Letters

Caudillos Plus

I must take issue with Matthew Continetti’s description of Pancho Villa and Emiliano Zapata as “bandits” in his review of John A. Adams Jr.’s new biography of William F. Buckley Sr. (“Father of a Revolution,” May 1). The term is problematic because its use ignores the greater role that Villa and Zapata played on the stage of the Mexican Revolution. The three great caudillos of the Mexican Revolution were Villa, Zapata, and Obregón. The review grants to Obregón the courtesy of his military title but does not grant this same courtesy to Villa and Zapata, despite their equal status. They were two of the most important figures of the revolution and commanded tens of thousands of men in the field.