages or their cornbread could offer sustenance to Europeans as well was also the question of whether Amerindians could ever become good Christians.
You can try sorting by "top" on this sub though I just did that and didn't exactly get a ton of longer ones.
Off the top of my head, I know there's also a long write-up on Casey Anthony on the sub.
Then I've found I've stumbled upon a few longer write-ups online that I have really been engaged in.
Sneha Philips
Maura Murray
The murders of Jo Rogers and her daughters Michelle and Christe
(this one has a resolution but I was drawn in by the writing)
Also try going to longreads.com and I think you can sort by "crime" there.
Then.. if you really get into it, a few book recommendations!
Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil
The Monster of Florence
People Who Eat Darkness
The Lost City of Z
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/9870563457/
Written by a dude that actually went through an economic collapse in Argentina.
Venezuela likely has the most mobilized and organized population in the world aside from perhaps Rojava. Each group within this kaleidoscope of social movements maintains varying degrees of autonomy from the state.
We should seek out and support those leftist organizations which advocate keeping the revolution independent from the government. We can be critical of the Chavez/Maduro-run state without throwing away all the legitimate progress made by millions of people there. And of course we must totally oppose US imperialism.
A great book on this subject (though a bit dated now) is We Created Chavez. Another good one is Venezuela Speaks! Voices from the Grassroots.
Everyone should read the book about this when they can. It's an extremely enjoyable and sometimes gritty true account of a group of men who went into the jungle in search of a lost city and simply vanished from the face of the earth.
They based their hunt on a rare Portuguese document written by a friar in Brazil after one surviving man from an expedition emerged from the jungle in 1753 after 10 years and gave his account as to what they saw. It's a real document known as Manuscript 512 and it's in the Brazilian state archives.
Fantastic true story! At one point they were even planning a movie starring Brad Pitt about this as recently as 2010:
http://www.wordandfilm.com/2010/11/brad-pitt-leaves-the-lost-city-of-z-in-limbo/
Great book on Fawcett's story:
http://www.amazon.com/The-Lost-City-Deadly-Obsession/dp/1400078458/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1371843165&sr=8-1&keywords=lost+city+of+z
I enjoyed reading about this after hearing about the 'Lost Mines of Moribeca' from Graham Hancock's "Fingerprints of the Gods". Apparently, long story short, some Portuguese explorers back in the 1700's got lost in the Brazilian jungle and after 10 years only one guy made it out and told his story to a friar who wrote it down.
The story included them finding the ruins of a city with small pyramids and a grand avenue, temples and the whole bit complete with engravings that looked like ancient Greek.
Here's the original manuscript:
http://www.fawcettadventure.com/english_translation_manuscript_512.html
Not really exploration but I always thought that this little factoid was amazing. After the events of the Mutiny on the Bounty, William Bligh and some crewmen were put on board a 23 foot launch with the only navigation tools being a sextant and a quadrant. No charts, maps or anything else to help out. Despite that Bligh managed to sail over 3600 nautical miles in 47 days with all of his crewmen intact (except one who was killed by unfriendly natives in Tofua).
I'm also partial to Percy Fawcett and his expeditions in the Amazon looking for the Lost City of Z
Based on the hardcore economic analysis I follow (that is not upbeat enough for the nightly broadcasts), we are in for a very bad time.
Visit ZeroHedge.com and see how much of it you can understand.
If you don't think this is all "nutso" and you believe that things can really get this bad, the first thing you should do is immediately lower your cost of living. Every luxury you keep today will mean not having that money in the future. It is better to assume the worst case and be a little embarrassed later than to spent years kicking yourself for not having done better.
Some guy lived during the 2001 economic collapse of Argentina. He talks about how to evasive driving techniques, recession-proof jobs and trading with strangers in his book
Support the people on this list
Register to vote and be really well informed. Vote for those who have repeatedly tried to warn us about this crisis and who are still out there begging us to pull back from the brink. They haven't been bullshitting us all along like others.
Read this and send a donation to Electronic Frontier Foundation. We need to keep the communication channels open.
Good luck.
Wow. You have to read the The Lost City of Z. It's a true story about the search for El Dorado by legitimate explorers in the early 20th century. Good story telling, fascinating times, and, again, 100% true.
Hola. Soy un Dominicano criado en los Estados Unidos, y tambien estaba interesado en la situacion en Venezuela hace unos meses. Era una des las cosas que me compelo a estudiar el socialismo.
It will take time to understand. If you read each day little by little, you will understand. I will not simplify this for you. To have knowledge of the situation takes an understanding of Venezuelan history, the capitalist global economy, and the political atmosphere of Venezuela. But I will give you the tools to learn about Venezuela.
First and foremost, read this article. It should be enlightening.
http://roarmag.org/2013/03/chavez-death-venezuela-bolivarian-revolution/
Here is a documentary about Chavez, the political atmosphere of Venezuela, and the coup attempt of 2002:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Id--ZFtjR5c
Here are books about Venezuela:
Changing Venezuela by Taking Power
Venezuela Speaks: Voices from the Grassroots
This is a website for news on Venezuela:
http://venezuelanalysis.com/
Bolivia is also a country allied with Venezuela that you should be interested in. Nicaragua, Ecuador, Argentina, and Chile are also fairly leftist, and should attract your attention in the future. Here is a book on Bolivia:
The Price of Fire: Resource Wars and Social Movements in Bolivia
Here is a documentary about an Argentinian workers movement:
The Take
Here is a legendary book that details the history of the Latin American continent has had with imperialism and capitalism:
The Open Veins of Latin America
Here is a book about the Latin American left of the 21st century:
Dancing with Dynamite: Social Movements and States in Latin America
Here are websites for the Latin American left in general:
http://www.nacla.org/
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/
Here are organizations of the Latin America countries that you should know about:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ALBA
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unasur
Finally, here is just a list of documentaries (mostly about issues in the US, but still useful):
http://www.filmsforaction.org/walloffilms/
Also...is your name from the Japanese video game Ikaruga?
