COUNTERSPY: FUELING COUNTERREVOLUTION IN NICARAGUA

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00845R000100140003-9
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 60
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 15, 2010
• Sequence Number: 3
• Publication Date: June 1, 1982
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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SECRET CIA DOCUMENTS ON MOSSAD
COUNTER l3y
The Magazine For People Who Need To Know
Volume 6 Number 3 $2
Fueling
Counterrevolution
in Nicaragua
Resuming the
Vietnam War
U.S. Green Berets
Torture
in El Salvador
May - June 1982
secret
noforn-nocontract-orcon
Israel
Foreign
Intelligence
and
Security
Services
secret
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STATEMENT OF PURPOSE
The United States emerged from World War II as the world's dominant political and
economic power. To conserve and enhance this power, the U.S. government created a
variety of institutions to secure dominance over "free world" nations which supply
U.S. corporations with cheap labor, raw materials, and markets. A number of these
institutions, some initiated jointly with allied Western European governments, have
systematically violated the fundamental rights and freedoms of people in this coun-
try and the world over. Prominent among these creations was the Central Intelligence
Agency (CIA), born in 1947.
Since 1973, Counterspy magazine has exposed and analyzed such intervention in
all its facets: covert CIA operations, U.S. interference in foreign labor movements,
U.S. aid in creating foreign intelligence agencies, multinational corporation-intel-
ligence agency link-ups, and World Bank assistance for counterinsurgency, to name
but a few. Our view has been that while CIA operations have been one of the most in-
famous forms of intervention, the CIA is but one strand in a complex web of inter-
ference and control.
Our motivation for publishing Counterspy is two-fold:
? People in the U.S. have the right and need to know the scope and nature of
their government's abrogation of U.S. and other citizens' rights and liberties in
order to defend themselves and most effectively change the institutions.
? People in other nations, often denied access to information, can better
protect their own rights and bring about necessary change when equipped with such
information.
BOARD OF ADVISORS (in formation): Walden Bello (associate of Southeast Asia Re-
source Center; director of the Congress Taskforce of the Philippine Solidarity Net-
work and the Coalition Against the Marcos Dictatorship; co-author, McNamara's Sec-
ond Vietnam: The World Bank in the Philippines.) Robin Broad (doctoral candidate
at Princeton University; co-author, McNamara's Second Vietnam.) John Cavanagh
(economist at the United Nations; author of numerous articles and a book on multi-
national corporations.) Noam Chomsky (professor at MIT, activist in the peace
movement, has written extensively on foreign policy and ideology.) Joshua Cohen
(assistant professor of philosophy and political science at MIT.) Ruth Fitzpatrick
(member of the Steering Committee of the Religious Task Force on El Salvador.)
Dr. Arjun Makhijani (consultant on energy and economic development, author of Ener-
g~L Agriculture in the Third World.) Martha Wenger (office worker, volunteer at
WPFW Radio, Washington D.C.; CounterSpy's copy editor.) Organizations for identifi-
cation only.
FROM THE EDITORS
This is the first issue of CounterSpy will continue to publish, and we wilL ac-
that was prepared under the so-caZZed In- tiveZy fight the "InteZZigence identities
teZZigence identities Protection Act - Protection Act."
the first issue under U.S. government Beginning with this issue, CounterSpy
censorship. As we go to press, the Senate will appear five times a year, instead of
is about to vote on the bill, which was four. (This does not affect your sub-
approved by the House several months ago. scription which covers five issues or one
TY,erefore, there is a good chance that year already.) We believe that it is more
the "InteZZigence Identities Protection important than ever to publish CounterSpy,
Act" will be Zaw as you receive this'is- and growing sales and subscriptions seem
sue. Needless to say, Counterspy magazine to confirm that.
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Contents
BOSS Gets Caught ....................... 4
Public Relations ....................... 6
Sinister Disinformation ................. 7
U.S. Green Berets Torture
in El Salvador ....................... 8
Counterrevolution in Nicaragua:
The U.S. Connection ................. 11
Resuming the Vietnam War .............. 24
Noam Chomsky Interview:
The Intelligence Identities
Protection Act ...................... 27
British Intelligence and Iran ......... 31
Secret CIA Documents on Mossad........ 34
AID in El Salvador .................... 58
ATTENTION SUBSCRIBERS
News NOT
in the News
Classify Acid Rain
The Reagan administration's efforts to in-
crease secrecy ("when in doubt, classify")
have an obvious goal: restrict public ac-
cess to embarrassing or indicting informa-
tion. President Reagan is now considering
a new and far-reaching Executive Order on
the classification of so-called national
security information. The order would even
allow "reclassification" of already de-
classified documents. In addition, the ad-
ministration wants to give the Environ-
mental Protection Agency new "classifica-
tion authority" so that, as Steven
Gorfinkel of the Information Security
Oversight Office said, it can classify in-
formation on issues such as "acid rain in
Canada." Gorfinkel did not explain the
connection between acid rain in Canada and
U.S. national security.
IF YOUR LABEL READS "R63" OR "L63",
THIS IS YOUR LAST ISSUE OF COUNTERSPY
Chemical Warfare in Laos
- SO PLEASE RENEW RIGHT AWAY AND DON'T
MISS A SINGLE ISSUE.
