rrizzo@bbncca.ARPA (Ron Rizzo) (02/22/86)
I guess the following preface is a disclaimer, committed as I am, now to my chagrin, to posting all of Edward Sheehan's articles. The article below on the contras is sure to elicit howls of rage from the net. Sheehan ignores contra atrocities, tyrannical behavior, and the violent character of the contra bands, despite massive documentation by Christopher Dickey, Julia Preston, and others; he refers to atrocities as "alleged," & interviews Enrique Bermudez, perhaps the worst offender among contra heads. Sheehan calls the contra forces an "army of national liberation": this is less outrage- ous, since Peru's Luminous Path guerillas, India's defunct Naxalites, & the Philippines' New People's Army have amassed bloody records of their own, widely known in their respective countries. Still, the contras, however brutal they are, may represent to some degree real popular opposition to FSLN rule. Not all their recruits are coerced or kidnapped: there's evidence that many young draft dodgers and uprooted or disaffected peasants have joined them. The Sandinistas have depopulated areas near the border or battlegrounds by massive forced relocation (of at least 45,000 people) & "scorched-earth" methods, perhaps as much to deny the contras potential recruits or support and to prevent access to FSLN war-making as to deprive the contras of food and other resources. Civilian support may be, as Robert Leiken thinks, in inverse proportion to contact with the contras, but the sometimes brief association, now ended, that leading opposition politicians (eg, Chamorro, Cruz, others) formed with them indicates how desperate the situation is. The volume of atrocity accusations may testify to the efficiency of FSLN propaganda and manipulation of foreign observers; actual contra atrocities may be somewhat fewer in number: eg, one of the most well-known reports of atrocities, by NY lawyer Reed Brody, is open to doubt, at least in part. Allegations or indications of Sandinista brutality, constantly denied or underplayed by their sympathizers, are gradually increasing in number. Still, partisanship over Nicaragua carries a risk of getting be- smirched by too close an identification with one side or another, given the violent, backward and even nasty character of the region and its history, features embodied by revolutionaries, moderates, and reactionaries alike. And there's a woeful lack of decent documentation in many areas; much observer testimony is maddeningly subjective or very limited in scope or depth. For some netters, Sheehan's coverage of the contras will destroy his credibility on other subjects (economy, religion). But if the aim is to learn about a situation for which reliable information is scarce, we must separate, to use a very tired cliche, the wheat from the chaff. Perhaps most of the time we have no choice but to pick among the dreck. Ron Rizzo [ Reproduced without permission from the 2/19/86 Boston Globe, page 11. ] THE CONTRAS' ARMY OF CHILDREN By Edward R. F. Sheehan (3rd of 4 articles) SAN JOSE, Costa Rica --- "Atrocities? But we have the support of the Nicaraguan people! Why should we abuse our own supporters? [Why in- deed!--RR] We command our men to respect human rights. Of course, there could be an isolated incident...." The words are those of Commandante Enrique Bermudez, the leader of the Nicaraguan Democratic Force (FDN), the anti-Sandinista contra army based in southern Honduras on the border of Nicaragua. We were sitting in his headquarters, a rude tent with radio equipment and secretaries tapping on American typewriters. Reacting to all the bad publicity about their alleged atrocities, the contras have placed human rights high on their agenda, but human rights were not really what Commandante Bermudez wished to discuss. He wants more American weapons --- the sophisticated kind --- and he wants them now. "The Soviet bloc has supplied the Sandinistas with a huge arsenal," Bermudez told me. "The Sandinistas have MI-24 helicopters, BM-21 rocket launchers, T-54 and T-55 tanks, PT-76 light amphibious tanks, BTR-60 armored personnel carriers, 152mm howitzer guns... We have only rifles, machine guns, very few RPG-7s [rocket-propelled grenades], very few 60MM mortars..." Plus some SAM-7 ground-to-air missiles, of course, bought on the open arms market apparently with the help of the Reagan administration. "We need a flow of logistical supply," Bermudez continued. "President Reagan has said that he won't permit the establishment of a Marxist- Leninist regime on the American mainland, but [his] aid to us is not sufficient. Our capacity is down to 40 percent, and we haven't the resources to defeat the Sandinistas in the short term." "We don't want the US to defeat the Sandinistas for us --- we want to win our own war. Our product is much cheaper than a direct US inter- vention. We do need some US specialist advisers so we can undertake night drops of special equipment. We need more effective surface-to- air missiles... We need combat aircraft --- US T-33s, for example --- to shoot down Sandinista helicopters. The people of Nicaragua won't rebel against the Sandinistas till they see we're strong enough to win." Commandante Bermudez would not admit that the Sandinistas are winning the war --- but, in fact, they are. Inside Nicaragua, I saw that the western provinces have been pacified, and that contra activity now is confined to minor battles in the departments of Jinotega, Matagalpa, Boaco and Zelaya farther east. Obviously for this