Whatever Happened to Radicalism? Voices from the George Vickers Papers

Member, Principled Union of College Students, one of several revolutionary organizations active at the University of El Salvador.

The Salvadoran Civil War (1979-1992) was a protracted conflict between El Salvador’s US-backed military government and a coalition of revolutionary guerilla groups united as the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN). The ouster of Nicaraguan dictator Anastasio Somoza by revolutionary forces in the summer of 1979 had inspired a preemptive military coup in El Salvador, whereby an existing US-backed military regime was replaced by a more repressive one. The new regime met protests with violence and in the face of revolutionary opposition launched a pervasive campaign of kidnappings, torture, extrajudicial killings, and bombings of rural areas, ultimately killing over 75,000 civilians. College students and faculty suspected of aiding armed resistance were also periodically targeted by the government.

Vickers with Maribel Rosales, who brought international attention to repressive measures faced by the University of El Salvador.

Starting in 1984, George Vickers made biannual visits to El Salvador, speaking with human rights advocates and political actors across the ideological spectrum, and in the US collaborated with many others to shift US foreign policy. Later, he served as an adviser in the negotiations that led to peace accords in 1992 and was a collaborator in subsequent efforts to document atrocities committed during the war. The images and audio recordings presented here offer a glimpse of more than a decade’s work.