I'm also reading this The Modern Survival Manual: Surviving the Economic Collapse it's a first persons account of how the Argentina collapse went down, lots of good info on prepping in general, but what was most valuable as barter. But then comes the surprising news out of France that Nutella is a new consideration for barter in that area of the world.
I agree. I think Argentina and Russia are closer examples than Armageddon. Surviving the Economic Collapse is probably more useful than trying to learn how to live like you're in the stone-age.
I think it is Gerrard Williams, co-author of Grey Wolf: The Escape of Adolf Hitler^ebook.
Here is another interview with Williams.
Sidenote: I just want to say, I thought it was odd that the interviewer in the OP's video brought up holocaust denial when Williams's story had nothing to do with refuting the holocaust.
I'm surprised that so few people mention Iceland in these threads. Their banking system experienced one of the biggest crashes by any country ever. The people revolted and took back their country (they actually forced their government to resign).
Obviously the western media have tried to keep a lid on this as they don't want us knowing that it can be done, and I am almost certain that if Iceland was a Central/South American country, the the US government would have tried their hardest to obstruct this (like they (successfully) did with Chile, Guatemala, El Salvador, etc.). I think our problem (UK & US), though, is that our economies and political systems are so inherent to the global corruption (Rothchilds, Royal Family, etc.) that taking back our countries might prove to be an entirely different kettle of fish to Iceland.
As for dealing with the aftermath of the impending collapse, I would recommend researching basic survival skills (the SAS books are really good for this) and also what happens in times of an economic collapse (I would recommend The Modern Survival Manual: Surviving the Economic Collapse & When All Hell Breaks Loose: Stuff You Need to Survive When Disaster Strikes.
I have an English degree, but I didn't read nonfiction until I graduated a few years ago. Here are the best I've read: Nothing to Envy: Ordinary Lives in North Korea by Barbara Demick, The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon by David Grann, and Kon-Tiki by Thor Heyerdahl.
Pretty good book about surviving the economic collapse in Argentina. Some solid prepping advice in this book.
The Modern Survival Manual: Surviving the Economic Collapse https://www.amazon.com/dp/9870563457/ref=cm_sw_r_other_taa_TUaXBbEJCZQH0
You might be interested in Percy Fawcett, the early 20th century explorer.
He was a very famous explorer, mostly for helping map parts of South America and the Amazon. I recently read the book The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon and it goes over a lot of the stories and details of his life.
Some of the stuff sounds like it is straight out of a movie or book. Cutting your way through one of the last unknown, uncharted areas of the world, making contact with local tribes (many who had never seen white people and could be very hostile), reports of never-before-seen animals/bugs. It's said that his Amazon explorations were even the inspiration for Authur Conan Doyle's The Lost World.
I doubt he ever found himself avoiding booby-traps in an ancient tomb but he is the closest to an Indiana Jones-type guy I've ever read about.
A must read would be the pinochet file, about operation condor.
I recommend to have a look at the wikipedia's page on anti american sentiment in latin america as a starting point for specific actions and check out the "further reading sections" for each event.
The banana wars that are more about central america and the caribean are also worth looking into.
No problem, it is a fascinating topic. I don't know what to suggest, there's way way too many books.
Really top of my head, any anthropologist here will probably crucify me for forgetting something, I would suggest the following :
Some are more or less technical and harder to read without a background, I remember Malinoswki, Descola and Mead to be fairly easy to read. Tristes Tropiques is also very easy, it's like a novel. Mauss, Clastres and Savage Mind can be a bit more "advanced" but they are very readable.
EDIT : Fun fact about something similar to cargo cult. Some tribes, don't remember if it's in Africa or Oceania, value foreign objects as possessing supernatural powers. As such, they cover their shields (which are absolutely amazing) with stickers, such as beer brands. The anthropoligist that told me this said that he tried to tell them that they are ruining the beautiful shield and they just thought he was an idiot, the shield looked much nicer with the stickers.
https://www.amazon.com/Grey-Wolf-Escape-Adolf-Hitler/dp/1402796196 I got the title wrong
I'd suggest you pick up Grey Wolf, it's an excellent read.
>People in venezuela are tired while people like you say those protesting are agents of the US government, it's disgusting.
I am not claiming people in venezuela are agents of the US government.
I am claiming that the US government has a long history of interference in Venezuela and that it has a well documented history of funding opposition groups, and running ops.
Gollinger made that clear more than a decade ago.
https://www.amazon.com/Chavez-Code-Cracking-Intervention-Venezuela/dp/1566566479/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1524456961&sr=8-1&keywords=chavez+code
But keep on ignoring the complexity of the situation on 'muh socialism does not work'.
That being said! I love the idea of a bold escape to Argentina with a handful of people (and Blondi!) to live out the rest of his life there. There's an excellent book on the subject, Grey Wolf, that makes a very compelling case. There just isn't any real evidence one way or another.
I'm back.
1st of all, there is no definitive book, you'll probably have to read a bit.
I would recommend looking into Ferfal and his blog and book. He lived in Argentina when it defaulted on its debt and argues that it's better to remain in cities than live in very rural places during an economic collapse. With that in mind, he offers very pragmatic strategies for coping with almost every kind of problem you could run into.
His book is on amazon and is called, The Modern Survival Manual: Surviving the Economic Collapse. If nothing else, I'd recommend browsing through the 352 reviews on amazon to get a feel for his strategies.
Also, he has a great blog called, Surviving in Argentina (I think he actually hosts it under a different name/site as well). It's here: https://ferfal.blogspot.com/
If you look through the titles in the left column of his site, you'll see that he's organized his previous articles according to topic.
I haven't gone to his site in a while, but I think it's just what you're looking for.
