The military dictatorship in Brazil (Portuguese: ditadura militar), occasionally referred to as the Fifth Brazilian Republic, was established on 1 April 1964, after a coup d'état by the Brazilian Armed Forces, with support from the United States government, against president João Goulart. The Brazilian dictatorship lasted for 21 years, until 15 March 1985. The coup was planned and executed by the most senior commanders of the Brazilian Army and received the support of almost all high-ranking members of the military, along with conservative sectors in society, like the Catholic Church and anti-communist civilian movements among the Brazilian middle and upper classes. The military regime, particularly after the Institutional Act No. 5 in 1968, practiced extensive censorship and committed human rights abuses, including institutionalized torture and extrajudicial killings and forced disappearances. Despite initial pledges to the contrary, the military regime enacted a new, restrictive Constitution in 1967, and stifled freedom of speech and political opposition. The regime adopted nationalism, economic development, and anti-communism as its guidelines. The military coup was fomented by José de Magalhães Pinto, Adhemar de Barros, and Carlos Lacerda (who had already participated in the conspiracy to depose Getúlio Vargas in 1945), then governors of the states of Minas Gerais, São Paulo, and Guanabara, respectively. The U.S. State Department supported the coup through Operation Brother Sam and thereafter supported the regime through its embassy in Brasília.The dictatorship reached the height of its popularity in the 1970s with the so-called "Brazilian Miracle", even as the regime censored all media, and tortured and exiled dissidents. João Figueiredo became president in March 1979; in the same year he passed the Amnesty Law for political crimes committed for and against the regime. While combating the "hardliners" inside the government and supporting a redemocratization policy, Figueiredo could not control the crumbling economy, chronic inflation and concurrent fall of other military dictatorships in South America. Amid massive popular demonstrations on the streets of the main cities of the country, the first free elections in 20 years were held for the national legislature in 1982. In 1985, another election was held, this time to indirectly elect a new president, being contested between civilian candidates for the first time since the 1960s and won by the opposition. In 1988, a new Constitution was passed and Brazil officially returned to democracy. Brazil's military government provided a model for other military regimes and dictatorships throughout Latin America, being systematized by the so-called "National Security Doctrine", which was used to justify the military's actions as operating in the interest of national security in a time of crisis, creating an intellectual basis upon which other military regimes relied. In 2014, nearly 30 years after the regime collapsed, the Brazilian military recognized for the first time the excesses committed by its agents during the dictatorship, including the torture and murder of political dissidents. In May 2018, the United States government released a memorandum, written by Henry Kissinger, dating back to April 1974 (when he was serving as Secretary of State), confirming that the leadership of the Brazilian military regime was fully aware of the killing of dissidents. It is estimated that 434 people were either confirmed killed or went missing and 20,000 people were tortured during the military dictatorship in Brazil. While some human rights activists and others assert that the true figure could be much higher, and should include thousands of indigenous people who died because of the regime's negligence, the armed forces have always disputed this. Source: Wikipedia (en)