Just who has been using chemical
weapons
in Laos? An unpublished U.S. Air
Force
history obtained by the National
Veterans
CounterSpy is available in microfilm
Task Force on Agent Orange under the Free-
from: University Microfilms Interna-
dom of Information Act reports that-the
300 North Zeeb Road, Dept. PR,
tional
"United States secretly sprayed herbicides
,
MI 48106, and 30-32 Morti-
Ann Arbor
on Laos during the Vietnam war."
The State
,
London W1N 7RA
PR
t
De
mer St
Department opposed the release of this re-
,
,
.
p
.,
England.
port because it "would cause identifiable
damage to the national security." Accord-
ing to the Air Force history, spraying in
Laos began in December 1965 "at the urging
d
er
Of ben. William l WCSl.morelGULL, comman
Counterspy encourages the use of its arti-
"
Over
cles in not-for-profit publications. Other of U.S. military forces in Vietnam.
t t d re rinti the next seven months, 200,000 gallons of
71 -7 t,
2n
pu 2ea eons n eres p ng
"
(Inter-
herbicides were dumped over Laos.
CounterSpy materials must request permis- national Herald Tribune, 1/26/82)
sion in writing. All reprints of Counter-
fpL must be credited and include Meanwhile, the Reagan administration
Counterspy's address. continues to accuse the Soviet Union of
using outlawed biological and chemical
Counterspy -- May-June 1982 -- 3
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weapons against the Hmong people in Laos.
(Some of the Hmong tribespeople worked for
the CIA in the 1960s and early 1970s.) The
State Department comes up with "the final
proof" of these charges about once a
month. (See also "General Haig's Yellow
Rain," CounterSpy, vol.6 no.2.) However,
wrote journalist Gene Lyons in "What
Rain?," it is "hard to fathom what the
administration is up to with its repeated
charges of Soviet chemical and biological
atrocities in Asia - other than justifica-
tion for its program to spend $4 billion
to $7 billion on... nerve gas-weapons." He
concluded that "for all its shrillness,
the Government's case would not suffice to
convict a purse snatcher." (New York Times
Times, 3/3/82)
Lyons quotes two biochemists, Chester
Mirocha of the University of Minnesota and
James Bamburg of Colorado State University,
who investigated government claims of "yel-
low rain" in Laos. They say that the
amounts of "yellow rain" the State Depart-
ment claims kills people would need to be
multiplied more than ten-fold to be lethal.
Fred Swartzendruber, a Mennonite Central
Committee worker in Laos from 1979 to 1981
travelled freely in Laos during that time.
And he says that he couldn't find a single
person in all the Hmong villages he visit-
ed who knew anything about "yellow rain."
Redirecting *the RDF
U.S. officials now admit that the Rapid
Deployment Force (RDF) is not primarily
directed against a "Soviet invasion" of a
Middle Eastern or African country. The ad-
ministration is "redirecting its military
efforts in the Middle East in the belief
that internal subversion is more of a
threat to friendly countries, and their
oil, than Soviet attack" (emphasis added).
The RDF is to police and prop up shaky pro
-U.S. regimes in the region. U.S. off i=
cials point out-that the "near toppling of
the pro-Western government in Bahrain in
gimes. Bahrain, a small island nation in
the Persian-Arabian Gulf has been ruled by
a one-family dictatorship since the Brit-
ish withdrew in 1971. It harbors a U.S.
naval base, and has been periodically
shaken by demonstrations in support of
democratic rights for decades. The ruling
Sultan is using his Western-trained police
and intelligence services to counter such
democratic movements. With the RDF, he has
gained a powerful backup force.
BOSS Gets Caught
It would be a "pushover," Michael Hoare
told his fifty or so mercenaries before
they went to the Seychelles on November
25, 1981 to overthrow the government of
Albert Rene. Hoare was dead wrong. When
his party landed in Victoria Airport,
where they were expected by an advance
party of several..mercenaries, troops of
the Seychelles quickly surrounded them. At
least one mercenary was killed in the bat-
tle, but most of them managed to escape by
hijacking an Air India plane to South Af-
rica. Six others were subsequently arrest-
ed on the island.
Back in South Africa, most of the merce-
naries were quickly released in spite of
the tough anti-hijacking laws of the coun-
try's government. Five, including Hoare,
were charged with kidnapping (which, un-
like hijacking, does not carry a mandatory
sentence) and were released on bail. South
African police minister Louis Le Grange
justified this unusually lenient treatment
of the mercenaries and hijackers by saying
that they "only shot out some windows and
ran around in the bush. You tell me what
laws they broke in South Africa." ,Some of
the mercenaries have now reportedly been
rearrested.)