For history suggestions, don't forget /r/history
​
Looking quickly at their excellent reading/watching list, https://www.reddit.com/r/history/wiki/recommendedlist
I see this:
​
Latin American/Caribbean History
General
South America
Central America
I'm not so interested in trying to go back and forth on whether the major political party leadership is socialist or not. What I'm more interested, and what I think socialists should be more interested in, is the underlying social and political movements that produced and is producing "Bolivarian Socialism". These movements are diverse and multi-faceted--they can include everybody from liberal-progressives to members of the old military dictatorships to revolutionary communists.
Judging from books like We Created Chavez: A People's History of the Venezuelan Revolution, revolutionary communists and socialists do have a very strong presence in Latin America, so I'm hopeful for the future. I'm also hoping that infrastructure gets developed to import their movements into North America.
Although it's probably not quite what the original poster meant by "highly organized," there is a good example in Brazil. There were once legends of what explorer Percy Fawcett called the "Lost City of Z," an ancient city or civilization once referenced by early explorers of the region. Fawcett died searching for this ancient civilization, but died in his quest. However, recent work by archaeologist Michael Heckenberger suggests that there was, in fact, an ancient society that inhabited the area of Kuhikugu, which may be what inspired the myths of the Lost City.
Heckenberger used remote sensing to analyze the area, which allowed him to see areas where the land was inconsistent, or where settlements once were and how they once connected. He also analyzed the ways in which the land changed; wherever there were once moats or walls, a mark can be seen on the land in the form of mounds, holes, or ditches. Because the structures would have been made of wood, they would have deteriorated over time, unlike the stone ruins of Egypt, Greece, or Maya:
>“There isn’t a lot of stone in the jungle, and most of the settlement was built with organic materials—wood and palms and earth mounds—which decompose,” [Heckenberger] said. “But once you begin to map out the area and excavate it you are blown away by what you see.”
Sherds can also be found in these areas, further suggesting a previous organized society.
If you want to read up on it, there was a New Yorker article (where the above quote is taken from) which led to a fasinating book by the same author. Both discuss both Heckenberger's findings as well as the ill-fated expedition of Colonel Percy Fawcett. I believe a movie is in the works, as well.
Additionally, you can read some of Heckenberger's articles relating to his work in Brazil.
Grey Wolf.
http://www.amazon.com/Grey-Wolf-Escape-Adolf-Hitler/dp/1402796196
1415: Henry's Year of Glory by Ian Mortimer is excellent. John Julius Norwich's series about Byzantium (Byzantium: The Early Centuries, The Apogee and Decline and Fall) are also excellent.
Edit: didn't add any links (3rd attempt).
I haven't bought this book yet, but I've heard it's pretty good
https://www.amazon.com/Argentine-Mauser-Rifles-1871-1959-Schiffer/dp/0764318683
The Lost City of Z by Grann for sure. Reads like fiction.
Good book. https://www.amazon.com/Grey-Wolf-Escape-Adolf-Hitler/dp/1402796196
Here's a blog and really good book by a guy who lived through the early-2000s collapse of Argentina. He says some similar things. Self-sufficient types out in the country tended to get invaded while they slept and tortured to death. He recommends staying in town and keeping a pistol handy...or moving to a safer country if you've got means.
I think the Argentina collapse did happen fairly suddenly though. Soviet collapse didn't take that long either.
Here, u/JewbaccaIsReal. 3 recomendations, all well-reviewed and updated (oldest is from 2016)
https://www.amazon.com/Brazil-Biography-Lilia-M-Schwarcz/dp/0374280495
(The translated edition is newly launched, so there are no reviews yet, but the brazilian one has 4,5 stars)
https://www.amazon.com/Brazil-Troubled-Rise-Global-Power/dp/0300216971/
https://www.amazon.com/Concise-History-Brazil-Cambridge-Histories/dp/1107635241
Colin Webster's Argentine Mauser Rifles.
https://www.amazon.com/We-Created-Ch%C3%A1vez-Venezuelan-Revolution/dp/0822354527
ignore the low stars rating, its from the various times GCM ended up in the news for saying shit like kill whitey fuck the troops
> A lot of you guys are falling for the alternate conspiracy theories being pushed by shills being paid by the Venezuelan government. They are on a Frenzy right now online. The 2002 coup for example, mostly came from our side, the CIA barely had anything to do with it.
The US funded the opposition to the tunes of millions.
And the CIA were involved in the 2002 coup, Eve Gollinger's book has xeroxes of official documents confirming it.
SI quieres entender un evento crucial, el golpe de estado del 2002, leete "El Silencio y el Escorpion":
http://www.amazon.com/The-Silence-Scorpion-Against-Venezuela/dp/1568586868
The Lost City of Z
http://www.amazon.com/The-Lost-City-Deadly-Obsession/dp/1400078458
Man goes hunting for a lost City in the Amazon lots of history and his
story in the current time.
My favorite book for your sort of situation is The Modern Survival Handbook: Surviving the Economic Collapse. The cover is a tad hokey, but it was written by a guy who lived through the massive depression in Argentina in the early 2000's, and the content is top tier. Really enjoyable read that taught me a ton.
The recent book "The Silence and the Scorpion: The Coup Against Chavez and the Making of Modern Venezuela" by Brian Nelson is a great place to start. The Economist review summarises the key points:
http://www.economist.com/PrinterFriendly.cfm?story_id=13813460
Book deatils and other reviews here:
http://www.amazon.com/Silence-Scorpion-Against-Chavez-Venezuela/dp/1568584180/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1250549874&sr=8-1
I just ordered this book to learn more
For Dad, the book about those Chilean miners might combine his interest in books and caves, although it's obviously not caving per se.
Hunt and Lipo's The Statues that Walked.
They have some more recent articles, one on whether the mata'a were actually used for warfare. Lipo et al 2016
Also Hunt and Lipo rebutting Jared Diamond:
http://www.marklynas.org/2011/10/the-easter-island-ecocide-never-happened-response-to-jared-diamond/
I originally encountered it in the book The City of Z, which is about a modern writer retracing the steps of the famed Fawcett and attempting resolve what exactly happened to him on his last expedition. In the end he starts discussing how Fawcett was doomed to never find the legendary city he searched for, because he was searching for the hallmarks of a European society. It's an interesting read, and well worth it if you like adventure style things(this writing literally retraveled Fawcett's expedition paths and attempted to discover from the natives what may have happened. One tribe even produced a body, but it was determined to just be a native's bones.). Many of the sites both Fawcett and the author visited are now thought to be places where major amazon cities once stood.
