De-Catholization

De-Catholization
Part of the Creeperian Civil War and the Red Terror
Miguelist soldiers killing five Creeperian Catholics.
Location	Primarily Creeperopolis, but also in Atlántida, Castilliano, El Salvador, and the State of the Church under Miguelist control
Date	January 2, 1933-September 30, 1949 (16 years, 8 months and 4 weeks)
Target	Primarily Creeperian Catholics and the Catholic Church, but also Romerists, Salvadorans, and Deltinian Nationalists
Attack type	Genocide, Ethnocide, Ethnic Cleansing, Cultural Cleansing, Mass Murder, Mass Rape, Looting, Pillaging, Forced Labor
Deaths	9-11 million
Perpetrators	National Council for Peace and Order, State of Granada, Senvarian Liberation Front, Atheist Red Army, Special Task Squadrons, Elite Medical Detachment, Apostates for the Cause
Motive	Anti-Catholicism, Anti-Salvadoran Sentiment, Anti-Deltinian Sentiment, Anti-Fascism, Anti-Monarchism
Trials	San Salvador Trials, La'Libertad Trials, Adolfosburg Trials, Salvador Trials, White Terror (extrajudicial), Black Terror (extrajudicial)

De-Catholization (Creeperian Spanish: De-Católización), commonly known as the Creeperian Genocide (Creeperian Spanish: Genocido Creeperiano), was the genocide of Creeperian Catholics, Romerists, and Salvadorans. Between 1933 and 1949 across Miguelist controlled territories of Creeperopolis, the Miguelists systematically murdered around 9 to 11 million Catholics, Romerists, Salvadorans, and other political opponents, along with any Miguelist dissidents or deserters. The murders were carried out in mass executions, mass shootings, and by a policy of extermination through forced labor in quarries, farmland, and mines, or in gas chambers and gas vans in Miguelist extermination camps, chiefly Teguracoa, but also Joyagua, Jucuaguel, Mafrerio, Quetgoza, and Sechakan. Massacres, looting, and pillaging were also commonly committed by the Miguelists such as the 1944 La'Libertad Massacre, the 1947 San Salvador Massacre, and the 1948 Burning of San Salvador.

The National Council for Peace and Order implemented the persecution in stages. Following the outbreak of the Creeperian Civil War on January 2, 1933, the Miguelists built a network of prisoner of war camps for prisoners of war and arrested political opponents starting with Quetgoza in January 1933. Its prisoners were treated porrly and were poorly fed and hydrated, many of whom died from starvation or dehydration. In occupied civilian life, Catholics were segregated and treated as subhumans. Following defeat in the Salvadoran War, Salvadorans began to be targetted by groups of the Escuadrones de Tareas Especiales, Miguelist paramilitary death squads tasked with killing those deemed as enemies of the state. Prisoners were medically experimented on by the Elite Medical Detachment.

The segregation of Catholics culminated in the policy of extermination discussed by senior Miguelist officials at the Adolfosburg Conference in Adolfosburg in August 1935. As Miguelist forces captured new territories, all anti-Catholic measures were radicalized. Under the coordination of the ESTARES with directions from the highest leadership of the National Council for Peace and Order, killings were committed within Miguelist occupied zones of Creeperopolis. The Miguelist Army and the Escuadrones de Tareas Especiales, in cooperation with the Athiest Red Army, the Senvarian Liberation Front, and local collaborators, murdered around 2.1 million Catholics in mass shootings and massacres between 1935 and 1949. By 1939, victims were being deported from across Creeperopolis in sealed freight trains to extermination camps where, if they survived the journey, they were worked to death, executed, or gassed. The killing continued until the end of the Creeperian Civil War on September 30, 1949.

Creeperian Catholics were targeted for extermination as part of a larger event during the De-Catholization Era, usually defined as beginning in January 1933, in which the Miguelists and its collaborators persecuted and murdered other groups, including Salvadorans, political dissidents such as Romerists, and Deltinians. The death toll of these groups is thought to rise to 9-11 million dead. Denial of the genocide, questioning the genocide, or supporting the genocide is illegal in Creeperopolis and is punishable by death.

Terminology and Scope

Terminology

The term "De-Catholization" was originally used by Creeperian conservatives to label the period of time from August 13, 1729, to September 15, 1730, known as the Republic of Creeperopolis. Conservatives saw it as Creeperian liberals under Orlando Moreno Hidalgo abolishing the centuries of tradition of the Creeperian Catholic Church in the nation with the intent of turning Creeperopolis into a secular dominated nation with the majority of the population being agnostic, athiest, or irreligious. The abolition of the First State of the Church is pointed to as the greatest evidence that this is the case. Certain liberals from the Second Parliamentary Era embraced the idea of De-Catholization during the Creeperian Republic while the majority denied the claims of the conservatives as falsehoods.

