Nebraskans in Solidarity with Nicaragua

Sorry for the long absence between posts but I was a little distracted by finishing a chapter of my dissertation. Yesterday I came across this letter in the Witness for Peace newsletter, and being a Nebraskan I couldn’t help but post it.

Witness for Peace is a Christian relief organization whose originated in the early 1980s in opposition to U.S. intervention in Nicaragua. Witness for Peace spoke out against U.S. covert and overt aggression towards Nicaragua, holding demonstration and rallies in cities across the United States. They also sent thousands of volunteers to villages along the Nicaraguan/Honduran border in order to deter Contra attacks. They recognized that villages with U.S. volunteers in them would not be attacked because the Contras feared that the death of a U.S. citizen would spark public outcry in the United States and lead to a reduction in support from the U.S. government. The efforts of Witness for Peace and organizations like it did much to hamper the Reagan administration’s efforts to escalate the war in Nicaragua.

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Poking Fun at the Dictator

The images below are taken from Gaceta Sandinista the official voice of the FSLN in Cuba during the 1970s. The FSLN published the journal out of Cuba and drew heavily on the internationalist sentiments of the Cuban Revolution. Gaceta Sandinista largely reported on the situation in Nicaragua, heralding the achievements of the FSLN and decrying the abuses of the Somoza regime and the United States. Besides its articles and political essays, Gaceta Sandinista featured many cartoons, illustrations, and collages. Images, such as those below, were an important means of conveying the political message of the FSLN, especially in Nicaragua where the illiteracy rate remained over seventy percent during the 1970s.

An overweight man, many images in Gaceta Sandinista, such as the one above, mocked Somoza’s girth. The text at the bottom of the image translates as “a comment in respect to,” which is both a comment on Somoza’s faltering regime and a joke about the dictators weight.

The writers of Gaceta Sandinista also used Somoza’s plumpness as a means of highlighting the kleptocratic nature of his regime. Somoza notoriously stole millions of dollars from the people of Nicaragua while at the same time murdering thousands of them. The text reads “Archive of Somocista Corruption” and is the header to a section of the journal dedicated to cataloging the abuses of the Somoza regime.

The final image depicts Somoza as Rocky Balboa who is fighting for the dollars of his trainer Mickey Goldman, representing the United States. Although not a complete puppet of the United States, Somoza sought to appease the United States and regularly toed-the-line, knowing that without U.S. support his regime would crumble.

French Feminist Solidarity

Last week I received a package in the mail from Toulouse, France, which contained a booklet from a feminist Nicaraguan-solidarity organization in Paris. I had originally found a copy of this booklet in the Gabi Guttwald collection at the Archiv Grünes Gedächtnis, but while looking into the organization I found a copy online. I have not found many sources from French solidarity groups, this booklet being my only piece so far.

“Nicaragua Women”

Printed shortly after the fall of Somoza in July 1979, this booklet contains accounts of events in Nicaragua and Nicaraguan women’s efforts in helping to oust the Somoza regime. Early in its history the FSLN adopted a policy of gender equality within its ranks, allowing women the same rights and opportunities within the organization as its male members. During the revolution women served in support as well as front line positions. After the revolution women remained in significant roles in the organization and by the mid-1980s one quarter to one third of the leadership positions in the FSLN government and party were held by women.

I was not able to track down this Sandino quote and I do not know French well enough to give it a proper translation, or at least one that makes sense.

“Women and Armed Struggle”

“The Women’s Struggle After Victory”

Karen Kampwirth, Women and Guerrilla Movements: Nicaragua, El Salvador, Chiapas, Cuba (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2003)

Victoria Gonzalez and Karen Kampwirth, Radical Women in Latin America: Left and Right (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2001)

Israel, Palestine, and Nicaragua

The above video is a talk given by Dr. Les Field, a professor of anthropology at the Univeristy of New Mexico. In the video he discusses connections between the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), Israel, and Nicaragua that he gave at the American University of Beirut in 2012.  He makes the point that PLO weaponry captured by the Israelis during their 1982 invasion of Lebanon were given to the Contras. Although I have found similar claims made by those on the left (I have examined many of the sames sources cited by Dr. Field), I have not found any concrete evidence to suggest that the Israelis provided captured weaponry to the Contras. However, if Dr. Field’s claims are true it would prove that the Israelis were arming the Contras prior to the Iran-Contra scandal, significantly altering the our perception of the event.

