Word: hondurans
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...across their northern border into Honduras to attack bases of the U.S.-backed contras who have been waging civil war against the Sandinista regime. At first there was skepticism. Not only did Nicaragua deny the report, but so did Honduras. But the next day a terse statement from the Honduran government confirmed that the Sandinista army had crossed the line and noted that the day had brought "new incursions" into Honduran territory...
President Reagan immediately granted Honduras $20 million in military assistance and ordered U.S. troops stationed near Tegucigalpa to start airlifting Honduran troops to the border. Fifty U.S. pilots and crew members, manning ten Hueys and four Chinook helicopters, began ferrying 600 Honduran soldiers to some ten miles from the embattled zone. Since the U.S. military presence in Honduras began building in 1980, it was the first direct involvement of U.S. troops in a Honduran military operation...
...week reports from the scene dispelled any doubt that the Nicaraguans had blatantly penetrated Honduran territory. Yet the size and significance of the invasion remained in dispute, and even some Administration officials conceded that it had been somewhat exaggerated, given that Sandinistas and contras regularly tangle along the border. Nevertheless, like Muammar Gaddafi's fitful missile attack on the U.S. fleet in the Gulf of Sidra, the Nicaraguan incursion provided a suitable pretext for showing U.S. military might in the region...
...week, Nicaraguan officials denied that Sandinista troops had crossed the border. In Managua, Joaquin Cuadra Lacayo, the army Chief of Staff, told reporters, "In the last several weeks we have mobilized many thousands of men to the border. But it is absolutely false that Nicaraguan troops have violated Honduran territory." But the Sandinistas undercut their own denials later. At a press conference on Friday, Ortega sought to justify but not deny the raid. "Honduras lost control of its sovereignty by having the mercenary forces there," he said, referring to the contras. "The border area is converted into a war zone...
...committing atrocities against civilians. The facts are difficult to know; in a brutish guerrilla war, it is sometimes hard to distinguish between civilians and combatants. Although the U.S. military is currently barred from advising the contras, the Administration plans to send U.S. advisers to train them in their Honduran camps as soon as Congress passes an aid package. By instilling better discipline, U.S. advisers have been able to improve the behavior of Salvadoran troops; it is hoped that they would do the same for the contras...