During the Creeperian Civil War, Romerists from the Catholic Imperial Restoration Council and its supporters called the attacks on civilians through mass shootings and massacres as "Las'Grades Matanzas," translated as "The Great Massacres" or "The Grand Massacres," or as "Los'Trabajos del Diablo," translated as "The Works of the Devil." Others called the massacres "El Genocido", translated as "The Genocide." Meanwhile, the Miguelists officially called the mass shootings and massacres as "La'De-Catolización de la'Patria de la'República Popular de Creeperopólis", translated as the "The De-Catholization of the Motherland of the People's Republic of Creeperopolis." The Miguelists officially stated that the program was to transform Creeperopolis into a secular state through peaceful and progressive means as a way to mislead the public as to the actual methods De-Catholization would be achieved.

After the civil war, the Creeperian government officially named the genocide as "La'Gran Matanza," translated as The Great Massacre or The Grand Massacre." In 1956 following the Salvadoran Revolution of 1956, the Creeperian government officially designated the genocide as "De-Católización," translated as "De-Catholization," as to make the genocide more "relatable" to all those subject to the Creeperian government. Sometimes it is written or spoken as "La'De-Católización," translated as "The De-Catholization," as to signify it was a significant event. The genocide is commonly referred to as the "Genocido Creeperiano," translated as the "Creeperian Genocide," to refer to the genocide in a way as to not reference the Catholics which were the primary targets of the genocide.

Definition

De-Catholization at its most basic level is the genocide of Creeperian Catholics by the National Council for Peace and Order. Broder definitions used by the Creeperian government include Salvadorans and Romerists. Some historians also include Deltinians into the definition of De-Catholization.

Distinctive Features

Genocidal State

Map of the six National Council extermination camps in San Luís and Adolfosburg.

The logistics of the mass murder turned Creeperopolis into what Orlando Pareja Palau, a professor from Antonio José Sáenz Heredia University, called a "genocidal state." The De-Catholization was the second time a nation had thrown its power behind the idea that an entire people should be wiped out only after what Pareja Palau argues is the Jewish Holocaust in Greater Sacramento. Anyone who was a Creeperian Catholic, a Salvadoran, or a Romerist has to be killed to protect the state and purify the country. People who were identified as such had their property confiscated and were deported on trains to forced labor camps, concentration camps, or extermination camps. As prisoners entered the death camps, they were ordered to surrender all their personal property. The National Council for Peace and Order used to confiscated property to help finance their war effort.

Collaboration

Orlando Pareja Palau argued that without collaborators, the National Council for Peace and Order could not have extended the killing across the entire country. The National Council had to have received aid from local peasants in their efforts to kill Creeperian Catholics. Groups like the Escuadrones de Tareas Especiales, commonly known as the ESTARES, were formed to recruit locals to join in on the genocide to hasten the process. Other rebel groups such as the Senvarian Liberation Front sympathized with the National Council feeling oppressed by the Creeperian Catholics since the Senvar-Senvekian native population of Senvar-Senvek was overwhelmingly Protestant. Other organizations such as the Creeperian Social Communist Party's Atheist Red Army under Cayetano Handel Carpio and Mariano Alcocer Fraga also collaborated with the National Council and perhaps even pushed the National Council into initiating an industrialized genocide of Creeperian Catholics.

The industrialization and scale of the murder was unprecedented, even for the Creeperian standards. Killings were systematically conducted in virtually all areas of Creeperopolis. Nearly 7 million Creeperian Catholics from across Creeperopolis, El Salvador, and the State of the Church were killed from 1933 to 1949. Hundreds of thousands more Creeperian Catholics died in Atlántida and Castilliano whenever the National Council for Peace and Order and its collaborators entered their territory.

Groups of Catholic collaborators were organized into the Apóstatas por la'Causa, translated as "Apostates for the Cause" (APOCA).

Medical Experiments

Medical experiments were conducted on concentration and extermination camp inmates by the National Council for Peace and Order under the direct control of the Destacamento Médico de Élite, translated as the Elite Medical Detachment and abbreviated as DEMÉDÉL. At least 28,000 prisoners were subjected to experiments, with most dying as a result either during the experiments or later. Nineteen senior physicians and other medical personnel were charged at the Adolfosburg Trials after the civil war with crimes against humanity. They included the head of the Destacamento Médico de Élite, tenured professors, clinic directors, and biomedical researchers. Experiments took place primarily at the six extermination camps of Teguracoa, Joyagua, Jucuaguel, Mafrerio, Quetgoza, and Sechakan, but also occured at other camps. Some dealt with sterilization of men and women, the treatment of war wounds, ways to counteract chemical weapons, research into new vaccines and drugs, and the survival of harsh conditions.

