Beginning in 1983, there has been a new democratic opening in Guatemala,'' wrote Julio Godoy, one of the country's rising young political commentators, in a recent analysis.
''The opening was made necessary by the new chorus of history in Latin America,'' Mr. Godoy wrote. ''Fascist military regimes have become unthinkable in the region, their basis eroded by their isolation from the people they sought to rule. Corruption and official crime turned them into violators of the very state of law they were supposed to represent.
