Word: somozaism
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Ironically, the civil war erupted just as the country prepared for Independence Day, the annual celebration on Sept. 15 of the break by Nicaragua and other Central American states from Spanish rule in 1821. Somoza, directing the war from a windowless bunker at National Guard headquarters overlooking Managua, marked the day with a champagne reception that U.S. Ambassador Mauricio Solaun declined to attend. The Sandinistas promptly labeled this year's observance Second Independence Day. But neither side could really celebrate a victory in one of the most savage and confusing wars that Central America has ever seen. Each side...
...least four of the dead were decidedly not civilians. Brigadier General José Ivan Alegrett, 47, the guard's tough chief of operations, who was openly contemptuous of Somoza for having capitulated to the Sandinistas at the National Palace last month, died when the plane he was piloting crashed near the Costa Rican border. Killed with Alegrett were three of half a dozen foreign mercenaries employed by Somoza to train the guard. One of these was an American known in Managua as Mike the Mercenary. When news of the death of the most hated guard officer spread through Managua...
From his bunker, West Point Graduate Somoza, whose favorite pastime is watching war movies, called for more mercenaries. Newspaper ads suddenly appeared in the U.S. Southwest: "ExMarine combat veterans needed to fight Communist takeover in Central America." An Albuquerque recruiter, Guy Gabaldon, quickly signed up his quota of 100 men and asked Managua for permission to enroll more. Somoza also ordered up his own National Guard reserves. Reportedly, he did so with reluctance because of suspicions that they might not otherwise remain loyal and turn over arms to the rebels. In any case, Somoza needed the extra help. His regular...
...Somoza boasted that his side had already won. Even if that were so, he may have lost the larger war. Two weeks before the fighting began, 15 opposition political parties, labor groups and business organizations, banded into a "Broad Opposition Front," mounted a general strike to force the Somoza family out of power. The strike had a quick effect since the participants controlled 75% of the nation's industry and 90% of its commerce. Last week, in a further show of unity, the front, joined by the Sandinistas, called on five friendly Latin American nations to mediate a ceasefire...
...meanwhile, had cut off military aid for Somoza and was seeking to bring the Broad Opposition Front and the government together in hopes of finding a "Nicaraguan solution." Explained a State Department official: "We're trying to avoid any 'U.S. solution.' If we were to suggest that Somoza should take a three-month vacation, that's exactly what Somoza's people would do-and then say that this was what the Americans told them to do." But Nicaraguan opposition leaders demanded more substantial U.S. support than that; for example, a cut in $11 million worth...