At the time of the coup, U.F. led its industry by every measure: in profits, market share, volume (and it wasn’t even close). Within a generation, it would trail Standard Fruit in nearly every category. The overthrow had all the ingredients of irony: meant to prevent the establishment of a Communist beachhead in the hemisphere, it would help create just such a beachhead in Cuba. Meant to make Guatemala friendly for the company, it would engender such hostility that the company was eventually forced to abandon the isthmus altogether.