Interrogation of the captured merce-
naries in the Seychelles soon established
South African involvement in the attempted
December [1981]" was the latest example coup. Not only were the mercenaries re-
that convinced the Pentagon that "the big- cruited in South Africa, one of them even
gest threats to western oil supplies in confessed to being a South African intel-
the Persian Gulf [are] internal." ligence officer: "I am Martin Dolinchek
The example of Bahrain indicates that from the South African National Intelli-
the Reagan administration will use the RDF gence Service and I am a senior officer."
in support of blatantly repressive re- Former BOSS (Bureau of State Security,
4 -- CounterSpy -- May-June 1982
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previous name of South Africa's intelli-
gence agency) agent Gordon Winter con-
firmed Dolinchek's statement. He said that
he had worked with Dolinchek - alias
Martin Donaldson, alias Anton Lubic - when
Dolinchek was the head of BOSS' Yugoslav
Section at BOSS Headquarters in Pretoria.
According to Winter, Hoare, the leader of
the expedition, is also a "South African
military intelligence man," and several
other members of the mercenary group are
members of the Reconnaissance Squad, a
"crack unit of... specially trained com-
mandos." The Reconnaissance Squad is also
the sector of the Army from which BOSS
used to recruit members for the "Z" or as-
sassination squad.
Hoare's Seychelles enterprise was in-
tended to replace Albert Rene with former
Prime Minister James Mancham. Mancham, as
Gordon Winter told a press conference be-
fore the attempted coup, is a BOSS agent
who "spied for BOSS at the OAU [Organiza-
tion of African Unity] and the United Na-
tions." Hoare had a tape recording with
him by Mancham which was to be played in
the radio if the coup was successful.
Winter's claim that Mancham was paid by
BOSS was confirmed by Eschel Rhoodie of
Information Scandal fame. Rhoodie admitted
handing government money to Mancham, and
told the South African paper Argus this
was "old news."
Mancham, one-time head of the "Sey-
chelles Democratic Party," is a close
friend of the U.S. and Britain, the former
colonial power. In the early 1970s,
Mancham campaigned against a movement for
an independent Seychelles arguing that
the country still needed "British protec-
tion."
Western powers have "good reason" to op-
pose Albert Rene's government even though
he has allowed a U.S. satellite tracking
station to remain on the island. The U.S.
government obviously wants more - espe-
cially landing rights in Seychelles
ports. These rights do not exist because
the U.S. Navy refuses to declare whether
its ships are carrying nuclear weapons.
Rene is a vocal advocate of making the In-
dian Ocean a nuclear free zone.
The November 1981 mercenary attack on
the Seychelles was not the first such at-
tempt. In April 1979, Rene ordered the de-
portation of a Belgian mercenary,. Alfred
Lefevre. Lefevre was accused of being an
associate of mercenary Bob Denard, who
staged a successful coup in another Indian
Ocean Island nation, the Comoros, in 1978.
More attempts may be in the offing for the
Seychelles; but the defeat of Hoare and
his South African backers this time shows
the strength of a people willing to fight
against terrorist aggression.
Civilian Internment Camps
The Canadian government gave itself some
far reaching powers last year in a May 21,
1981 "Emergency Planning Order." These in-
clude the authority to "establish, admin-
ister, operate civilian internment camps"
and "facilitate the selective reduction of
prison populations to provide for the es-
tablishment of civilian internment camps."
This order, some parliamentarians charge,
"was drawn up in secrecy" and suddenly ap-
peared in Canada's official Gazette. Fed=
eral officials are trying to play down its
significance, saying it is not a law, just
a planning order.
Celine Hervieux-Payette, Parliamentary
Secretary to the Solicitor General, de-
fended the order in parliament. She said
that it was intended for situations such
as "war,... a breakdown in public order
preceding the outbreak of war or in case
of terrorist acts." This definition is un-
doubtedly fairly wide since the federal
government defines "a breakdown in public
order;" but Hervieux-Payette said it was
all in the public good. "The purpose of
this order," she said, "... will, in fact,
be to prevent occurrences such as those
that took place during the last World War,
which were mainly due to a lack of staff
and regulations...." In other words, the
internment of thousands of Japanese-Cana-
dians as such was not the problem, the in-
ternment became problematic because of the
lack of regulations on how to proceed with
it in an orderly fashion.
CORRECTIONS: In our last issue, three
mistakes were made: The nation of Cyprus
became independent in 1953 and not in
1960; and Greece did not join the common
market in 1980 but in 1981. Finally, the
South African town of Brandfort is not a
five mile but a five hour drive from Jo-
hannesburg. Our apologies.
CounterSpy -- May-June 1982 -- 5
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organization.... Then they prepared me for
Public Relations the famous press conference of October 22
.... A prefabricated conference with some
In its efforts to win the hearts and minds pseudo-journalists who beforehand had been
of the U.S. Congress and the Guatemalan delivered the questions, as with me, as I
people, that country's military regime is was given the questions and the text of my
making use of Luis Pellecer, a Jesuit declaration." Toj was also forced to ap-
priest who was captured by the government pear on TV and radio, and the military
last year. Pellecer is compelled to appear took him around in helicopters to speak to
on national television and in internation- some villages from the air.
