NICARAGUAN MILITARY BUILDUP

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP84B00049R001303240020-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 10
• Document Creation Date: December 19, 2016
• Document Release Date: March 23, 2006
• Sequence Number: 20
• Publication Date: March 3, 1982
• Content Type: REPORT

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MEMORANDUM FOR: Director of Central Intelligence
Deputy Director of Central Intelligence
Attached for your, review and use is the briefing on
Nicaraguan activities. The sections on the Nicaraguan
military build-up and the destruction of the Indian
villages have been coordinated with DIA and
We are still working with the section on Nicaraguan
export of subversion.
I have included some page-size graphics as ex-
amples to show some of the boards which will
use in the briefing.
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Attachment:
As stated
IOUS
ORM USE -75 11) EDITIONS
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D/ALA
Date 3 March 1982
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SECRET
3 March 1982
NICARAGUAN MILITARY BUILDUP
Prior to the overthrow of Somoza by the Sandinistas, he maintained a
National Guard of around 10,000 men. This force was widely dispersed through-
out the country in an internal security role. The National Guard had little
heavy equipment, as there was little perceived external threat.
When the Sandinistas came to power, they-immediately began organizing a
regular military force and a police force. The Sandinista Police, similar to
Somoza's National Guard, was gradually built up to 5,000 to 6,000 men.
We have seen the regular military grow from a small force of 5,000 to a
large standing army supplemented by an even larger militia and reserve. It is
now the largest military in Central America. This combined force, which
totals about 70,000 men, has upset the military balance -in Central America and
alarmed Nicaragua's neighbors. This is especially true since Costa Rica
maintains no?standing army. By way of contrast, Guatemala with a population
of 7.2 million and a growing insurgency has an armed force of 15-17,000 with a
reserve of some 35,000 comprised of reserves in varying state ofreadiness,
national police, treasury police, etc. Honduras with 3.8 million population
has some 12,500 under arms with a police force of 5,000, .5 percent of the
population and El Salvador with almost 5 million--and fighting an active
insurgency--has a security establishment of some 24,000, .5 percent of
population. The Nicaraguan military is 3 percent of the total population.
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To illustrate Nicaragua's force growth, this map (map 1) shows some of
the major military bases the Sandinistas have constructed since coming to
power. They have divided the country into seven military regions, and each
contains at least one major infantry garrison.
Since coining to power the Sandinistas have built some 30 new
installations.
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We know that Nicaragua has received at least two dozen T-54/T-55 tanks as
well as 12 152-mm howitzers, and 12 APCs. These give it a distinct firepower
advantage over its neighbors. (Honduras has only 16 Scorpion tanks, and no
APCs.
In addition to this infantry buildup, we know that Nicaragua has pilots
training on MIG fighter aircraft in Cuba and Bulgaria. Four airfields in
Nicaragua are being improved to handle these aircraft.
Once Nicaragua begins to receive MIG fighter aircraft sometime this year
and after the pilot training and airfield expansions are completed, it will
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have the best air force in Central America. (Honduras has only 15 vintage
Super Mysteres bought from Israel and a small number of unflyable F-86s.)
The Cuban influence in the Nicaragua military has been pervasive. We
estimate the Cubans have some 2,000 military and security advisers in
Nicaragua. These include advisers from the general staff level down to
individual companies. Last Fall, the Cubans sent a contingent of elite
counterinsurgency advisers to Nicaragua from their Ministry of Interior,
including several senior officers. The total Cuban contingent in Nicaragua is
approximately 6,000. They are employed in a variety of areas: 500 medical;
2,000 in teaching; 300-600 in government agencies, 750 in
construction/fishing, in addition to the 2,000 military/security advisers.
While the Soviet military presence is not nearly as large, perhaps 50
personnel,they have various officers advising the Nicaraguan General Staff,
and they have helped in the preparation of military plans. The visit in
November of Sandinista Defense Minister Humberto Ortega to Moscow clearly
portends a more extensive Soviet involvement in Nicaragua in the near future.
In summary, we view the continued expansion of the Nicaraguan armed
forces and the continued receipt of Soviet-style weaponry with concern. While
for the present, the Nicaraguan buildup can be considered in large part
defensive, these trends provide Managua with an obvious offensive capability
which has alarmed its neighbors and upset the traditional military balance in
Central America.
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Destruction of Indian Villages
Another development of concern is the recent Sandinista repression of the
Indians in the northeastern part of the country especially along the Rio Coco,
the natural boundary between Honduras and Nicaragua. (See Map 2.)
Since early January, the Nicaraguan government has forcibly relocated
entire Indian communities, totalling some 10,000 people, away from the
Honduran border area.
Reports from refugees, Church officials, and other sources indicated that
most of the vacated villages were burned to the ground.
The area of destruction appears widespread near the Honduran border.
The Sandinistas probably are attempting to create a cordon-sanitaire that
will facilitate counterinsurgency operations along the border and deny the
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insurgents--many of whom are Indians--any support from Indian communities in
Nicaraguan Export of Subversion
Another tactic of Sandinista military strategy is to support so-called
wars of national liberation in Central America. The Sandinistas have provided
military advice and assistance to Marxist insurgents in Guatemala and El
Salvador and to leftist terrorists in Honduras. Ample evidence, much of which
is available in the White Paper, demonstrates that Nicaragua, Cuba, Soviet
Bloc countries, and other radical governments began providing large quantities
of mostly Western-manufactured arms to the Salvadoran insurgents after the
fall of Somoza in mid-1979: In the spring of 1980, the Soviets told some East
European countries to begin sending arms to the Salvadoran guerrillas. Some
of these arms were aboard the Panamanian aircraft that crashed near San
Miguel, El Salvador, on 15 June 1980.
Arms that are known to have reached the Salvadoran guerrillas via
Nicaragua include Western-made semi-automatic and automatic assault rifles
such as the US M-16, Israeli Galil, West German G-3, and the Belgian FAL.
Heavy machine guns, mortars, recoilless rifles, and rocket-propelled anti-tank
weapons also are part of a large and diverse arsenal that has been sent from
Nicaragua by land, air, and.sea to El Salvador since mid-1980. Nicaragua has
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used Costa Rica as a transit point for weapons shipments to El Salvador and
has established guerrilla training camps in northern Costa Rica in order to
conceal its own involvement.
We can document that arms continue to flow through Honduras to guerrillas
in Guatemala and El Salvador.
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The Sandinistas also have trained Salvadoran guerrillas in the military
tactics, weapons, communications, and explosives at temporary training schools
scattered around the country and on Sandinista military bases. Managua's
assistance has been important for the increase in tactical sophistication of
the guerrillas in El Salvador. The provision of false documents and training
to Salvadorans has been verified by two Salvadoran terrorists who were
captured by Costa Rican authorities when they attempted to kidnap a Salvadoran
businessman on 29 January 1982 near San Jose. The businessman was wounded,
but escaped. Three other terrorists were killed. In a recently released
confession, the captured terrorists said that the Nicaraguan government gave
them false passports and identification cards for travel to Costa Rica and
that they had received political and military training in Nicaragua from
Sandinista officials.
In sum, we have incontrovertible evidence that arms are continuing to
flow from Nicaragua to insurgents in El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras, and
that both the Cuban and the Nicaraguan governments have been providing
military and terrorist training to guerrillas from these countries. At
present, Nicaraguan and Cuban efforts to export subversion appear to be
targetted primarily on El Salvador, but the information presented here today
shows that the insurgent threat to other Central American countries such as
Guatemala and Honduras is just as much a cause for concern.
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