Word: contra
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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MANAGUA, Nicaragua--An American captured after a Contra weapons supply plane was shot down over Nicaragua said yesterday he worked with CIA employees and took part in 10 such flights from Honduras and El Salvador...
...Florida, the drug war is an omnipresent fact of life, so naturally Graham and Hawkins are vocal hard-liners on halting the narcotics trade. Otherwise, Graham is, ideologically, all over the map. But his views appeal to Florida's diverse populace: he is for contra aid and a tough immigration policy, while also supporting affirmative action and increased health services...
...graffiti war in Honduras is at once a parody and a paradigm of the larger phantom war that is haunting the country within its borders and without. Ever since 1982, when the U.S.-backed contra rebels set up bases in Honduras for their efforts to bring down the Nicaraguan government, the country has found itself in a curious kind of limbo: not at war, but hardly at peace, caught in the line of a fire that it is unwilling and largely powerless to join. Now, with Washington about to send $100 million in aid to the contras, the reluctant hosts...
That air of embattlement has gradually spread across the country. After the contra aid package was passed by Congress this summer, President Azcona predicted a "backlash of subversive acts in Honduras." Two weeks later, seven men with machine guns and hand grenades set upon a prominent Nicaraguan exile, wounding two of his guards. Only a few days later, the car of a journalist who had criticized the contras' presence was blown...
...argument is hardly heard anymore in the Central American context. Something happened. The Salvadoran guerrillas are in retreat, and yet, mirabile dictu, root causes remain. The tides have changed, while poverty and misery endure. As for Nicaragua, those most habituated to the use of the root cause argument are contra opponents. They are hardly likely to invoke it to explain -- i.e., legitimize -- the contra cause...