Green Aid to the FSLN

The image to the left is of an article from La Prensa Grafica, a Salvadoran newspaper, dated October 27, 1989. The article discusses the efforts of the German Greens to raise funds for the FSLN. The article states that the Greens raised 300,000 marks for Daniel Ortega‘s presidential campaign against Violeta Chamorro. By the late 1980s European support for the FSLN had significantly dwindled in the face of U.S. political and economic pressure as well as growing relations between the Sandinistas and the Soviet Union. Although state support was on the decline, grassroots solidarity groups on the far-left of European politics continued to support the FSLN. A number of the factions that made up the Greens espoused solidarity with Nicaragua in its struggle with U.S. aggression, providing material and moral support. These groups channeled some aid, such as that mentioned in the article, through umbrella organizations like the Greens, while others used their own organizational apparatus to support the FSLN. This resulted in extremely complicated transnational networks with grassroots groups in Germany pursuing an individual program of support while simultaneously coordinating with other groups under the aegis of broad coalitions.

Solon Lovett Barraclough, Aid That Counts: The Western Contribution to Development and Survival in Nicaragua (Washington D.C.: Transnational Institute, 1988).

Eusebio Mujal-León. “European Socialism and the Crisis in Central America.” Rift and Revolution: The Central American Imbroglio (Washington D.C.: American Enterprise Institute, 1984).

Back from Break and there are Russkies Everywhere!

The above is another cartoon from Roger Sanchez published by the Nicaraguan Solidarity Campaign. In it Sanchez’s Uncle Sam calls out an imagined Soviet invasion while opening the door for U.S. intervention. The United States justified its war against Nicaragua by arguing that the Sandinistas were a puppet of the Soviets. Interestingly, the Soviets and the FSLN wanted nothing to do with each other. The expensive experience of aiding the Cuban Revolution combined with the catastrophic decline of the Soviet economy ensured that the Soviets had neither the will nor the resources to turn Nicaragua into a hemispheric beachhead. Also, by the mid 1980s Cold War tensions between the Soviets and United States had thawed and Soviet leaders feared that supporting the Sandinistas would undermine these more congenial relations. The depiction of an invasion of the United States by Cuba, Nicaragua, and the Soviet Union in the film Red Dawn was never even close to reality (however that movie is an awesome 80s action flick and should be watched). However, this is not to say that the Soviets did not aid the Sandinistas. As the U.S. embargo of Nicaragua slowly strangled the small nation and as Latin American and European states cut aid in the face of U.S. pressure, Nicaragua turned to the Soviets and Cuba for assistance. Ironically U.S. actions pushed the FSLN into a closer relationship with the Soviets. However, this aid was limited and short lived. By the late 1980s the Soviets drastically cut much of their assistance to Nicaragua.

For their part the Sandinistas followed the advice of the Fidel Castro and pursued policies that would not agitate the United States, this included not cultivating a relationship with the Soviets. Highlighting their own experience of attacks at the hands of the United States, Castro and the Cubans advised the Sandinistas not turn to the Soviets, giving the United States a reason for aggression, but instead turn to Western Europe and the Nonaligned nations for aid. The Sandinistas followed this path until the U.S. embargo forced them to turn to the Soviet Union.

Danuta Paszyn, The Soviet Attitude to Political and Social Change in Central America, 1979-90 (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2000).

Merry Christmas from Nicaragua via Great Britain

I recently ordered a collection of Roger Sanchez’s cartoons published by Nicaragua Solidarity Campaign, a British solidarity organization. The cartoon above highlights Israel’s role in the conflict in Central America in the 1980s. Israel was one of the region’s largest arms providers, even giving substantial amounts of weapons, many seized from the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) during the 1982 invasion of Lebanon, to the Contras. Between 1982 and 1984 the U.S. Congress attempted to limit the amount of U.S. weaponry going to the Contras, but the Reagan administration turned to Israel who acted as a middle man, allowing Reagan to sidestep the Boland Amendment and continue arming the Contras. A Honduran soldier is shown at the base of the tree because the Contras operated out of Honduras and much of the arms being used against Nicaragua moved through that small country.