After that I started seeing it in a lot more places. I think I was blind to it before.
This wiki page is about terra preta; an artificial dirt created to farm in the amazon. It's not directly related to canals, but still interesting.
Agroforestry may have been used in conjunction with terra preta, and canal systems.
The City of Z(Legend not book)
Kuhikugu Archaeological site that suggests the natives had greater geoscaping capabilities then we initially assumed.
There are also dozens of news articles that comment on it, but the details tend to either fall behind a pay wall or EDU access.
You don't know enough about Venezuela, comrade. Here's where to start.
Always watch critically, and I doubt their coverage of Syria will be all that great, but there is some serious horseshit going on in the US about Venezuela. Fucking nobody knows anything and the state supports the violent reactionaries.
Reminds me of Ferfal's book about conditions in Argentina after the economic collapse there in 2001:
blog
book
Yes, the book is called "The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon" by David Grann. Below is a link to it on Amazon. This is one of the best books I've ever read.
https://www.amazon.com/Lost-City-Deadly-Obsession-Amazon/dp/1400078458
I wouldn't say wealth was wiped out right, likely it was just resettled to a more accurate number.
Also, that wasn't a collapse in the economic system, just a crisis, if it was to continue it would have been a collapse. See Ferfal, who wrote 'The Modern Survival Manual', about surviving during the troubles in Argentina. There have been a few AMA's on here as well about people that have survived the collapse of USSR, the economic trouble in the Balkans and a few others I can't recall. Also, life during the Great Depression in America is pretty well documented and it wasn't bright. Not everybody was looting and pillaging, of course, but enough people were that it was a serious problem. A lot of gang wars stem from that era out of necessity.
Not to mention all the third world countries that have experienced hard and continuous economic problems. Even war torn countries, like Afghanistan, have a relative sense of calm and tranquility in some parts, but in others people are getting shot and blown up on a routine basis. People will attempt to maintain a relative level of normalcy wherever they are, it's human nature. That's not to say the status quo during an economic collapse it good or desirable and that you shouldn't prepare for that eventuality. Everyone should have a hedge against unemployment.
Can I give you a list? Imma give you a list with a little from each category. I LOVE books and posts like this!
Non-fiction or Books About Things:
The Lost City of Z: In 1925, the legendary British explorer Percy Fawcett ventured into the Amazon jungle, in search of a fabled civilization. He never returned. Over the years countless perished trying to find evidence of his party and the place he called “The Lost City of Z.” In this masterpiece of narrative nonfiction, journalist David Grann interweaves the spellbinding stories of Fawcett’s quest for “Z” and his own journey into the deadly jungle, as he unravels the greatest exploration mystery of the twentieth century. Cumberbatch will play him in the movie version of this.
Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers: Hilariously gross and just super interesting. Her writing is like a non-fiction Terry Pratchett. Everything she's written is great, but this one is my favorite.
Devil in the White City: All about HH Holmes and his murder hotel during the Chicago World's Fair. Incredibly well-written and interesting.
The Outlaw Trail: Written in 1920 by the first superintendent of Capitol Reef National Park (aka, the area around Robber's Roost). He went around interviewing the guys who were still alive from the original Wild Bunch, plus some of the other outlaws that were active during that time. Never read anything else with actual interviews from these guys and it's a little slice of life from the end of the Wild West.
Fiction, Fantasy, Sci-Fi:
Here I'm only going to give you the less known stuff. You can find Sanderson (light epic fantasy), Pratchett (humor / satire fantasy), Adams (humor fantasy), etc easily in any bookstore. They are fantastic and should be read, but they are easy to find. I suggest:
The Cloud Roads: Martha Wells is an anthropologist and it shows in her world building in every series. She creates societies instead of landscapes. These are very character-driven and sometimes emotional.
The Lion of Senet: Jennifer Fallon starts a great political thriller series with this book. If you like shows like House of Cards or things where there's a lot of political plotting, sudden twists, and a dash of science v. religion, then you'll love these.
The Book of Joby: Do you want to cry? This book will make you cry. Mix arthurian legend with some God & Devil archetypes and it's just this very powerful story. Even though it deals with religious themes and icons, I wouldn't say it's a religious book. Reads more like mythology.
On Basilisk Station: Awesome military space opera. Really good sci-fi.
Grimspace: Pulpy space opera. Brain bubble gum instead of serious reading. But that's fun sometimes too!
> I didn't say that. I asked why you need to have this particular gun
There is no reason for me to prove that need.
> when there are over 100 different models out there.
Here is a 300 page book on the 37 variants of Mauser rifles used by Argentina
https://www.amazon.com/Argentine-Mauser-Rifles-1871-1959-Schiffer/dp/0764318683
There are a lot more guns than you think
	
	
	
> # Did the “Invisible Blockade” against Allende’s Chile work?
>
>
>
> Did an “invisible blockade” by the United States fatally undermine the Chilean economy under the presidency of Salvador Allende (1970-73)? Did it actually work? Short answer: No.
>
> Note: this post is not about the wider US involvement in the September 1973 coup or about the regime of General Pinochet. It’s about the economic and financial dimensions of US-Chilean relations during the Allende years. (Edit: For a short post on post-Allende Chile, see my “There was no Chilean miracle“.)
>
> - - - - - -
>
> [allende_at_un_1972](https://pseudoerasmus.files.wordpress.com/2015/05/allende_at_un_1972.jpg?w=300&h=222)On the eve of the violent military coup against Salvador Allende on 11 September 1973, Chile found itself in unprecedented economic chaos. Shaken by hyperinflation, widespread shortages, and labour unrest, the “Chilean road to socialism” might have been doomed by simple economic collapse, even if the coup had never taken place. But for many people it’s an article of faith that the United States was deeply responsible for the destabilisation of the Chilean economy. In that narrative, the Nixon administration had imposed an “invisible blockade” against Chile, a multi-front economic war conducted by an alarmed imperial hegemon bent on aborting the first democratic socialist experiment in Latin America.
