ABSTRACT
From the late 1950s to the 1990s, Latin America and Europe witnessed several series of guerrilla campaigns and terrorist attacks from left-wing extremists. About 25-30 groups of social-revolutionary terrorists were active during this period, most of them of limited scope and lacking major support in their respective societies, but some of them quite strong in terms of number of members and destructive power. Being considered in general more as a cause of trouble and annoyance than a serious challenge for the ruling class, in two cases (that of Cuba in 1959 and that of Nicaragua in 1979) they succeeded to overwhelm the government and to seize power.
