Travel through time

Travel through time

By: Cristiana Guevara Mena

Traditional dictators claim to be forever. Who says that dictatorships are forever? Who says that absolute powers don’t end? Don’t believe me? Then, let’s get on a time machine, travel through history, and meet the most famous absolutist leaders of humanity. Let us be witnesses to the end of their power and the silencing of their lives. Here we go.

Let's fly to the Ides of March of ancient Rome from 44 BC. We are in the Senate, and a group of senators are waiting conspiratorially for the Lifelong Consul Julius Caesar. He walks through the front door, very sure of his victories and full of majesty from conquering the known world. In that, we see a senator, named Casca that takes out a knife and cuts a slit on his neck. Casca screams: - Help brothers! - Suddenly, about sixty senators throw themselves against the dictator and drill multiple stab wounds. Caesar, blinded by his own blood, trips and falls, and still alive sees his stepson Brutus who, with a knife in hand, also throws himself forward, sinking his weapon to the handle. Caesar, in agony, asks – You too, my son? - While covering his face, he falls helplessly on the low porch stairs. This was the end of the great Julius Caesar. Bloody and dramatic, right? Let us ride our time machine again.

Let’s move to June 18, 1815 in Waterloo, Belgium. We’re in the last battle of Napoleon Bonaparte. In the field we see thousands of French soldiers in uniform of white pants, black high boots to the knee, blue and red jackets with long sleeves, and rifles with sharp bayonets, fighting against the English, dressed in their traditional red suit with the same type of rifle. Let’s hide behind a hill to protect ourselves from stray bullets. This is a slaughter! Soldiers are mutilated, and pieces of human flesh go flying through the air. A piece of arm has dropped all the way here! We are splashed with blood. In the end, the French were defeated, and Napoleon, who believed he was invincible, was arrested and humiliated by the British, and was exiled to the island of St. Helena where he was allegedly poisoned. This marked the end of the Napoleonic era. Let’s travel again.

We are in the Dominican Republic. It's Tuesday May 30, 1961. We crossed the wide, beautiful Dominican beaches and arrived at mile 9 on the road from Santo Domingo to San Cristobal. It's 9:45 pm, and we see the car where the powerful protégé of the United States, the great dictator Rafael Leonidas Trujillo, travels. At that moment, there is a planned ambush by a group of opponents that shoot with machine guns. Trrraa-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta! We heard sixty different caliber bullets hitting the car. Trujillo died because of the rain of bullets; only seven of them killed him. Horrifying! Let’s go back to our time machine.

We return to Nicaragua. It's Friday September 21, 1956 at the Casa del Obrero in the city of León. There’s a party here! Very elegant, right? Everyone is dressed in their best clothes. People are dancing to the song "Caballo Negro" by Perez Prado. As agreed, the Nationalist Liberal Party again proclaimed Anastasio Somoza Garcia as their candidate. Somoza, newly rich, owner of the army, police, Congress, judicial power and party, feels undefeatable and dances very happily with his wife. When Somoza sits down with his wife after dancing, a known young man appears unexpectedly. He, without any hesitation or disgust, shoots the barrel of his gun in the large body of the president, who falls mortally wounded, just saying -Aahhh!- You hear the shots, and the clatter of guns are heard, and everyone leaves, running. That was the end of Somoza.

We’re coming back to the present. Let's review the lesson. You see that there is no such thing as eternity in power? Historically, each one of these leaders came to an end right in their best era. When they think they’re on top of the power, that they have everything under control, that they are absolute and invincible and that nobody can touch them, that’s when the end of their days seems to be at its closest. Any tyrannical leader who seeks at all costs to cling to power, anywhere in the world, ends up facing the consequences. In Nicaragua, we are also accustomed to assassination of leaders which leads to their collapse, especially when it seems that we are more subjected to a single will. I don’t say it, history says it. Should we expect these things to be repeated? Do you think that this government has learned the lesson of history? Most likely not. So, most probably, as we saw in our time travel, their end will come when they least expect it.