al press conferences to denounce the Guer- After he was freed, the EGP took over
rilla Army of the Poor (EGP, a principal three radio stations in Guatemala City and
guerrilla organization in Guatemala). aired statements by Toj informing the?peo-~
Moreover, Pellecer is "renouncing" his ple about the real reason for his "denun-
membership in the Jesuit order, saying ciations" of the revolutionary organiza-
that it is engaged in "subversive" activi- tions. In his statement, Toj also reported
ties in Guatemala. Friends of Pellecer military actions he had witnessed as a
claim that they are sure Pellecer has been prisoner. Toj learned that high-ranking
brainwashed to make these statements, and government officials, including General
there is concern that the government will Benedicto Lucas Garcia (the president's
kill him when he is no longer useful. brother), Army Chief of Staff, participat-
According to a statement by Emeterio Toj ed in massacres of civilians. He also
Medrano, the Guatemalan military is indeed learned that government soldiers often
using brutal torture, drugs, and threats participate in military operations while
that it will wipe out whole villages to dressed in civilian clothes.
compel individuals to perform such "public The liberation of Toj and his statements
relations" speeches. Toj is one of the about how he was forced to "testify"
founders of the Committee for Peasant Uni- against the EGP were virtually ignored in
ty (CUC), the largest union for farmwork- the U.S. media. Luis Pellecer's "denuncia-
ers in Guatemala. CUC is part of the Gua- tions" were given much more room.
EL SALVADOR: BACKGROUND TO THE CRISIS
"This book fills a vital need in bring-
ing to bear a wealth of relevant factu-
al material on the El Salvadorean situ-
ation. Its account of the nature of the
social and political order and U.S.
policy provides essential documentation
for the burgeoning opposition to the
Reagan Administration. "
James F. Petras
"This book... provides accurate and
relevant information, hitherto not
readily accessible, and should be wide-
ly distributed and read."
Noam Chomsky
Order from: Central America Information
Office, 1151 Massachusetts Ave., Cam-
bridge, MA 02138. 148pp., $5. Write
to CAMINO for discount schedule.
showed me off to a group of senators from I
the United States as a deserter from my
6 -- CounterSpy -- May-June 1982
temalan National Revolutionary Unity
(URNG), a formal alliance of all revolu-
tionary groups in Guatemala. Like
Pellecer, Toj was captured and then
forced to denounce Guatemala's revolution-
ary groups over TV and radio. Unlike
Pellecer, however, he was eventually lib-
erated from prison by the EGP on November
26, 1981.
Toj was kidnapped in Quetzaltenango
on July 4, 1981 and taken to various po-
lice, army and air force detention cen-
ters. Toj was brutally tortured and con-
stantly given drugs to make him talk. Mil-
itary interrogators threatened to kill his
family and assassinate the inhabitants of
whole villages. On August 6, government
soldiers, some of them dressed in civilian
clothes, indeed massacred the people of
the village Estancia de El Quiche.
They told Toj that they were prepared to
drop napalm on other villages in western
Guatemala if he did not collaborate.
States Toj: "In this manner they obliged
me to publicly accept my recalcitration
from my revolutionary militancy.... They
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Sinister Disinformation
On February 18, 1982, a group of rightists
in the U.S. announced the formation of the
Coalition for Free Elections in El Salva-
dor. The Coalition's members are corporate
officials with financial interests in Cen-
tral America, retired U.S. diplomats and
leaders of rightwing organizations such as
Young Americans for Freedom and the Coun-
cil for Inter-American Security. "Besides
working for a consensus in this counrty
(sic) backing the Salvadoran elections,"
the Coalition's first press release
states, it also aims to counter a "disin-
formation campaign being waged by the Sal-
vadoran Marxist guerrillas... and their
supporters." Behind this campaign, the
Coalition argues, are "the sisnister (sic)
forces which keep Cuba, Eastern Europe,
and the Soviet peoples under the totali-
tarian iron heel." However, as it turns
out, the Coalition for Free Elections in
El Salvador itself may be part of a "sin-
ister" disinformation campaign.
A look at the histories of some of the
Coalition's members will explain why. The afrique-asie
press release lifts Daniel James as the
h der-
i
Napoldon
Duarte
vu per
Ramily
Coalition s secretary. James as cons
ac- with Major Guevara's group, miss Bunke was
able experience with disinformation, ' attached
cording to the New York Times (12/25/77). to the Soviet KGB.' He said in
an interview that that had been his own
"One of the most intriguing CIA disinfor- conclusion."
mation campaigns of recent years was its Still, James acknowledged that he "did
attempt to discredit the Cuban revolution get information" from the CIA for his
in the eyes of other Latin American na- book. James said that he had been ac-
tions by planting the suggestion that it quainted with the CIA's Mexico City sta-
was controlled to some extent from Moscow. tion chief, and that he had asked him for
... Asked how the agency had disseminated "anything that they [CIA] could get for me
its fabrication [that Tamara Bunke, an as- or help me with." However, James refused
sociate of Che Guevara, was a high offi- to say whether "the agency had supplied
cial of both the KGB and East German in- him with any of the material concerning
telligence] the [CIA] official recalled Miss Bunke."
