Brazil goes Communist in 1935

In 1935, there was a communist revolt in Brazil that was quickly suppressed. What if it succeeded? FDR is following his good neighbor policy towards Latin America and because the US is isolationist, I doubt he would interfere.

How would communist Brazil affect the Cold War later on?
 
this could definitely change the out come of this alternatecuban missile crisis if the soviets had supported brazil after the war as it being a another communist country it probaly would have joined the soviet allaince. this would have made brazil a far more useful missile base compared to cuba. this also would create far more tension during the the alternate cuban missile crisis. so the possibity of all out war is far more a reality in this scenario then it was in ours.
 
this could definitely change the out come of this alternatecuban missile crisis if the soviets had supported brazil after the war as it being a another communist country it probaly would have joined the soviet allaince. this would have made brazil a far more useful missile base compared to cuba. this also would create far more tension during the the alternate cuban missile crisis. so the possibity of all out war is far more a reality in this scenario then it was in ours.

I think the role Brazil would play in a Cold War would not be as a missile base but rather as a strong political and economic influence in South America and to a lesser extent Africa.

As a missile base, Brazil is over 1000 miles away from Florida; Cuba was a good base because it is 50 miles away. Brazil is nearly as far as Russia is (at least over the North Pole) so not a big improvement.

But Brazil would be a really powerful Communist ally. It could offer a base of operations for throughout South America and also it would probably want to be involved in the decolonization of Portuguese Africa.

Definitely an interesting possibility
 

Paul MacQ

Donor
Brazil reaction to the Spanish Civil War comes to mind.

Could a Brazil get enough influence there to tip the scales ?

What little I found was the Brazilian Communists seemed more Trotsky idealists to Stalinist type of Communist. Trotsky meddling in central America with the Numbers Brazil can bring to bear. Interesting
 
In 1935, there was a communist revolt in Brazil that was quickly suppressed. What if it succeeded? FDR is following his good neighbor policy towards Latin America and because the US is isolationist, I doubt he would interfere.

How would communist Brazil affect the Cold War later on?

Sorry, but there is simply now way it could have succeeded. First, the rebells simply didn't have any important support among the population. It was rather a military rebbellion inspired by communists than a proper communist rebellion, given the fact that all the conspirators were from the Army. It had nothing to do with organized workers. The majority of them were simple soldiers who knew nothing about communism, they only believed it was something that would be good to Brazil. If the officers that convinced them to join the fight had told them that Fascism was the solution for the nation's problems they would join the fight too. They fought more due to loyalties and dislike of their commanders rather than ideology. It also meant that when the rebells asked some of their fellow officers to join the movement many of them decided that they needed to inform their commanders about it or even try to convince the commanders to join the rebellion.

Also, the government was well aware of the insurrection, and only in Natal, the lest important of the three cities where they rebelled (Natal, Recife and Rio de Janeiro) the movement managed to occupy a public building other than their own headquarters, and they simply fled and gave up when they saw a loyal company arriving the to city.

Finally, it only happened because Luis Carlos Prestes sent wrong information to Moscow, informing that support for communism was widespread among the Brazilian population. The contacts between him and the Politburo were known by the British, who informed Vargas that a revolt was likely to happen. The rebells simply had no chance.

Unfortunately I couldn't find any good online source about it in English, but there is this good work of Frank D. Mccann: "Soldiers of the Pátria: A History of the Brazilian Army, 1889-1937" (Stanford University Press. ISBN 0804732221). He gives a lot of interesting information about the movement and why it was doomed from the start.
 
Top