>
> But was the “invisible blockade” actually successful? Did it cause, or contribute substantially to, Chile’s shambles in 1972-73? This narrower question of the actual economic impact of the ‘blockade’ has gotten lost in the shuffle of the larger question of US culpability in Pinochet’s coup.
>
> In this post, I argue, regardless of whether the “blockade” was as extensive or as maliciously intended as its maximalist critics allege, it did not make any difference.
>
> (1)
>
> The controversy about the US involvement in Chile peaked in the1970s immediately following the coup and in the wake of the Church committee hearings in the US Senate. But it has periodically flared up in tandem with coup anniversaries, the arrest of Pinochet in London, his prosecution in Chile, his death in 2006, etc. At the same time, there’s been a steady stream of books and articles dealing with US interference in Chile which mention the ‘blockade’ mostly in passing. Yet these usually assume as a matter of course that it must have ‘worked’.
>
> For example, Peter Kornbluh’s The Pinochet File, now in its second printing (2013), combines a narrative of Yankee shenanigans with fascimiles of declassified US government documents relating to Chile. Amongst those are Richard Nixon’s hand-written instruction to the CIA to “make the [Chilean] economy scream“; or Henry Kissinger’s infamous National Security Memorandum 93, calling for economic and financial measures against Chile. The steps outlined in that memo bear close resemblance to what the United States actually did.
>
> And such documents are essentially regarded as prima facie evidence for the efficacy of the “invisible blockade”. Or most people just don’t really give it much thought and default to the conventional view you can find by googling the “invisible blockade” (e.g., 1, 2, 3, 4, etc.)
>
> The literature on Chile in 1970-73 is incredibly large. Yet the part that’s specifically on the ‘blockade’ that I’m aware of is quite modest in comparison:
>
> - Farnsworth et al., Facing the Blockade (1973) (Spanish translation in PDF).
> - Paul Sigmund, “The Invisible Blockade and the Overthrow of Allende” (1974) (Spanish translation in PDF).
> - Exchange between Farnsworth and Sigmund in Foreign Policy (1974).
> - pp 79-118 of Petras & Morley, The United States and Chile: Imperialism and the Overthrow of the Allende Government (1975)
> - Farnsworth et al. “The invisible blockade: the United States reacts” in Chile: Politics and Society (1976), pp 338-373.
> - Petras & Morley, “On the U.S. and the Overthrow of Allende: Reply to Professor Sigmund’s Criticism” (1978)
> - Sandro Sideri, ed., Chile 1970-73: Economic Development and its Interational Setting (1979).
> - chapter 4 of Gonzalo Martner, El gobierno del presidente Salvador Allende 1970-1973 (1988);
> - pp 200-241, Mark Falcoff, Modern Chile, 1970-1989: A Critical History (1989).
>
> Except for the Sideri volume, this ‘blockade’ literature is about financial politics and diplomacy, not economics. They dwell on (a) the motivations of the US government, various private banks and corporations, the multilateral financial institutions, etc.; and (b) the minutiae of Chile’s external financial relations in the years 1970-73, such as the Paris Club negotiations over the country’s external debt, World Bank deliberations, legal proceedings related to copper, etc.
>
> The ‘blockade’ literature seems to agree on the following :
>
> - US foreign aid to Chile fell dramatically in the Allende years. This included long-term development loans (USAID), trade finance (Eximbank), etc.
> - During Allende’s tenure, no new loans were originated by the World Bank, and the amount of loans from the Inter-American Development Bank fell dramatically. Chile had been a major beneficiary of both institutions before 1971.
> - At the end of 1971, the Allende government announced a moratorium on the servicing of foreign debt (mostly owed to US banks).
> - There was a gradual reduction, not a total elimination, of lines of credit from US private banks which normally financed Chile’s imports on a short-term basis.
> - There was no embargo on trade, but Chile had to pay for imports in cash upfront, in proportion to the loss of trade finance.
> - The Allende government completed the nationalisation of the copper mining companies initiated by the previous administration (Frei), but decided not to compensate the mostly U.S. owners.
> - US copper companies attempted in various jurisdictions, including France, to attach Chilean copper shipments, but this met with only partial success.
> - Chile was able to obtain aid and credit from alternative sources in Western Europe and Latin America, as well as the socialist bloc.
>
> Sigmund and Falcoff, who might be called ‘anti-blockadists’, argue there was no blockade because there wasn’t a total cut-off in aid and credit. And the “credit squeeze” by private banks was not politically motivated, but largely a legitimate financial response to Chile’s deteriorating credit-worthiness. They also argue alternative sources of aid and credit went a long way in compensating for the loss of traditional sources.
>
> (continues in next comment)
I’ve run across it in various books over the years. Most recently in this one—although it isn’t the central purpose of the book. It will be in lots of accounts of the period to some extent because they really were part of a dual empire, both material and spiritual.
Best to move somewhere. Ideally IMO one should live 10 minutes drive from a small town that is outside of a moderately large city by at least an hours drive. An example using texas, where I am familiar. Outside of fredericksburg. It is an hour or so from austin texas.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Modern-Survival-Manual-Surviving/dp/9870563457
Best book I have found. the guy lived through the argentine collapse and has seen and lived a true collapse. He really breaks through a lot of myths.
I've heard good things about The Lost City of Z.
It gets ugly quick and stays ugly if someone figures out how to EMP the electric grids and fry the transformers. Have you ever seen a walmart that lost EBT on a Friday night? or even people trampling others on black Friday for some Nike's?
The civilized veneer is thin.