that it [CIA] had provided 'material and Another member of the Coalition for Free
background' to Daniel James, an American Elections in El Salvador, Dr. Evron
author and former managing editor of [the Kirkpatrick (husband of U.S. Ambassador to
CIA-funded] The New Leader, living in Me- the U.N., Jeane Kirkpatrick) brings a
xico, who published a translation of Major
background in "Latin American elections"
Guevara's Bolivian diaries in 1968. to the group. Evron Kirkpatrick was the
"In his introduction, Mr. James noted founder and president of Operations and
that Miss Bunke, who had taken the nom de Policy Research, Inc. (OPR) of which Jeane
guerre of Tania and who is scarcely men- was a member. According to Evron
tinned in the diaries had nonetheless been Kirkpatrick himself, "in 1963, 1964 and
identified a few months earlier by a low- 1965 OPR, Inc. received CIA money." This
level East German defector as an agent of
the East German security agency. Mr. James money, says Kirkpatrick, was "'principal-
did for studies of Latin American elec-
tions." (The Nation, 2/27/67)
CounterSpy -- May-June 1982 -- 7
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U. S. Green Berets Torture
in El Salvador by Ruth Fitzpatrick
On a sunny day in October 1981, nineteen
religious leaders from Canada and the U.S.
sat around a large table in Cuernavaca,
Mexico taping and photographing a slight
young man from EZ Salvador. He was de-
scribing how Green Berets from the United
States taught him torture tactics when he
was a military draftee in EZ Salvador.
"Aren't you afraid for your life to tell
us this?", one of us asked. "I am wanted
dead or alive in EZ Salvador as it is
now. ", was his quiet reply.
The young man's name is Antonio. The
place was the Cuernavaca Center for Inter-
national Dialogue for Development (CCIDD).
We were a group of religious leaders on
the first leg of a study tour of Mexico,
Nicaragua, and Cuba. What we heard con-
firmed our worst fears of direct U.S. in-
volvement in torture in EZ Salvador.
Antonio's eyewitness report was that.
American advisors were not only advising,
they were teaching and participating in
torture.
Even before meeting Antonio I had sus-
pected that U.S. advisors were more in-
volved than the government was admitting.
Only a months before I had visited La
Lateinamerika Nachrichten
CounterSpy -- May-June 1982
Virtud refugee camp on the Honduran-Salva-
doran border. I brought back with me sev-
eral photographs of U.S. Green Berets
wearing camouflage fatigues and with M-16
rifles slung over their shoulders. Then in
February 1982, Cable News Network TV
filmed U.S. advisors also carrying M-16s,
this time in El Salvador. A Lieutenant
Colonel was ordered to leave the country
for that violation, and now the Pentagon
reportedly wants to change the rules for-
bidding the advisors to carry M-16s.
When our study group returned to the
U.S., a number of us quietly circulated
our tapes of the interview with Antonio -
a simple young man who wanted no part in
the fighting but was caught in circum-
stances beyond his control. We cautioned
that we were not able to prove any of his
allegations and hesitated to focus inter-
national publicity on this man who already
had gone through so much.
Then on January 11, 1982 the New York
Times published Raymond Bonner's four
column story about Carlos Antonio Gomez
Montano, a "21-year old who asserts that
he is a former Salvadoran soldier. [He]
says that United States military advisors
were present at two 'training sessions'
early last year when two suspected guer-
rillas were tortured by Salvadoran Army
instructors." Bonner wrote that although
Gomez's story cannot be independently cor-
roborated, and Salvadoran military offi-
cers claim he was never in the army, un-
identified "military sources" confirmed
Gomez's recruitment and desertion. In ad-
dition, Bonner states, Gomez "revealed
knowledge of military life in El Salvador
that lent credibility to his story."
The story on our tape and that in the
New York Times are almost identical. We
are sure it is the same person. However,
(Ruth Fitzpatrick is a free lance writer
working on a book about her life as the
wife of an army colonel and her develop-
ment into activism for justice. She is now
a member of the Steering Committee of the
Religious Taskforce on EZ Salvador.)
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there is a key difference. Antonio told us
that one United States advisor himself
tortured and taught how to torture while
the New York Times said the advisors were
merely present. I have no reason to be-
lieve that Antonio fabricated the story he
told us.
The following is a slightly edited
transcript of Antonio's story which was
simultaneously translated into English.
My profession is repairing watches. In El Sal-
vador I was summoned to report to the barracks.
At the same time, my brother was involved with
the guerrilla struggle. Before I entered the
military, my brother was a guerrilla fighter.
He asked me many times, why did I not incorpo-
rate into the guerrilla struggle, for the peo-
ple? I said, "No, I didn't like those sorts of
things." A few months later I got a summons
from the army that I had to report in February
to the barracks. I did not answer the summons
in February, was summoned again, and finally
had to go in December of 1980. So I went and
presented myself.
After we were there, they taught us how to
handle rifles, different types of formations,
and working the streets. They brought us out to
the different towns to carry out searches. Af-
ter a month, they taught us a course in anti-
guerrilla warfare. Many of my friends went on a
course in Panama, but I didn't go. After they
returned, there was another course that I took
which was for paratroopers. After that course,
they taught us a lot of tactics - advancing,
retreating, military tactics. After that they
gave us camouflage uniforms and boots that came
from the U.S. Then they gave us classes about
the war in Vietnam - how we should act on the
battlefield. What they told us was that we
shouldn't have mercy on anyone. Whether it be
children or women or men, you have to kill them
all.