reason Reagan plans to asdk Congress for up to $100 million in "lethal aid" (Orwellian language) to keep the contras alive. Should they receive it? I arrived in Central America wirth the conven- tional liberal wisdom that the contras, through their past links to the Argetine colonels and the CIA, and with so many ex-SOMOCISTAS as their commanders, were a reactionary right-wing force. After nearly a week with them, I modified this preconception. I see them now more as actors, bearing a legitimate grievance, in a terrible national tragedy and civil war. True, up to 40 percent of their officers are former SOMOCISTAS; Comman- dante Bermudez himself was a colonel in Somoza's final years as military attache in Washington and is not as tainted as some of his subordinates. The remaining commandantes are heterogeneous, including some ex-Sandin- istas. But the troops are an army of simple Nicaraguan peasants of no ideology save their ardent Catholicism. Some are in their early twen- ties, but many are much younger, boys --- and girls --- who have barely reached puberty. One contra is 11; he has been fighting for a year. They are an army of children. The Sandinista army numbers 60,000, with reserves of 60,000. The contras claim 20,000 in their ranks, though the true figure may be nearer 15,000. Nevertheless, despite absurd denials by the Honduran government and the US Embassy in Tegucigalpa that the contras even operate from Honduran soil, the contras are swarming all over southern Honduras in the Las Vegas salient and along the River Coco, evocative of "Fatah land" in southern Lebanon before the Israelis pushed out the PLO. Roaming about the area, I saw no Honduran soldiers, but the contras were everywhere, running on the roads in the misty dawn, bathing in the muddy rivers, marching off to battle inside Nicaragua singing hymns and with rosaries around their necks. My heart went with them, for I knew that in facing such massive Sandin- ista firepower so many of these children would be killed. Surely I admired them more than I did their political leaders, who beyond vaguely promising Nicaragua "democracy and pluralism" are hopelessly divided and have no coherent program. I consider the military contras an authentic national liberation force. And yet ... despite my sympathy I cannot make the leap to an espousal of their plea for more American weapons. To give the contras the sophi- sticated arms they seek would simply accelerate an insane arms race in Central America, provoke the Russians pouring yet more tanks and heli- copters into Nicaragua --- maybe even MIGs --- and multiply the death count into larger numbers still. History shows that arms races, once unleashed, are usually impossible to control and inexorably lead to disaster. In Nicaragua, a heightened arms race could only result in thousands --- perhaps tens of thousands --- of fratricidal deaths. Even against the incompetent and cruel Marxist regime of Managua, that is too high a price to pay. *********************************************************************** Edward R. F. Sheehan, novelist and a winner of the Overseas Press Club Award, is a former fellow of Harvard's Center for International Affairs.
vassos@utcsri.UUCP (Vassos Hadzilacos) (03/01/86)
In <1716@bbncca.ARPA> Ron Rizzo writes (among other things): > Still, partisanship over Nicaragua carries a risk of getting be- > smirched by too close an identification with one side or another, > given the violent, backward and even nasty character of the region > and its history, features embodied by revolutionaries, moderates, > and reactionaries alike. The vicious racism and chauvinism of this statement is nauseating.
lkk@mit-eddie.UUCP (Larry Kolodney) (03/01/86)
In article <1716@bbncca.ARPA> rrizzo@bbncca.ARPA (Ron Rizzo) writes: > >Still, the contras, however brutal they are, may represent to some >degree real popular opposition to FSLN rule. Oh come now Ron, a little perspective please. The Hells Angels represent some popular opposition to the mainstream of American Society. Would you have, say Libya, sending them money to disrupt American towns. The contra are not much better than Hell's Angels. They represent nothing except opposition to the Sandanistas. That is to say they represent nothing POSITIVE which is worthy of support. -- larry kolodney (The Devil's Advocate) UUCP: ...{ihnp4, decvax!genrad}!mit-eddie!lkk ARPA: lkk@mit-mc
afb@pucc-i (Michael Lewis) (03/03/86)
In article <2241@utcsri.UUCP>, vassos@utcsri.UUCP (Vassos Hadzilacos) writes: > In <1716@bbncca.ARPA> Ron Rizzo writes (among other things): > > > Still, partisanship over Nicaragua carries a risk of getting be- > > smirched by too close an identification with one side or another, > > given the violent, backward and even nasty character of the region > > and its history, features embodied by revolutionaries, moderates, > > and reactionaries alike. > > The vicious racism and chauvinism of this statement is nauseating. Maybe disagreeing with your asessment of Rizzo's statement makes me just as bad in your eyes (I hope you can be a little more open-minded than that), but I do. Central America certainly has its share of extremists, ideologues, and crazies, doesn't it? I mean, do you dispute that Central America has a violent history? That it has a violent character now? There are two (or is it three?) civil wars going on now. As far as "nasty" goes, the Salvadoran rebels kidnapped Duarte's *daughter*, which qualifies as "nasty" to me. Now for "backward". There are lots of problems in the region which seem to draw upon violent solutions. This is not civilized, and could be characterized as "backward", although many other places are much more so... One of the main problems in Central America is, in my opinion, a surplus of ideologues and a shortage of pragmatists... Micahael Lewis @ Purdue University