Check out Selco from Bosnia http://shtfschool.com/
it went downhill fast, like a matter of days.
or even Venezuela in 2001 (and again today). Ferfal lived through it.
https://www.amazon.com/Modern-Survival-Manual-Surviving-Economic/dp/9870563457
It's amusing to hear the pro-Chavez moustache guy explaining that businesses close because they don't want to sell at lower regulated prices, as if it is the fault of the businesses.
Of course they don't want to operate if if it involves losing money. Businesses are created to make money. Similarily to him writing a book and then selling it. He is not giving it away, is he? Would he be ok if I post a link here with a pirated PDF of the book?
Do these guys intentionally blind themselves to these very simple concepts?
A couple of books that I enjoyed:
Felix Gilman - The Half-Made World
http://www.amazon.com/Half-Made-World-Felix-Gilman/dp/0765325535/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1422115061&sr=8-1&keywords=The+Half-Made+World&pebp=1422115068901&peasin=765325535
The lost city of Z
http://www.amazon.com/Lost-City-Deadly-Obsession-Amazon/dp/1400078458/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1422115097&sr=1-1&keywords=lost+city+of+z
Jeff Long - The Descent
http://www.amazon.com/Descent-Jeff-Long/dp/051513175X/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1422115133&sr=1-3&keywords=the+decent
Edit: I would also check out Mark Hodder's Burton & Swinburne series. Book 3 Expedition to the Mountains of the Moon is what I was thinking of.
Not fantasy or sci-fi, but great tale of exploration!
You can also think of your food stores as an investment like you would for your guns and ammo. I have seen my rice and beans go up in value about 30% recently. The key is packing it correctly in airtight mylar bags with oxygen absorbers. This food can last you 20+ years if packed safely. I plan to rotate through my food stores about every 10 years, and I don't plan to touch my current stash until the ten year mark. I am hoping my Return On Investment will be pretty good after 10 years assuming we don't have any major deflationary times in the near future.
EDIT: Forgot to mention: In my opinion, the more likely survival scenario is going to be loss of a job or economic collapse. In this scenario I think it would be wiser to live off food stores in more populated areas rather than run to the wilderness and try to live off the land. I have come to this opinion after reading The Modern Survival Manual by Ferfal. He is a well studied survivalist and has survived Argentina's Economic Collapse for the past ten years. His shared experiences and knowledge is priceless and his book has changed my viewpoint on survivalism. Its a must read for the true survivalist.
Still not an academic-academic source, but I'm currently reading Philippe Descola's The Spears of Twilight: Life and Death in the Amazon Jungle (1998). what might be of interest to you is his account of how he finally managed to gain access to a group of Jivaro Indians of Amazonian Ecuador. Plus it's a marvellous read in its own right, anyway!
Take a look to some of this:
Latin America in the 1940s: War and Postwar Transitions
[Argentina, 1516-1987: From Spanish Colonization to Alfonsín] (http://www.amazon.com/dp/0520061780)
[State Building and Political Movements in Argentina, 1860-1916] (http://www.amazon.com/Building-Political-Movements-Argentina-1860-1916/dp/0804744661)
All of these are from David Rock, a well known argentinian specialiced historian.
Well, I suggest you check out this book: The Silence and the Scorpion. And here is a review of the book, where I first heard about it, by the Economist (it's premium content so I had to find it at this link). Basically, Chavez has already demonstrated his despotic credentials by using violence.
The true ignorance is in believing he has yet to exercise violent oppression against his citizens.
Except the deforestation of easter island didn't happen because people were cutting logs to transport the Moaï statues.
It is more plausible that it was the first humans coming to the island with rats onboard. This happened in a lots of pacific islands as well. They are just eating seeds, same happened to Hawaii.
And I think you are wrong about when those events took place. Actually the deforestation happened at the beginning of the island colonisation while the statues apparition was later on.
Still this is speculation based on reading. Haven't found a recent book on the subject in a while!
Edit: Found a book on the subject: http://www.amazon.com/The-Statues-that-Walked-ebook/dp/B003V1WXEG
I'm not sure how bad it would get. Ferfal Aguirre, a husband and father, lived through Argentina's economic collapse and wrote a book about it and what we might expect to see here:
http://www.amazon.com/The-Modern-Survival-Manual-Surviving/dp/9870563457
He says that PM's did quickly play a role in the "new economy", completely off the books. And he did touch on your point about being a target. His recommendation is to have silver and gold, but to keep it very quiet and when it's time to sell, only bring a little, dress modestly, scope out your buyer first, and bring a friend or two.
Being a brazilian also carries the burden of knowing a lot of books about each period and only just a few who talks about the whole scenario. I think one of the best still is "History of Brazil" (História do Brasil), by Boris Fausto. As far as I've looked, they published the concise version, which might be good to get started (since the regular version is thick like a brick! But it's great nonetheless). Some others that might be interesting are: "Formation of Contemporary Brazil (Formação do Brasil contemporâneo), by Caio Prado Jr. He was one of the first biggest marxists of the country; "Roots of Brazil" (Raízes do Brasil), by Sergio Buarque de Holanda. He was one of the first biggest culturalists of country. If you wish for some books about any specific period of our timeline, just let me know.
Do you have any weapons? There was a book write by am Argentinian about survival... While I don't know if you could get a written copy maybe find it online... I bet the author would send you one... Let me find it..
Found it: https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/9870563457/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1501211429&sr=8-1&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_FMwebp_QL65&keywords=surviving+the+economic+collapse+fernando+aguirre&dpPl=1&dpID=51KgmWm4ZbL&ref=plSrch
Sadly only written format. No doubt you have figured out much of this by living through it.
It's a tricky subject and a lot of Very Serious People have written studies about what a boon it has been to the economy and populace of Chile, but most of those people are advocates of the neoliberal socio-economic model so they tend to see and say things that support that narrative.
I'd say if you really want to dive into this subject, you should start with the book The Pinochet File by Peter Kornbluh/the National Security Archive. It uses a wealth of declassified US intelligence and state department documents to examine the history of Pinochet's rise to power and his government around that time. While it doesn't directly address privatization of the country's social security system, it gives a great look at the political environment and conditions in which it happened and, in my opinion at least, is essential reading to parsing any sort of later analysis of the policy shift.
