Dictatorship of Cipriano Castro

The dictatorship of Cipriano Castro (self-proclaimed "Restauración Liberal") is the term used to refer to the military dictatorship in Venezuela under Cipriano Castro that began after he seized power by force in the Restorative Liberal Revolution after invading the country from Colombia with a private army of sixty men.

At the legislative level, the constitutions of 1901 and 1904 were approved, legalising divorce and changing the national flag for the first time in more than forty years.

Defence policy included an increase of up to 22% in the national defence budget. The government was sustained by an effective national army and a centralized, statist administration. It played an important role in ending caudillismo in Venezuela.

Castro's foreign policy included failed support for the liberals in Colombia during the Thousand Days' War with the intention of restoring Gran Colombia, the naval blockade of Venezuela from 1902 to 1903, and the Dutch-Venezuelan crisis of 1908, along with the breakdown of relations with the United States that year. The constitution also prohibited the immigration of black people.

According to historian Elías Pino Iturrieta, it was a personalistic dictatorship plagued by corruption problems that came to dominate the political power elite.

In 1908, Juan Vicente Gómez, Castro's Vice President, conspired to overthrow him in a coup d'état, initiating the period known as Gomecismo.