THE WAR WE LOST IN NICARAGUA

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000200930016-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 19, 2012
• Sequence Number: 16
• Publication Date: June 2, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/19: CIA-RD
RTIMLE APPEARED
On PARF N' '
ART BUCHWALD
The War We Lost
In Nicaragua
WASHINGTON, D.C., June 15,
1999-Officials and veterans gathered
in the nation's capital today to celebrate
"Nicaraguan Remembrance Day" and honor the
more than 200,000 American GIs who died in
the recent war in Central America.
The ex-GIs, dressed in old khaki, some
wearing combat boots and medals, marched
from the steps of the Capitol to the recently
completed memorial overlooking the Potomac.
The war, which began during the second
term of Ronald Reagan and was continued by
two other presidents, ended in a stalemate with
the withdrawal of American troops after a
decade of fighting.
An estimated 535,110 fighting men on
both sides and 1,620,000 civilians died during
the bloody police action.
Many of the ex-GIs who participated today
were bitter about the way they had been
treated on their. return from Nicaragua.
Ex-chief petty officer Clyde Durban had
served on the destroyer escort Fishbait, the
vessel that President Reagan claimed had been
fired on by a Nicaraguan PT boat. It was
because of this incident that the president
asked for a "Gulf of Fonseca Resolution," which
he said gave him the legal justification for
ordering the U.S. Marines to invade Managua.
ADurban said, "It was nighttime and we
never did see the ship that was supposed to
have attacked us in the Gulf of Fonseca. Some
of the guys on board the Fishbait said they
thought it was a fishing boat shooting up flares.
We never dreamed the United States would go
to war over. it."
Former infantry lieutenant Harvey
Robinson, who had been wounded at the Battle
of San Rafael del Norte, tried to find the names
of his buddies on the memorial wall. "It was
Vietnam all over again," he said. "We were able
to get control of the cities, but the Commies
held the countryside. We'd wipe out a jungle
hideout and as soon as we moved on, they
would move back in. We didn't know which
civilians were for us and which ones were
against us. So after a while we started shooting
at anybody who looked suspicious. When we
couldn't hold on to real estate, Washington
demanded body counts. Based on the counts,
every president since Reagan promised we'd be
home by Christmas."
WASHINGTON POST
2.-June 1985
Ex-captain Robert Simpson, who was shot
down in a helicopter by a Soviet missile near
Jinotega and held prisoner by the Sandinistas
for four years, was bitter because so many
American boys refused to go when President
Reagan asked Congress to reinstitute the draft
in September 1986.
He said, "After the October riots when an
estimated 3 million kids declared they would go
Ito jail rather than fight in Nicaragua, the
-president had to backtrack on his call for
national conscription. So this left the
professional military people and the
unemployed to fight the dirty little war. We got
our butts shot off while the guys back home
were earning big bucks and getting the best
jobs. 'Nicaraguan Remembrance Day' doesn't
mean diddly beans to the guys who were there."
George Shultz, who was Ronald Reagan's
secretary of state at the time of the "Gulf of
Fonseca Resolution," and is now teaching
diplomacy at the University of Chicago, told
reporters he still feels the United States did the
right thing by invading Nicaragua. "At the time,
Congress would not support the freedom
fighters in Honduras, nor CIA efforts to
destabilize the Sandinista government. So we
had no choice but to get our American boys ,?
directly involved. The price may have been
higher than we predicted, but we kept tyranny
from being exported to Haiti. In spite of the
casualties, the important thing is that President
Reagan sent a strong message to the Russians
that he would do everything to maintain his
credibility. I'm sure that if faced with the same
set of facts, Ronald Reagan would not hesitate
to throw our boys into Nicaragua again."
0 1985, Los Angeles Times Syndicate
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/19: CIA-RDP90-00965R000200930016-4