El Mozote Massacre - Background

Background

In 1981, various left-wing guerrilla groups coalesced into the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front to battle El Salvador's right-wing government. Prior to the massacre, unlike many villages in the area, El Mozote had a reputation for neutrality. While many of its neighbors were largely Roman Catholic, and therefore often influenced by liberation theology and sympathetic to the guerrillas, El Mozote was largely Evangelical Protestant. The village had sold guerrillas supplies on occasion, but was also "a place where the guerrillas had learned not to look for recruits".

Prior to the massacre, the town's wealthiest man, Marcos Díaz, had gathered the citizens to warn them that the army would soon pass through the area in a counterinsurgency operation, but that he had been assured that the town's residents would not be harmed if they remained in place. Concerned that fleeing the town would cause them to be mistaken for guerrillas, the townspeople elected to stay, and extended an offer of protection to peasants from the surrounding area, who soon flooded the town.