Revolution, Reform, and Reconciliation in Central America

REVOLUTION, REFORM, AND_________ RECONCILIATION IN CENTRAL AMERICA Thomas O. Enders Ur 'nul a few years ago the only significant political contrast in Central America was that between democratic Costa Rica and the undemocratic rest of the isthmus. Today, the situation is more complex: Costa Rica remains a democracy, but each of its neighbors has recently experienced significant political transformations. There are now new contrasts, and of these none is more important—for an understanding of what is happening in Central America—than that between Nicaragua and El Salvador. It was Nicaragua that first concentrated attention on Central America . In July 1979 the future junta of Nicaragua pledged formally to the Organization of American States (oas) that its goals were democratic, pluralistic, nonaligned, and peaceful. The United States, indeed the entire international community, accepted this pledge and embarked on programs of peaceful reconstruction typically including substantial appropriations of assistance outside annual budget processes. As the months passed, however, it became apparent that the Sandinistas saw themselves as the armed vanguard ofa movement involving all ofCentral America. Nicaragua's new regular army, the Ejercito Popular Sandinista (eps), was founded in 1979. By the end of last year, according to its commander, it had grown to be "four times as big and eight times as strong" as Somoza's Guardia Nacional.1 The eps reached an estimated strength of 20,000, backed up by militias and reserves 80,000 strong. During this time Nicaragua received an estimated $125 million of 1. EPS Chief of Staff Joaquin Cuadra to U.S. Army assistant chief of staff for intelligence, Major General William E. Odom, in November 1982. Thomas O. Enders was assistant secretary of state for inter-American affairs until June of this year. He has been nominated to be ambassador to Spain. 1 2 SAIS REVIEW military equipment and supplies from the Soviet Union alone.2 It obtained the heaviest tanks in Central America, antiaircraft weapons, assault helicopters, rocket launchers, heavy artillery, and patrol boats. While military pilots and crews trained in Bulgaria and other Eastern European locations, airfields were prepared for advanced jet-fighters. More significant, large numbers of foreign military and security advisors were introduced. Currently no fewer than 2,000 Cubans, 50 Soviets, 35 East Germans, and 50 plo and Libyan personnel are estimated to be stationed in Nicaragua on security missions—roughly one foreign military advisor per thousand Nicaraguans. In 1980 Cuban agents brought five guerrilla groups from El Salvador together (just as Castro had brought the three main Sandinista factions together in Havana in 1978), worked out a unity pact among them, established a joint command-and-control apparatus in the Managua area, and organized logistical and training support on Nicaraguan soil. Since that time, the great bulk of the arms and munitions used by the insurgents in El Salvador has flowed through Nicaragua.3 Nicaragua's Sandinistas aid the guerrillas in El Salvador by supplying arms, training, financial aid, and by allowing the guerrillas' commandand -control center to operate near Managua. Arms and ammunition destined for clandestine delivery to El Salvador reach Nicaragua by ship and by direct flights from Havana to Nicaragua. The arms remain stockpiled near Managua until their use by the guerrillas. 2.By way of comparison, El Salvador received $121 million from the United States during the same period. 3.Nicaragua's Papalonal airfield was used for direct supply flights to the Salvadoran guerrillas for the January 1981 "final offensive"; two overland shipments from Nicaragua through Honduras discovered in 1981 contained weapons originally shipped to American units in Vietnam. A captured Salvadoran guerrilla leader confirmed that the Sandinistas control weapons delivered from Vietnam to Nicaragua for the Salvadoran insurgents. The Sandinistas use a variety of routes (overland, air drop, and sea) to furnish arms and, increasingly, vitally needed ammunition. In 1982 these supply operations have included increased quantities of heavier weapons, including M-60 machine guns, M-79 grenade launchers, and M-72 antitank weapons. A Salvadoran guerrilla, Alejandro Montenegro, captured during a raid on a guerrilla safehouse in Honduras in August 1982, confirmed that Nicaragua remains the primary source of insurgent weapons and ammunition, although the guerrillas capture some weapons and ammunition from...