Editing Jacobo Árbenz (section)

==Military career and marriage==
[[File:Arbenz y vilanova 1944.jpg|thumb|right|alt=Jacobo Árbenz seated next to his wife María Vilanova|Árbenz seated next to his wife [[Maria Cristina Vilanova]] in 1944. His wife was a great ideological influence upon him, and they shared a desire for social reform.]]
Árbenz excelled in the academy, and was deemed "an exceptional student". He became "first sergeant", the highest honor bestowed upon cadets; only six people received the honor from 1924 to 1944. His abilities earned him an unusual level of respect among the officers at the school, including Major John Considine, the US director of the school, and of other US officers who served at the school. A fellow officer later said that "his abilities were such that the officers treated him with a respect that was rarely granted to a cadet."{{sfn|Gleijeses|1992|pp=134–137}} Árbenz graduated in 1935.{{sfn|Gleijeses|1992|pp=134–137}}

After graduating, he served a stint as a junior officer at [[San José Castle (Guatemala City)|Fort San José]] in [[Guatemala City]] and later another under "an illiterate Colonel" in a small garrison in the village of [[San Juan Sacatepéquez]]. While at San José, Árbenz had to lead squads of soldiers who were escorting chain gangs of prisoners (including [[political prisoners]]) to perform [[forced labor]]. The experience traumatized Árbenz, who said he felt like a ''capataz'' (i.e., a "foreman").{{sfn|Gleijeses|1992|pp=134–137}} During this period he first met [[Francisco Arana]].{{sfn|Gleijeses|1992|pp=134–137}}

Árbenz was asked to fill a vacant teaching position at the academy in 1937. Árbenz taught a wide range of subjects, including military matters, history, and physics. He was promoted to captain six years later, and placed in charge of the entire corps of cadets. His position was the third highest in the academy and was considered one of the most prestigious positions a young officer could hold.{{sfn|Gleijeses|1992|pp=134–137}}

In 1938 he met his future wife [[Maria Cristina Vilanova|María Vilanova]], the daughter of a wealthy [[El Salvador|Salvadoran]] landowner and a Guatemalan mother from a wealthy family. They were married a few months later, without the approval of María's parents, who felt she should not marry an army lieutenant who was not wealthy.{{sfn|Gleijeses|1992|pp=134–137}} María was 24 at the time of the wedding, and Jacobo was 26. María later wrote that, while the two were very different in many ways, their desire for political change drew them together. Árbenz stated that his wife had a great influence on him.{{sfn|Gleijeses|1992|pp=134–137}} It was through her that Árbenz was exposed to [[Marxism]]. María had received a copy of ''[[The Communist Manifesto]]'' at a women's congress and left a copy of it on Jacobo's bedside table when she left for a vacation. Jacobo was "moved" by the ''Manifesto'', and he and María discussed it with each other. Both felt that it explained many things they had been feeling. Afterwards, Jacobo began reading more works by Marx, Lenin, and Stalin and by the late 1940s was regularly interacting with a group of Guatemalan communists.{{sfn|Gleijeses|1992|p=141}}