Alright, now that I have finally some free time I'm gonna continue this. Last time I mentioned how Cipriano Castro, The 1st most influential guy in the political history of Venezuela during the XXth century, managed to seize power (starting the rule of the Andinos) in 1899 and was exiled by his General Juan Vicente Gómez in 1908 (for more details, here ) and now here is the second most influential guy in the political history of Venezuela of the XXth century:

To describe in the fastest way the personality and rule of Gómez, we only have to read the words of José Rafael Pocaterra, a political exile during his rule:

Invulnerable para la piedad en un país de sentimentales, silencioso en una tierra de habloistanes, reservado en una marejada de chismosos, el hombre más temido y odiado, vergüenza de la patria, sin que santo ni poeta ni sociólogo puedan decir hasta donde podrá prolongarse su influencia en los futuros destinos de Venezuela

Invulnerable for mercy on a country of sentimentals, quiet in a land of speakers, reserved in a wave of gossipers, the most feared and hated man, shame of the country, with no saint, poet or sociologist who can tell how far he will prolong his influence in the future destinies in Venezuela.

Juan Vicente Gómez was perhaps the scariest dictator in the history of the world, because like Hitler, Chávez, Franco and many others, he managed to obtain power and force his rule (and he started to wipe out the lifestyle of the Venezuelans the same way Hitler started to wipe out the Jews), but unlike many other dictators, he managed to stay in power until his death in December 17th of 1935 (the same day thay Simón Bolívar, Liberator of Venezuela, died) and he did managed to wipe out the lifestyle of the Venezuelans of the XIX Century.

One of the first things that made Gómez so interesting (which makes him very different from Hitler) was that he was a very capable general: He knew how to make war, he knew how to fight, he studied Napoleon and Bismarck (even though he didn't knew how to read or write), he took notes of WWI and created the National Air Force (and many airports) and nobody would ever managed to defeat him in battle (One invasion attempt to note here would be the attempt of Román Chalbaud in 1929, he tried to invade through the sea, but he was defeated by the air force that Gómez created); during his rule, there would be many, many attempts from Generals, Caudillos (Men with personal armies) and exterior forces to defeat him and end his rule, but nobody would ever win, Gómez managed to crush them all and either exile them, or have them in one of his prisons where they would stay there until they died or were released after his death.

He was a good politician, to make sure that no nation would ever mess with him, he decided to pay ALL the international debt and never searched war with any other nation (in other words, he isolated Venezuela from the world), he created the National Armed Force (or FAN in spanish) to make sure that the Caudillos would stop existing (and it worked, the only man that would have a capable army to fight would be Gómez), he used his political prisoners to construct highways, that even today are still being used, to make it easier to travel in Venezuela and assert his control, he practically destroyed the educational system because, in his own words, "A Dumb Country is easier to manipulate" and once again he was right, by the end of his rule, the illiteracy was extremely high in the whole country and since very few venezuelans had studies, could afford studies or were studying, almost nobody were complaining specially because those who did would end up in Jail. In other words, he did whatever it takes to stay in power and in the process, he sent Venezuela into a political coma (the political parties that dominated the XIX Century, the Liberal Party and the Conservative Party, would be gone, almost all of their leaders died by 1935 and nobody would ever talk about politics until 1936).

He managed to make Venezuela produce and be mayor exporter in food (that way he got the money to pay the international debt) and he allowed external companies to take the oil, making deals of 10-90 (or selling it to prices so cheap, that it was practically giving it away) and he took all that money for himself and his followers, making him the richest guy in Venezuela and letting Venezuela famished in hunger and ill in disease.

One thing to note here, is that in the 28' there was a protest from a group of students, wanting to have the same educational system that other nations (like the US) had; this group of students would be called "The Generation of the 28" and many of this students would transform into important figure heads in the second half of the history of Venezuela (some of them would become Presidents of Venezuela), a few names to mention would: be Rómulo Gallegos (he was the teacher of this students), Rómulo Betancourt, Jóvito Villalba, Miguel Otero Silva, Germán Suárez Flámerich, Raúl Leoni, etc. Suffice to say about this protest, the students stopped going to school and started to go to the jails.

But Gómez's sons would study in the exterior.

He was also known as Padrote or Big Father, since he had many lovers and kids until he had 68 years of age (and his sons started to mix with his grandsons), a catholic priest would often ask him to marry, one day Gómez responded "If the marriage is so good, then why the Pope doesn't marry?" He loved his family, while he would let his daughters marry with any man they wanted, he always made sure that it was a rich man and his sons had high positions in his government (a little bit of trivia: my grandmother have a picture of one of her aunts marrying one of the sons of Gómez, the photo is cut in half, and in the cutted half, the one half that disappeared, it would show her father at the legs of Juan Vicente Gómez), and his enemies would often call him the Catfish for the way he looked with his moustache.

He would always torture his prisoners.

By the end of his rule (beginnings of the 30's), he started to accept (although he didn't wanted to) the idea of reforming Venezuela, Caracas stopped being a agrarian city and became an urban city (or metropoli if you want), the cars start to become a thing along electrical kitchens and movies start to come, Gómez would always watch this movies like a kid eat candy, and while he didn't knew how to read, he always had a man to read the movies for him.

He died of Cancer in 1935 and when he died, the country mourned him with his military making the honorary burials, but not even had they finished the burial, when Venezuela woke up from the coma and made a huge revolt in Caracas, that day, Gómez died another 1000 times for every statue, image and painting of him that was destroyed, along his political prisons and the return of his political enemies into Venezuela. The Venezuelans were so caught up in this that they didn't knew who to follow now, if either the new politicians (Gen of the 28) the political exiles or Eleazar López Contreras (Gómez Second in command) who was very quickly trying to find a way to make sure that they country didn't collapse with all of this political turmoil.

He looked like this when he died:

In the end, the greatest insult that Gómez could have ever left in Venezuela wasn't the he shared the exact same dates of birth and death as Simón Bolívar (The Liberator of Venezuela), it wasn't that he destroyed the country or that he made it produce to industry level just to take all of the money for himself, it wasn't the destruction of the education or his repression.

The greatest insult that Gómez could have ever left in Venezuela was that even today over 80 years after his death, you can still see the echoes of his rule and how he's still influencing the history of Venezuela from the grave, and in the next post, you'll start to see the results of Gómez.

And now, considering this group, I leave you with a question: How do you think Equestria would react to a man like him? I know that Celestia and Twilight would hate him, but what do you think? does anyone here thinks that Equestria would manage to defeat him (not counting Alicorns) although nobody ever did?

For more information, you can watch this documentary about him:

Here is a link for the next part

Thank you for reading, have a good day.