Mexico: From Revolution to Evolution

The potential benefits of this development, however, were undercut by corruption and cronyism. Not solely were the benefits unshared by the necessitous majority of Mexicans, most of whom were peasants; they were unshared even by most of the Mexican elite of landowners and industrialists. By 1910, when Porfirio's health and personal travelling bag on power began to fade, the regime's domestic support base had shrunk about to nothing. Hence the revolution that broke out that year was at once broad-based--drawing support from almost all sectors of Mexican society--and deeply divided, since these sectors had widely variant objectives. All could agree that the pie had to be redivided, moreover thither was no consensus on how to divide it (Brenner and Leighton 27-29).

Thus, for example, the initial phalanx success of the Revolution was due by and large to the support of ranchers and separate landowners, particularly in the north and south, who were able to take the guinea pig with their own armies of tenants and ranch hands--in effect, quasi-feudal retainers. The most storied of these leaders (though twain themselves of humble origin) were Emiliano Zapata in the south and Pancho Villa in the north (Brenner and Leighton 42); the last menti aned is long established as a stereotype " depredator" in norteamericano popular culture, among people who know little or nothing of his political role.

But the interests of these leaders, pr

When these armies move it was like a mass migration. [The troop trains] carried families, deuce-ace layers deep: few inside the boxcars, some on top, and others, more often than not the boys and young men, in hammocks slung between the wheels. Tortillas were ground and baked on fires in oil cans along the whole top of the train, and dogs and babies accommodated themselves in the warmest corners within (Brenner and Leighton, 46).

Hellman, Judith Adler. Mexican Lives. New York: The New Press, 1994.

Even nationalism, however, was only a loosely defined battle cry, and not one that led directly to greater national cohesion in the picayune run.

Landowners might be nationalistic in the scent out of wanting to reclaim lands that had fallen under foreign ownership, nevertheless they had little interest in the federal government turn in as a prize to be siezed. Falling short of that they tended to set themselves up as local warlords, a work that tended to prolong the civil conflict. A further factor here was that Mexico is a very large country. On a earth it does not appear large when compared to Russia, or even to the coupled States, but Mexico is as large, and geographically more diverse and divided, than the Russian heartland region where the Russian Revolution was decided. The nature of the fighting, frequently for match of the railroad system, hastened the fragmenting process, since in the course of the fighting the railroads themselves were often largely destroyed.

Brenner, Anita; and Leighton, George R. The Wind that Swept Mexico. Austin: University of Texas, 1971. Original publication 1943.

The women, though their job was foraging, cooking, and looking after the wounded, pitched in and fought if they matte like it. If a woman's husband was killed, she could either attach herself to some other man or take over his uniform and gun herself. Almost every troop had a famous lady colonel or captain, a husky, earringed girl armed to the teeth. and among headl
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