Although international solidarity sought to strengthen and protect the Nicaraguan Revolution, there existed an international counterrevolutionary consensus bent on crushing it. The Reagan administration stood at the vanguard of this counterrevolutionary current, often aided by Israel, Honduras, and other proxies. However, that is not to say that both revolutionary solidarity and counterrevolutionary consensus were monolithic in nature: fissures existed within each.

Killer Cartoons

Between the spring of 1986 and the fall of 1987, the presidents of five Central American states came together in Esquipulas, Guatemala in order to find a solution to the region’s military conflicts. The cartoon above shows the five presidents who signed the Esquipulas Peace Agreement, or Esquipulas II. From left to right, the signers of the peace agreement were: Vinicio Cerezo of Guatemala, José Napoleón Duarte of El Salvador, Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua, José Azcona Hoyo of Honduras, and Óscar Arias Sánchez of Costa Rica. The cartoonist apparently believed that Cerezo, Duarte, and Azcona were using the peace process as a means of hiding their misdeeds, while Arias organized the meeting out of his own vanity and desire for a peace prize. The cartoonist’s bias is quite evident considering Ortega stands with nothing to hide. However, the indigenous peoples of the Miskito coast might have disagreed with this portrayal. After the Sandinistas came to power they sought to incorporate the Miskito people of Nicaragua’s Atlantic Coast, who had historically enjoyed a large amount of autonomy. This led to a Miskito revolution against the Sandinistas, which culminated in the return of Miskito sovereignty in 1987. Ironically many who supported the Sandinistas in their struggle against the United States, such as Gabi Gottwald, also supported the Miskito Indians in their struggle against the FSLN, revealing that for many connected to the solidarity movement a conviction to supporting human rights often trumped political considerations.

Postermania

Images are a powerful means of protest. Much like the cartoons of Roger Sanchez, the posters of European solidarity organizations conveyed a message of resistance to U.S. imperialism.  Some posters advertised rallies and protests, aiding in the organization of mass demonstrations. Others, like the one above, carried a message that challenged the policies of the United States. This poster features a monstrous Ronald Reagan, shaped like North America minus Canada, about to devour tiny Nicaragua. The heading roughly translates as “The USA makes Nicaragua broken. We want the establishment of a free Nicaragua to continue.” The image in the bottom right corner indicates that  The Greens of North Rhine-Westphalia created the poster. Although some details are unclear, such as when this branch of The Greens printed this poster, it is not difficult to discern their stance on the situation in Nicaragua.

Merry Christmas from Nicaragua via Deutscheland

Nicaragua‘s resistance of U.S. imperialism in Central America, as well as its call for international solidarity, took many forms. In the 1980s Roger Sanchez‘s political cartoons challenged the United States, drawing international attention to the increasingly bloody situation in Nicaragua. Sanchez was the official cartoonist of Barricada, the daily newspaper of the Sanidinistas. He satirized the United States, often depicting the U.S. as a meddling and ill-willed Uncle Sam intent on killing Nicaraguans and overthrowing the FSLN. Solidarity organizations from Europe and North America published collections of Sanchez’s cartoons to raise funds for those affected by the U.S. embargo and the war against the Contras. The cartoon above is from a collection published by the German solidarity group Informationsburo Nicaragua, which published many documents about the plight of Nicaragua. Solidarity groups in the United States and Great Britain also published similar collections.

Although he worked at the official Sandinista newspaper, Sanchez called attention to the failures of the FSLN government. For example, Sanchez highlighted the overwhelming political influence of the Sandinistas in a cartoon featuring an enormous runner with FSLN on his jersey preparing to run against three much smaller runners representing the nation’s opposition parties. Sanchez also commented on Nicaraguan social inequality, represented in the cartoon above. Whether he spoke out against the United States, the FSLN, or poverty in Nicaragua, Sanchez proved to be one of the most influential voices to come out of the Nicaraguan Revolution.