Many times we would go to the mountains. I
saw many things regarding officials, and the
officers. They took the young men and women
from the houses and brought them to the bar-
racks where they tortured and killed them.
Later we had a welcome for the Green Berets.
That day was the day of the soldier. They lined
us up in columns.WW had an homage for those who
had fallen and for those still alive. They got
us up for this to greet the Green Berets who
came from the U.S. The officers said they would
be able to teach us a new tactic. We didn't
have any idea what this new tactic was. The
first time they brought us to the slopes of a
volcano where we went into combat with the
guerrilla fighters. The Green Berets didn't go
into combat; they were just behind teaching us
how to do these things. They would criticize us
as to what was good and what was bad. We passed
five days on this volcano. There were many who
did not return. There were lots of soldiers who
were killed.
Six days later we returned to the barracks,
and then they began to teach us how to torture.
One evening they went and got nine young people
that were accused of being guerrillas and
brought them to where we were. This was more or
less the last time that I had to see the type
of torture they carried out against the guer-
rillas. The first one they brought was a young
fellow around 15 or 16 years old.... This young
fellow said all sorts of things that they might
let him go. The officers said, "We are going to
teach you how to mutilate and how to teach a
lesson to these guerrillas." The officers who
were teaching us this were the American Green
Berets. They didn't speak Spanish, so they
spoke English and then another officer - Salva-
doran - translated it into Spanish for us.
They began to torture this young fellow. They
took out their knives and stuck them under his
fingernails. After they took his fingernails
off, then they broke his elbow. Afterwards
they gouged out his eyes. Then they took their
bayonets and made all sorts of slices in his
skin all around his chest, arms and legs. Then
they took the hair and skin off his scalp. When
they saw there was nothing left to do with him,
they threw gasoline on him and burned him. The
next day his dead body was found by people in
the streets.
The next day they started the same thing
with a 13-year old girl. They more or less did
the same, but they did other things to her,
too. First, she was used, raped by all offi-
cers. They stripped her and threw her into a
small room, they went in one by one. Afterwards
they took her out tied and blindfolded. Then
they began the same mutilating - pulling her
fingernails out and cutting off her fingers,
breaking her arms, gouging out her eyes and all
that they did to the other fellow. They cut her
legs and stuck an iron rod into her womb. The
last one they killed that day suffered more,
because they stripped him naked at mid-day.
Then they put him on this hot tin and made him
lie there - he was like cooking. After about a
half an hour, when they finally took him off,
he was all covered with blisters - like wounds.
They did different types of torture to him.
Then they threw him out alive at 14,000 feet
from a helicopter. He was alive and tied. They
go and they throw them out over the sea.*
This was the last that I saw of the partic-
ipation of the Green Berets. Twenty-five days
after they arrived, they put me into the brig.
I was put into jail in the barracks because
while I was on guard duty thousands of rounds
of munitions disappeared. That was when I
began to suffer - from that day on. They tor-
tured me in a somewhat similar manner as the
guerrillas. They didn't cut me, but struck lots
of blows. They broke my hand, my wrist with
kicks - my left leg. They blindfolded me and
This "interrogation procedure" was practiced
by the CIA and Green Berets in Vietnam during
the war according to sworn Congressional testi-
mony.
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they threw me into a cell with others who were
accused guerrillas. Four days later other guer-
rillas arrived and were thrown into the cell.
(Afterwards I realized that one of the officers
was working in coordination with the guerril-
las.).I suffered a lot in the barracks and the
jail. I never wanted to be a soldier. I never
liked fighting, period. After being there for a
while and talking with the young people that
were there, they convinced me that I should try
to escape and try to help them. I asked "How?".
Because I was unarmed and I was in prison just
like they were....
Some days later, I don't know how many, I
received bad news. I didn't believe it at
first. This news that they brought - it was
around six o'clock in the afternoon - the news
was that they had killed my mother and my fa-
ther and my brother. A lady told me who was a
good friend of my mother. I didn't believe
it. I knew she had a son who was a guerrilla
fighter; I thought it was a ploy to get me to
leave the jail. Afterwards an official came
and said, "I am an official, you are just a
private." He said, "Have confidence in me and
in yourself, that you-are going to be able to
leave here." I told him, "What is this all
about?" He said, "You're the brother of one of
the guerrilla fighters." He gave me the name of
my brother and I said, "Yes, that was true." He
said, "You are going to escape. If they kill
you, you'll die fighting, but against the impe-
rialists, not against the people." He told me,
"They have killed your mother.,. your father and
two of your brothers." It was a big surprise
for me and I felt very angry. That's when I
said, "What do I have to do to escape?" He
said, "Well, you'll see this evening. We'll let
you know. You are not the only one; there will
be eight others who will go with you." How was
I going to know who the others are who are go-
ing with me? He said, "One will bring you a ri-
fle, and if you have to - the sentinel who's
guarding you - you will have to take away his
rifle and kill him." Since they didn't bring me
the rifle, I had to take the rifle away from
this other soldier whom I had known - a soldier
like me. I didn't kill him as such, but we tied
him and put a grenade in his mouth so that if
he shouted, he would kill himself. We didn't
kill him but one of the other soldiers did.