rrizzo@bbncca.ARPA (Ron Rizzo) (03/05/86)
Vassos Hadzilacos writes: > In <1716@bbncca.ARPA> Ron Rizzo writes (among other things): > >> Still, partisanship over Nicaragua carries a risk of getting be- >> smirched by too close an identification with one side or another, >> given the violent, backward and even nasty character of the region >> and its history, features embodied by revolutionaries, moderates, >> and reactionaries alike. > The vicious racism and chauvinism of this statement is nauseating. Oh, please! Gimme a break. Spare me political correctitude masquerading as moral indignation. There's a point beyond which the conventions of political etiquette cease to function only as barriers to prejudice and seriously blind one to common facts. Anyone with an ability to read or travel can easily recognize the pro- nounced backwardness of Central America, one that goes far beyond the merely material: its "primitive political culture" (according to Arturo Cruz, Jr.) the murderous violence endemic to it since at least the early 19th century, excessive even for Latin America, a continent+ whose societies have discovered how to absorb large amounts of routine violence & physical anarchy without jeopardizing social order its often brutal race relations: "Spaniard" vs. mestizo vs. (highland vs. lowland) Indian. And these common facts have real effects. To deny this, to pretend not to see them, is not resistance to prejudice or simply good form, but self-delusion. As for political causes of nausea, there are many and they're probably a matter of individual taste. I for one become whoozey when leftists wax hot over "imperialism" then shift to cool detachment and a fussy demand for rigor when evidence of mass atrocities by "progressive" governments comes to light. Urp! Ron Rizzo
vassos@utcsri.UUCP (Vassos Hadzilacos) (03/09/86)
In <1716@bbncca.ARPA> Ron Rizzo had written (among other things): >>> Still, partisanship over Nicaragua carries a risk of getting be- >>> smirched by too close an identification with one side or another, >>> given the violent, backward and even nasty character of the region >>> and its history, features embodied by revolutionaries, moderates, >>> and reactionaries alike. To which I replied: >> The vicious racism and chauvinism of this statement is nauseating. To which RR then replied (in <1734@bbncca.ARPA>): > Oh, please! Gimme a break. Spare me political correctitude masquerading > as moral indignation. There's a point beyond which the conventions of > political etiquette cease to function only as barriers to prejudice > and seriously blind one to common facts. To which I now reply: Restraint from racist and chauvinist statements is not a matter of adherence to "the conventions of political etiquette". It is a matter of civility and political maturity. So much for the above quoted evasions. On to the substance of the debate: Is RR's statement racist and chauvinist? Yes, I suggest: It is because it brands violent, backward and nasty all Central Americans ("revolutionaries, moderates and reactionaries alike"). [Strictly speaking, I should not have called the statement racist -- it is "merely" chauvinist.] RR denies that his statement is what I called it. His evidence is: > [Central America's] "primitive political culture" (according to > Arturo Cruz, Jr.) Brilliant! A Central American politician (one, mind you, you miserably failed in mustering any kind of popular support in Nicaragua) says that the region has "primitive political culture". Ergo, the region has primitive political culture. QED. > the murderous violence endemic to [Central America] since at least > the early 19th century [...] > > [Central America's] often brutal race relations: "Spaniard" vs. > mestizo vs. (highland vs. lowland) Indian. There is "murderous violence" endemic to US society. It goes way before the 19th century and is as alive and well today as it has ever been. It is not usually political in nature (though it has been than, too -- eg Civil War) but violent and murderous it surely is. As for racial relations, whatever brutality exists in the race relations in Central America pales in comparison to what prevails in US race relations. Is RR prepared to conclude that all Americans ("revolutionaries, moderates and reactionaries alike") are "violent, backward and even nasty"? I hope not. > And these common facts have real effects. To deny this, to pretend > not to see them, is not resistance to prejudice or simply good form, > but self-delusion. Which real facts? That there exist violence, backwardness and nastiness in Central America? Of course there are. Is there *any* place in the world that's free of these vices? What I am taking issue with, quite clearly, is not such a blindingly obvious truth -- but RR's contention that these (violence, backwardness and nastiness) are features particularly characteristic of the Central American peoples. Singling out those peoples on the basis of facts that have been true of all parts of the world at all times of known history (the way RR's statement does) *is* chauvinist. Such is the sad price one has to pay for the political acrobatics one must perform to proclaim the contras an "army of national liberation". --Vassos Hadzilacos.