page_title: Juan Vicente Gómez
section_title: Legacy
hierarchical_section_title: Juan Vicente Gómez / Legacy
caption_attribution_description: Juan Vicente Gómez and Eleazar López Contreras in Maracay, 1934.
context_page_description: Juan Vicente Gómez Chacón was a Venezuelan military general and de facto ruler of Venezuela from 1908 until his death in 1935. He was president on three occasions during this time, and ruled as an unelected military strongman for the rest of the era.
context_section_description: Gómez's rule of Venezuela is a controversial period in the country's history. His cunning leadership brought enrichment to the country, particularly after the discovery of oil, which enabled the development of a modern infrastructure. His insistence on road construction and the creation of jobs in the then-new oil industry promoted population mobility and more frequent social contact among Venezuelans of different regions – previously a rare occurrence – which permanently rooted a sense of national unity in the country. He brought about the end of civil wars and political insurrections by exerting power over regional caudillos and, as a result, Venezuela became a peaceful country and would remain so for decades. Ironically, the elimination of the caudillo problem and the choosing of Eleazar López Contreras as his last minister of war and marine paved the way to the emergence of modern democracy; see Generation of 1928. He repaid all foreign and internal debt using excess reserves; his fiscal conservatism helped the country get through the Crash of 1929 and the Great Depression, and led to an increase in the value of the bolívar to the point of becoming hard currency.
  On the debit side, he is considered by some as one of the prominent examples of alleged U.S. domination in Latin America. During his rule, most of the country's wealth ended up in the hands of Gómez and his henchmen, and, according to Woddis, Wall Street.  Indeed, at the time of his death, he was by far the richest man in the country.  He did little for public education (believing that "an ignorant people is a docile people") and held basic democratic principles in disdain. Although cordial and simple in manner, his ruthless crushing of opponents through his secret police earned him the reputation of a tyrant. He was also accused of trying to make the country a personal fief.
  John Gunther described Gómez as follows: "The Catfish was—let us not gloss over the fact—a murderous blackguard. He made use of tortures of inconceivable brutality; political prisoners, of which there were thousands, dragged out their lives bearing leg irons (grillos) that made them permanent cripples, if they were not hung upside down—by the testicles—until they died. Others became human slime, literally. Gómez was quite capable of choosing one out of every ten by lot, and hanging them—by meathooks through their throats!" (Emphasis in the original.)
  Former Venezuelan President Rómulo Betancourt said in his book Venezuela: Oil and Politics that "(...) Gomez was something more than a local despot, he was the instrument of foreign control of the Venezuelan economy, the ally and servant of powerful outside interests." This is in reference to Royal Dutch Shell and Standard Oil's appeasement of the dictator in return for exploration rights to the country's oil fields.
  In Venezuelan politics, Juan Vicente Gómez has come to symbolize political endurance and a caudillo mentality. He was quoted as saying he needed a lifetime to fulfill his political work.
  Juan Vicente Gómez International Airport was named for him in 1993.
caption: Gómez and Eleazar López Contreras in 1934
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