Under the Flags, the Sun

8/18/2025

For 35 years, Gen. Don Alfredo Stroessner led the land-locked Latin American nation of Paraguay, heading up one of the planet’s longest-lasting authoritarian dictatorships, holding power from 1954 until his ouster by a supposedly trusted political colleague in 1989. Like many comparable autocrats of his day, he built and oversaw a carefully crafted cult of personality characterized by unrelenting right-wing policies and ideology and backed by a solid core of staunch religionist, anti-Communist, anti-trade union followers in his all-powerful Colorado Party (the dominant political organization still in charge in Paraguay to this day). And, while in power, he faithfully conformed to the mold of many of his despotic peers, systematically marginalizing, torturing or exiling minorities and oppon