daemon@decwrl.UUCP (The devil himself) (10/24/84)
Vietnam II_____________________________________________________________________
"Let me say to those who invoke the memory
of Vietnam: there is no though of sending
American combat troops to Central America;
they are not needed."
-- Ronald Reagan, 27-Apr-1983
When Ronald Reagan made that statement, there was only a handful of
military advisers in Central America. Two months later, 6000 American troops
were sent to Honduras as part of "Operation Big Pine II", a set of military
manuevers designed to prepare the troops for combat in - of all places! -
Central America. A number of military facilities were set up. So many, in
fact, that 2000 American troops still remain in Honduras, stationed at these
facilities.
Turning the clock back a bit to 23-Feb-1981, we have the White House
presenting its first White Paper. This White Paper, you'll recall, was the
Reagan Administration's argument for a Soviet/Cuban/Nicaraguan conspiracy in
Central America, aimed at overthrowing El Salvador and all the other dominoes,
no doubt. The white paper was presented along with a stack of papers that
served as the supporting evidence. Problem was, when the evidence was looked
at, it didn't support what was in the paper. In fact, it contradicted the
paper a number of times! Reagan himself admitted that the paper didn't prove
what it claimed to prove.
Never one to let facts stand in the way, Reagan and Co. launched a
covert campaign against Nicaragua. On 16-Nov-1981, at a National Security
Council meeting, the CIA was given its assignment: to train 500 _contras_ to
"step up pressure" on the Sandinistas in order to prevent them from shipping
arms to El Salvador.
Today there are 12,000 to 18,000 _contras_ that the CIA has trained.
Most of them intend to overthrow the Sandinistas, and they make no bones about
it. Can't blame the CIA for that, can we? After all, they're just there to
keep arms out of El Salvador. So what if some overzealous contractor wrote up
a manual that advocated terrorism, assasination (pardon me, "neutralizing"),
and overthrowing the Sandinistas? Only 12 rough drafts got out, didn't they?
12, 1000, what's the difference?
Let's look at how the contras, your tax dollars at work, have handled
their task of stopping arms shipments. Very well, it seems; there's no evi-
dence that arms have been shipped from Nicaragua to El Salvador since April
of 1981. We're told that there have been boats and planes crossing the Gulf
of Fonesca, loaded with weapons...funny thing, though, nobody's ever proven
it. You'd think they'd find at least one!
And let's look at the methods used by the contras to promote democracy
and the American way down there: Mining the harbors. Speedboat attacks. Air
attacks. In a word, terrorism. Naw, it's not terrorism when it's on our side;
as George Bush gleefully put it, "we call them freedom fighters!"
So there you have it. Thousands of American troops. Advisers training
indigent rebels who are the chosen champions of democracy, even if the people
there don't want them. And through it all, denials that we're going to war
there.
Exactly the way it began in Vietnam.
<_Jym_>
:::::::::::::::: Jym Dyer
::::' :: `:::: Dracut, Massachusetts
::' :: `::
:: :: :: DYER%VAXUUM.DEC@DECWRL.ARPA
:: .::::. :: {allegra|decvax|ihnp4|ucbvax}!decwrl!dec-rhea!dec-vaxuum!dyer
::..:' :: `:..::
::::. :: .:::: Statements made in this article are my own; they might not
:::::::::::::::: reflect the views of |d|i|g|i|t|a|l| Equipment Corporation.