We left the barracks and it was 7:30 P.M. in
the evening.... While we were leaving, we met
the guard and he shot at us. He gave the alarm
and all the others came after us. Very quickly
there were all sorts of soldiers. We began
shooting at them, too. We all had hundreds of
rounds of ammunition with us, German sub-ma-
chine guns, M-16s. Before we got out of the
barracks, one of the nine of us was killed. An-
other one, a corporal, died soon after and an-
other corporal was badly wounded and I also was
wounded. They had us pinned down. About 2:00 in
the morning we still hadn't been able to escape
the barracks. They were shooting at us from
land and air. But we finally managed to break
through and made our way toward the Department
10 -- CounterSpy -- May-June 1982
of Chalatenango. The guerrilla army was await-
ing us. They knew that we were deserters. The
officer already had communicated, so we weren't
in danger really that they were going to kill
us. We arrived there on a hill, a mountain;
they cured my wounds, bound them and also the
corporal. After that we slept there that eve-
ning.
The following day was the day that I told
them that I couldn't continue staying in the
[guerrilla] army. They told me if I wanted I
could stay but I didn't have to. I told them
no, I didn't want to stay. The others stayed.
They brought me to a city, then I went to my
home town. I wanted to say goodbye to my sis'
ter. I didn't tell her that I had deserted be-
cause I didn't want her to be more worried. I
told her I had a three-day pass. In those three
days I made believe, so she wouldn't be worried
but after seeing her, I left the country.
One night at the border of Salvador-Guatema-
la (the repression was very bad that day), so I
went across the border over the mountains. I
wasn't able to go through the streets. They
would have captured me because all of the bar-
racks had been notified that I had deserted.
The people in general didn't know it; it is not
convenient for them to say that people have de-
serted. The following day after we left they
said the barracks had been attacked by the
guerrillas, but it wasn't the guerrillas; it
was us who had the power struggle with the oth-
er soldiers.
I arrived in Guatemala, but there I was very
much afraid. The Guatemalan army is practically
the same thing as the Salvadoran. I was also
wounded, and the wound in my leg was bleeding a
lot; so I went through Guatemala and finally
got to Mexican soil. I was around 15 days in
Tapachula. From there I arrived in Mexico City.
From Mexico City I ended up in Cuernavaca.
Can you give a better description of the
Green Berets?
I don't know their names, but there were
eight. The officers knew. There was only one of
the eight that could speak Spanish. They were
all white.... The eight U.S. Green Berets...
dressed themselves the same as any soldier.
One of them sort of gave orders, but they did
not have any indication of their rank....
Did they do the fingernail pulling?
It was one of the Green Berets doing the
teaching. The Green Beret did the torture on
the first one and then the others did the tor-
ture on the others.
Were drugs given to the Salvadoran army?
What they gave us was marijuana and most of
them went into battle drugged with marijuana.
The officers said that those who don't want to
smoke don't have to. The officers said instead
of bringing food, "you can bring this because
it gives you the courage to kill," but they on-
ly said this for the soldiers. They didn't
smoke, they brought food. The helicopters ar-
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rived to drop food for the officers, but not
for the rank and file.....
Are you aware of U.S. helicopters machine-
gunning the campesinoa?
Before I deserted, 14 American helicopters
arrived, armored helicopters with 50 and 30
caliber machine guns. I went five times out in
the battle, they were bombing the houses.
Did they strafe the ccnrrpesinoa in the
fields?
They strafed the fields. First, they dropped
the bombs and afterwards, since those planes
are very fast, they immediately leave. The ma-
chine guns fire 1,600 rounds a minute. First
they bombed and then they strafed - both the
helicopters and the planes strafed.
Counterrevolution in Nicaragua:
The U.S. Connection by Jeff McConnell
In spite of official claims to the con- ralism," codewords for bolstering two mi-
trary, the United States has never had a nor sectors of Nicaraguan society: the
non-interventionist position toward the business sector and the National Guard.
Nicaraguan revolution. Since the assassi- Ronald Reagan has continued this policy.
nation of newspaper publisher Pedro He has also expanded it - by renewing U.S.
Chamorro in January 1978, when the revolu- reliance on former National Guard members
tion became a large-scale insurrection, and increasing U.S. aid to the business
the U.S. government has viewed develop- sector - into a policy intended to roll-
ments in Nicaragua as a difficult dilemma back the revolution. The revelations about
that required some kind of U.S. manipula- CIA involvement reflect the Reagan admin-
tion. Both the Carter and Reagan adminis- istration's latest refinements of this
trations have tried to influence events in rollback policy.
Nicaragua by building up two social groups
there: the so-called "private sector" (the I. CARTER'S POLICY TOWARD THE NICARAGUAN
bourgeoisie) and the military (that is, INSURRECTION
the National Guard while it existed, and
later, its remnants). What is surprising Carter's approach to the Sandinista insur-
about these American efforts is not that rection went through four phases.- Ini-
they have been occurring, but the openness tially, in response to growing unrest in
with which they are occurring, compared Nicaragua in 1977, the U.S. pressured Nic-
with the true covertness of similar ef- aragua's dictator Anastasio Somoza to lift
forts in the Philippines, in Greece, in the state of martial law under which he
Brazil, and in Chile in the years from had governed the country for three years.
