A truckload of some 30 Integralistas, the famed Brazilian Green Shirts who salute like Italian Fascists and are as anti-Semitic as German Nazis, rolled through the quiet streets of Rio de Janeiro just after midnight one night last week. They jarred to a halt at the main entrance to stately Guanabara Palace, once the home of Brazil's Crown Princess Isabella and now the residence of President Getulio Dornelles Vargas and family. It was the usual hour for the changing of the guard. With knowing nods the sailors on duty, in conspiracy with the Green Shirts, relinquished their posts. The Integralistas, wearing their green shirts concealed under fake Brazilian Navy uniforms and flaunting white kerchiefs inscribed with their watchword "Avante" ("Forward") around their necks, hopped from their truck, filed into the grounds. At the same time another band of Green Shirts rolled up to the west gate and when loyal guards resisted their entrance there, opened fire. Two guards got away, ran to warn the President.
Pudgy little President Vargas, his wife, his two sons, Luthero and Manoel Antonio and two daughters, Alzira and Jandrya, tumbled from their beds at the first burst of firing. "When I ran to the palace front door, I saw several dark figures. All the lights were out," said 23-year-old Alzira afterward. "By their voices I distinguished father, Uncle Benjamin, and my two brothers. All had pistols."
"We had no time to discuss what was happening," said younger Daughter Jandrya, "for father opened the window and saw a number of men shooting at the palace. Father shouted to us, 'Run for cover.' He began firing his revolver through the window." Added Alzira: "He was all for going out single-handed armed only with his pistol and meeting the invaders in the garden but the rest of us diplomatically dissuaded him."
Instead, President Vargas placed his sons defensively at the windows, had a submachine gun mounted and himself blazed away at the attackers. The Integralistas, apparently thinking a large force defended the palace, contented themselves with sending machine-gun bullets whining into the palace walls.
All telephone lines had been severed, except one to an isolated marine station. From there Vargas learned that the Green Shirts had struck simultaneously at the Navy Ministry, which had fallen, the Ministry of War, the Treasury, the home of army chief General Pedro de Goés Monteiro, the police and fire department headquarters and even the Pan American airport. Three radio stations were taken and used to send out false assurances that the Integralistas were in control of Brazil. Carloads of armed Green Shirts roared through the streets, hurling small bombs to create confusion. Excited but efficient, loyal army officers assured President Vargas by telephone that reinforcement would be sent as soon as the attackers were quashed in the downtown districts.