I have a couple of books about big game hunters on my list, but I have not read either of these yet:
As for explorers, the best non-fiction I've read about explorers are The Lost City of Z by David Grann, about Percy Fawcett's attempts to find Eldorado in the jungles of South America, and Endurance by Alfred Lansing, about Shackleton's survival after his doomed polar expedition.
It occurs to me that none of these are set in Africa. Hope that's not a deal-breaker.
I'll also recommend my favorite memoir of all time, Papa Hemingway by A.E. Hotchner. It's about his time spent traveling with Ernest Hemingway, who was something of a hunter and adventurer, and recounts a lot of very exciting trips to exotic locales in which manly deeds were done.
They do.
This author of this book lived through the currency collapse there:
https://www.amazon.com/Modern-Survival-Manual-Surviving-Economic/dp/9870563457?ie=UTF8&ref_=cm_cr_arp_d_bdcrb_top
When people get hungry enough, they hunt and eat everything that moves.
It's non-fiction, but Deep Down Dark is riveting; better than most adventure novels.
Non-fiction for sure. I do really like history but sometimes its just too dense. I like to switch it up with non-fiction (or some sci-fi) that are kinda self-contained and only relate tangentially to larger events or just a lighter biography. Thinking Shadow Divers, The lost city of Z, Lost in Shangri-La, At Ease - Eisenhower or An American Doctor's Odyssey
https://www.amazon.com/Grey-Wolf-Escape-Adolf-Hitler/dp/1402796196
>In a riveting scenario that has never been fully investigated until now, international journalist Gerrard Williams and military historian Simon Dunstan make a powerful case for the Führer's escape to a remote enclave in Argentina-along with other key Nazis—where he is believed to have lived comfortably until 1962. Following years of meticulous research, the authors reconstruct the dramatic plot-including astonishing evidence and compelling testimony, some only recently declassified. Impossible to put down, Grey Wolf unravels an extraordinary story that flies in the face of history.
I don't think we can agree. The most radical democratic, libertarian projects in the world we/are being carried out in Venezuela. 99.9% of the stuff you read about the country is misleading, at best. Even the liberal/progressive press is guilty of this; one libertarian socialist, Michael Albert, has recently written about it. ( I would point out that since his article, progressive news outlets have been much better)
One good book from a Libertarian left perspective, which goes ino the positives and negatives of the socialist party in Venezuela is We created Chavez: a people's history of the Venezuelan Revolution by George Ciccarello-Maher
Oh yeah, FerFAL is a good resource too. His book has lots of good no-nonsense urban advice even if the book lacks some polish.
If you're interested in amazon exploration check out The Lost City of Z, a really interesting novel about searching for ancient civilizations
I dunno. For a guy who ultimately failed in his greatest enterprise, he sure has gotten a lot more notice of late than other adventurers who, equally unsuccessful, never lost a man.
edit: Shackleton lost 3 men. My bad. But he brought 24 others back... alive. If I could choose one of those two as a leader, it would be...
How about economic collapse? It's very possible. Argentina and Russia are perfect examples.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/9870563457?tag=surviinargen-20&camp=14573&creative=327641&linkCode=as1&creativeASIN=9870563457&adid=1M6DJX7940GNQNZC4AF5&
SECTION | CONTENT
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Title | Cordage: Making a Hank of Cord
Description | My book "The Modern Survival Manual: Surviving the Economic Collapse": http://www.amazon.com/dp/9870563457?tag=surviinargen-20&camp=14573&cr... Website: http://www.themodernsurvivalist.com http://www.ferfal.blogspot.com
Length | 0:06:10
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There is a lot of evidence suggesting Hitler himself escaped to Argentina, and lived until the 1960s. This book covers it well. Really cool read.
Grey Wolf: The Escape of Adolf Hitler https://www.amazon.com/dp/1402796196/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_OV63Bb716MD76
I'm a historian of Latin America, so I really only know about the US-Latin American cases or the US/Canadian/European - Caribbean cases. Peter Kornbluh has published a lot of declassified US primary source documents that relate to US interventionism abroad.
The Pinochet File, about Chile
Bay of Pigs Declassified, about Cuba
A really good secondary source is Greg Grandin's book Empire's Workshop.
A great secondary source on this sort of stuff occurring during the 1970s in Southeast Asia, by Alfred McCoy, is The Politics of Heroin: CIA Complicity in the Global Drug Trade. Meticulously researched (the book is over 1000 pages, the footnotes are endless). McCoy is a pretty tremendous historian, out of U of Wisconsin. His area of expertise is Southeast Asia, not the US, and like me, he stumbled into a much darker story than he ever expected to find.
Arts & Photography: https://www.amazon.com/Imaginary-Cities-Darran-Anderson/dp/0992765595/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1500713407&sr=1-2&keywords=imaginary+cities; https://www.amazon.com/Burglars-Guide-City-Geoff-Manaugh/dp/0374117268/ref=sr_1_7?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1500713469&sr=1-7&keywords=imaginary+cities (both from the subcategory Architecture)
History: https://www.amazon.com/Devil-White-City-Madness-Changed/dp/0375725601/ref=sr_1_17?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1500713574&sr=1-17; https://www.amazon.com/Lost-City-Deadly-Obsession-Amazon/dp/1400078458/ref=sr_1_69?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1500713679&sr=1-69
You find the Lost City of Z yet?
May want to check out Fernando Ferfal's book. the modern survival manual: Surviving the economic collapse
I enjoyed John Norwich's three volume series: Byzantium: The Early Centuries, The Apogee, and Decline and Fall. If that is a bit too verbose for your liking, he has also published a Short History of Byzantium which summarises his trilogy.
Read Grey Wolf, which shows how Hitlers escape was possible.
First of all, thank you so much for the compliment. Brazil is a really interesting country and has a lot of unique things, specially due to the heterogeneity of the population.