The most notorious physician of the Creeperian Civil War and of the De-Catholization was Ricardo Klement Encarnación, a DEMÉDÉL officer who became the Teguracoa camp doctor on May 30, 1936. Interested in genetics, he would pick out subjects from the new arrivals during "selection" on the ramp. Whose who he selected for his experiments would be measured, killed, and dissected. Klement Encarnación was lynched and mutilated during the Massacre of the Seven Thousand April 5, 1957.

Catholics in Creeperopolis

Main article: Creeperian Catholic Church

Creeperopolis was and still is the world's largest Creeperian Catholic nation. In 1933, Creeperopolis had around 295 million Creeperian Catholics. The Creeperian Catholic Church continued to have a large influence over Creeperian culture and Creeperian society.

Origins

Anti-Catholicism and Anti-Monarchsim

Anti-Clerical and Anti-Catholic maganize cover published in 1933 in response to the start of the Creeperian Civil War. The magazine claimed that the Pope and Catholic clergy controlled the Catholic Imperial Restoration Council.

From the beginning of the First Parliamentary Era in 1565, the Creeperian Catholic Church bagan to come under attack from Creeperian intellectual figures, mostly stemming from the Liberal Party. Liberals called for the restriction of Church influence on politics, culture, society, and public life. The Liberals achieved their ultimate goals of secularization of abolishing the near 500-year long monarchy under the House of Martínez, the establishment of the Republic of Creeperopolis, and the abolishing the State of the Church and exile of the Pope under the leadership of Liberal Prime Minister and President Orlando Moreno Hidalgo. The abolition of the monarchy and esistence of the Republic was short-lived hoever as the Peoples' Revolution in September 1730 reestablished the monarchy and ended the Republic. Liberals continued to champion the destruction of the State of the Church until July 4, 1771, when King Manuel III deposed the Parliament in the Revolution of Restoration and had all Liberals in Parliament hanged, including Prime Minister Fernando Moreno Juderías, a descendant of Orlando Moreno Hidalgo.

Despite the efforts of Manuel III and Adolfo III to erradicate all support for republicanism, secularism, Anti-Monarchism, and Anti-Catholicism, these ideas became commonplace throughout Creeperopolis, especially in the final years of Adolfo III's reign as Emperor. The National Liberal Party (the Partido Nacional Liberal or PLN) of the Second Parliamentary Era named itself as the successor of the Liberal Party from the First Parliamentary Era and originated as an offshoot of the lingering republican and secular sentiments and it adopted light Anti-Catholicism and Anti-Monarchsim as two of its ideologies.

Other left-wing parties such as the Creeperian Socialist Party took a stronger stance on Anti-Catholicism and Anti-Monarchsim declaring that the complete abolition of the monarchy is the only way forward for Creeperopolis. Far-left parties such as the Creeperian Social Communist Party also called for the complete abolition of the monarchy but also the complete disestablishment of the Creeperian Catholic Church. The Creeperian Social Communist Party's Atheist Red Army engaged in the streets with the Falange Creeperiano and the Camisas Negras claiming that the paramilitary wings of the Catholic Royalist Party and the Creeperian Pro-Fatherland Front sought to destroy secularism and impose a Catholic theocracy. During the Reigns of Terrors, the Atheist Red Army killed Creeperian Catholics as they were all seen as collaborators with the enemy.

The local Protestant populations of Senvar and Senvek also despised the Creeperian Catholic Church and the Monarchy as both institutions were seen as imperialists who conquered the Kingdom of Senvar-Senvek out of greed and national pride with no consideration for the local population.

Civil War

Segregation

Creeperian Catholics were segregated into "Catholic Zones" in Miguelist controlled major cities.

The Creeperian Civil War began San Salvador del Norte, San Salvador del Norte, when soldiers loyal to Romero I and soldiers loyal to Miguel VII opened fire on each other at 7:25pm. The soldiers loyal to Miguel VII overran the soldiers loyal to Romero I and forced them to retreat the barrack. The soldiers loyal to Romero I took up positions one block from the barrack taking the city capitol turning it into their fortification. It remains a mystery who was the first to fire their rifle in the barrack.

At the onset of the civil war, senior Miguelist officials ordered the immediate segregation of Creeperian Catholics in Miguelist territory to prevent any large scale uprising against the Miguelist government. All major cities under Miguelist control were segregated into a Catholic and non-Catholic zone. The non-Catholic zone, called the "Zona Libre" ("Free Zone"), was accessable to the outside and housed secular Creeperans and people of other religions which were not loyal to the Pope. The Catholic zone, called the "Zona Católico" ("Catholic Zone"), was closed off from the outside. People could not travel in or out of the zone without permission from city officials. Zones were divided by barbed wire fences and guard towers ensured no one tried to escape out or smuggle food or water in. All major cities were fit with Catholic zones, with notable examples being Adolfosburg, San Luís, Denshire, San Miguel, La'Victoria, Port Senvar, and Port Senvek. Whenever cities with large Catholic zones were nearing liberation, all Catholics in zones were deported to another city with another zone and the zone was destroyed to leave no evidence of their existence.