I'm not really sure about books in English, but there's an author "Boris Fausto", whose book is the first that comes to mind. This book, published by USP (the most important university in Brazil) is the one I have. I haven't read all of it, due to being busy lately, but I believe it gives a good feeling about Brazil, even though he doesn't cover some cultural aspects and movements, like the Modern Art Week of 1922. So, if I had to indicate someone, it would be him. His "[A Concise History of Brazil]"(https://www.amazon.com/Concise-History-Brazil-Cambridge-Histories/dp/1107635241/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8) is available in English and the comments on Amazon seems to be positive. So I would check it out, for starters. I don't know about any foreign historians or geopolitical writers that cover Brazil in depth.
I believe that, if you read his book and did some research about the culture, you'd get a firm grasp of Brazil.
there's actually a book about it, too:
http://www.amazon.com/Grey-Wolf-Escape-Adolf-Hitler/dp/1402796196
I read an essay written by a gent who was in Argentina when their economy collapsed back in 2001..... huh, it is now a book on Amazon . The guy actually listed movies/video games as an essential part of survival; his reasoning was that once him and his family were hunkered down in a home they could defend if need be, maintaining your sanity becomes an issue. Entertainment (for him I believe it was a hefty DVD collection) became a form of mental escape from the exhaustingly mental task of staying alive. I'll have to get the book now, it was an amazing essay (I read it in 2004)
One River.
I'm a botany person with a lot of love for anthropology. If you're into Amazonia you should enjoy it. I think anyone would like this book. I liked it so much I bought 2 copies. Hell, it's safe to say it changed my life!
Lost City of Z might be more your thing. That is to say with your interest in (possible) ancient Amazonian civilizations. That's a pretty fun little book.
directedlight: ^^original ^^reddit ^^link
I think it is Gerrard Williams, co-author of Grey Wolf: The Escape of Adolf Hitler^ebook.
Here is another interview with Williams.
Sidenote: I just want to say, I thought it was odd that the interviewer in the OP's video brought up holocaust denial when Williams's story had nothing to do with refuting the holocaust.
David Rock's Argentina 1516-1987 is a pretty good english text.
Guerillas and Generals, recommended elsewhere here, is also good.
Unfortunately, my favourites are in spanish. Are you able to read any spanish?
edit: And if you're interested in the Dirty War & last dictatorship, and you have any specific questions about what you've read or there is anything that doesn't quite make sense, you could just ask here - there's a few of us who are old enough to have lived through that era. Even if you don't agree with the comments, you'll get a feel from the ensuing flame war what the issues were.
IMO, the whole era makes little sense without understanding what happened in 1955, the aims of the Revolucion Libertadora in that year and their context in the Cold War/Post WWII world, the proscription of the majority party, how this radicalised large sectors of the population throughout the 60s, and how real democracy was only allowed to return in 1973 on the condition that the radical elements be suppressed. There is a scene in the movie "Funny Dirty Little War" (set in the early Dirty War period, just before the '76 coup) where Peronists from opposing sides shoot at each other while yelling "Viva Peron!". Needless to say, foreigners tend to get confused when they see this sort of thing.
The Lost City of Z is an amazing book! One of my favourites.
http://www.amazon.ca/The-Lost-City-Deadly-Obsession/dp/1400078458
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/9870563457
He's not a great writer but it's very relevant and practical info.
You are p dumb and also you rely on Wikipedia for knowledge. The Roman (not Greek) emperor renamed the city after himself but to the Greek population until and after the fall of the city in 1453, thirteen centuries later, it remained Byzantium. and that was the name of their empire as a result.
I suggest that you first read John Julius Norwich's superb three-part history of the Byzantines:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Byzantium-Early-Centuries-v/dp/0140114475
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Byzantium-v-Apogee-Apogee/dp/0140114483/
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Byzantium-Decline-John-Julius-Norwich/dp/0140114491/
Then a useful primary source to start with would be Anna Komnene's Alexiad, written about her father the Emperor and infused with first-hand knowledge of the city of Byzantium and its empire: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Alexiad-Penguin-Classics-Anna-Komnene/dp/0140455272
Then perhaps something like Procopius' Secret History. Then come back and try and tell me that you don't cringe at that time you thought the Greeks called their city "Constantinople".
Read this. People freaking disappear in there after being captured by tribes and who knows what else.
Hello and Welcome back. So sorry that you're going throw bad times. let me know if i can do anything.
I have this book for 7.25 - https://www.amazon.com/dp/1400078458/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=SOZXP7H39ER4&coliid=I1E2WKP7ZBEQ98
[Edit: removed "simple-minded" before global left; unnecessary insult, irrespective of my feelings about the individuals who have cheered Venezuela's disaster on for the past 17 years.]
This is an important film, one not too many persons outside of those with a personal connection to Venezuela have paid much attention to. It was a lot easier for the ideological global left to believe in Chavez' propaganda, buy a Che Guevara t-shirts and think of themselves as radical, arguing that Venezuela was a utopia which the US was hellbent on destroying.
Chavez is gone, and he knew he was leaving behind a train wreck. He chose Nicolas Maduro for the sole purpose of making things so bad that he'll comparatively look like a hero in 50 or 100 years, possibly inspiring the next "Chavez."
Unfortunately, the majority of global media still believes that the United States supported the events leading to Chavez' brief ouster, and the film helps to expose that this assumption is untrue. A deeper inspection of the spontaneous uprising against Chavez is the topic of the book "The Silence and the Scorpion," http://www.amazon.com/Silence-Scorpion-Against-Chavez-Venezuela/dp/1568584180 which I highly recommend to anyone seeking to learn the truth which contradicts the propaganda.
In 2002 the United States tried to eliminate Hugo Chavez through a coup.
There is proof of direct american involvement.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2002/apr/29/venezuela.duncancampbell
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2002/apr/21/usa.venezuela
https://www.amazon.com/Silence-Scorpion-Against-Chavez-Venezuela/dp/1568586868