Groups of Catholic collaborators in the Catholic zones were organized into the Apóstatas por la'Causa, translated as "Apostates for the Cause" (APOCA). Members of the APOCA were tasked with spying on their fellow members of the Catholic zones to weed out escape attemps, popular revolts, or smuggling operations. APOCA collaborators met mixed results with nearly half of the collaborators being caught and lynched for their apostasy from the faith and for collaborating with the enemy. Those who survived got to live out their lives in the Free Zone of the city they lived in after 3 years of service in the zones. Former members of the APOCA were hunted down by the Creeperian government following the end of the Creeperian Civil War with those who were caught being publicly executed in the cities they served or being given to the angry crowds to beat to death. An estimated 3,000 people joined the APOCA with the vast majority of survivors being brutaly murdered or executed following the civil war with few fleeing to countries like Terranihil.

Establishment of the ESTARES

Main article: Escuadrones de Tareas Especiales

Execution of Catholic Zone smugglers in Adolfosburg in 1934.

On April 15, 1933, the Escuadrones de Tareas Especiales, translated as the "Special Task Squadrons" (ESTARES), was initially formed to monitor security on the Catholic Zones of major cities with such zones. The general command was held by Chief Field Marshal Juan Salinas Figueroa. When the Catholic Imperial Restoration Council under orders of Chief Field Marshal Adolfo Cabañeras Morneo established the Dirección de Inteligencia Nacional, translated as the National Intelligence Directorate (DINA), a week later on April 26, 1933, the operations of the ESTERES expanded to secret police missions. With the support of the Apóstatas por la'Causa, the ESTARES conducted raids of suspected rebel leaders' homes in the Catholic Zones.

With the news of atrocities being committed by the DINA under Adolfo Cabañeras Morneo in El Salvador during the Salvadoran War, most notably the El Mozote Massacre on January 13, 1934, The Escuadrones de Tareas Especiales began to shape itself into a group of secret police death squads.

Move to Extermination Camps

Killing Methods

Cristeros were publicly hanged by the Miguelists early in the civil war.

Affected Groups

Creeperian Catholic Church

The exectuion of Agustín Pro Juárez.

Creeperian Catholics

Catholic Resistance

Main article: Creeperian People's Catholic Front

Cristeros holding an early version of the Cristero banner.

Deltinians

Main article: 1937 Deltinian Rebellion

Professor Orlando Pareja Palau is a fierce opponent to the inclusion of Deltinians to the death toll of the De-Catholization.

On May 5, 1937, Deltinian Muslim peasants in the departments of Abdan, Helam, and Jakiz revolted against the rule of the National Council for Peace and Order. The Deltinian peasants were lead by Muammar al-Koroma. The peasants demanded total independence from the Imperial and National Councils for Abdan, Helam, and Jakiz, and called for support and aid from Greater Sacramento. The government declined to send direct aid but offered the Deltinians asylum in accordance with the 1853 Sacramatian Asylum Act. Before the Deltinians could accept the offer, National Council soldiers under General Pascual Espinar Casaus massacred 3,139 to 328,000 Deltinians, effectively suppressing the revolt on May 17, 1937.

Following the Miguelist massacre of Deltinians, Field Marshal Máximo Barrueco Morterero launched an offensive into the departments of Abdan, Helam, and Jakiz in order to "liberate" the Deltinians from atheist hands in August 1937. From August 1937 until January 1938, the Imperial Council made minimal gains. The offensive was forced to be cancelled in February 1938 due to a lack of supplies to continue the offensive. The Imperial Council fortified the frontline which had been established.

The Creeperian government officially includes the figure of 328,000 deaths to the total number of deaths during the De-Catholization. However, some scholars and historians disagree. The most notable opponent of including the Deltinians in the death toll of the De-Catholization is Orlando Pareja Palau, a professor from Antonio José Sáenz Heredia University. He argues that the Deltinians are not Catholics and should not be included in something called the "De-Catholization." He also argues that the Deltinians are of a lesser race and a lesser religion and are not worthy enough to be included in any tragic fatality statistic.

Death Toll

Group	Estimated Killed
Creeperian Catholics	6.9 million
Politican Opponents	1.2–2.8 million
Salvadorans	980,000
Deltinians	3,139–328,000
Resistance	Unknown
Deserters	Unknown

See Also

• Creeperian Civil War
• List of Massacres in Creeperopolis
• Chemical Weapons in the Creeperian Civil War
• San Salvador Trials