Truman through Nixon. In Nicaragua, Ameri- It also encouraged Somoza to negotiate
cans have kept a high profile while trying with the Broad Opposition Front (FAO), a
to manipulate events to suit U.S. govern- centrist coalition of opposition groups.
ment ends. This is a new trend in the his- The administration's strategy was to cut
tory of U.S. intervention. losses - by channeling the new political
The Carter-Vance-Brzezinski policy, both currents in Nicaragua in ways the U.S.
before the Sandinista victory and after,
was to contain the revolution: to maintain (An extended version of this article is
a favorable climate for U.S. business and available after April 10, 1982. Send $5
to keep "radicals" out of power - in to Jeff McConnell, Department of Linguis-
short, to block the creation of "another tics and Philosophy, MIT, Cambridge, MA
Cuba." The objective was to "foster plu- 02139.)
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could accept. But President Carter was not a very positive effect, by helping to
ready to abandon Somoza, since there were "strengthen contacts among important mod-
no guarantees that Somoza's successor erate sectors of the Nicaraguan polity. It
would adequately support U.S. aims in the is true that some of the member groups of
region. U.S. ties were closest to the most the FA0 quit the organization during the
pro-American sectors of the FAO: business negotiation process, but the fact is that
groups, American Institute for Free Labor most of them stayed the course. Indeed,
Development (AIFLD)-established labor the FAO picked up additional support from
unions, and conservative political par- a broad cross section of the private sec-
ties. When even these groups had abandoned -tor (COSEP) [Superior Council of Private
Somoza, however) (largely because of his Enterprise, the congress of leading Nica-
stranglehold on the economy through cor raguan business organizations; today at
ruption and his vast wealth) it signalled the forefront of opposition in Nicaragua
to Carter that a government centered and heavily funded through AID] which,
around Somoza was no longer in America's while not formally joining the FAO, did
"national interest." provide broad support to their negotiating
In January 1978, Pedro Joaquin Chamorro, effort and endorsed the mediators' final
editor of Nicaragua's leading daily La proposal with the FAO." Elsewhere Vaky
Prensa and an important opposition figure, wrote: "Thus the effort in effect cata=-
was assassinated. There were demonstra-' lyzed the moderate opposition elements in-
tions and a general strike. The Sandinista to a relatively cohesive group capable of
guerrillas made their broadest attacks functioning."2
yet against National Guard garrisons. The In early 1979 the several Sandinista
National Guard responded with savagery, factions united and joined a wide spectrum
The insurrection had begun. of Nicaraguan groups to form a very broad
As the year progressed, all the opposi- political front which approved a political
tion forces, including some sectors of the program for a pluralist post-Somoza Nica-
Sandinistas, came increasingly to hope ragua, and carried out more crippling
that Carter, the "human rights" president, strikes. The Sandinistas achieved signifi-
would abandon Somoza. But although he cut cant military victories in late spring of
back most military aid, Carter released 1979 as the entire country rose against
economic aid to Somoza in May 1978. When Somoza. In an OAS meeting in Washington,
Carter sent a letter to Somoza in August Cyrus Vance initiated the Carter adminis-
1978 praising Somoza's efforts to improve tration's third strategem for Nicaragua:
the human rights situation in Nicaragua, he proposed that the OAS call for an in-
the opposition's hope vanished. The guer- terim government drawn from all segments
rillas launched their largest offensive, of Nicaragua (including the supporters of
and the National Guard responded by bomb- Somoza) and consider deploying a "peace-
ing several Nicaraguan cities into rubble. -k?eping" force that would in effect block
Thousands of civilians died.
By 1979 it was no longer politically
possible for Carter to openly support
Somoza. In conjuntion with the Organiza-
tion of. American States (OAS), the U.S.
put together so-called "mediation" talks
between Somoza and the FAO, excluding the
a Sandinista victory. The OAS rejected
Vance's proposal and called for Somoza's
ouster and an interim government drawn
from the opposition.
By now, the opposition front had formed
a provisional government. The Carter ad-
ministration, in its final gambit, tried
Sandinistas and their broad-based politi- to arrange a ceasefire. It proposed that
cal fronts. The eventual outcome of these Somoza resign and that a successor picked
negotiations was envisioned by the U.S. to by the Somoza-dominated National Assembly
be a plebiscite, and the replacement of appoint a group of prominent Nicaraguans
Somoza by a government of private-sector to mediate among Somoza's Liberal Party,
moderates. Somoza rejected the plebiscite Somoza's National Guard, and the opposi-
in January 1979. When the U.S. responded tion forces to form an interim government.
by proposing a compromise.acceptable to The opposition rejected this. Then Wash-
Somoza, the FAO walked out. ington attempted to force the opposition
Still, the Assistant Secretary of State to add more conservatives to the provi-
for Inter-American Affairs, Viron Vaky, sional government and to guarantee the
later wrote that the mediation effort had survival of the National Guard. In ex-
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change, Carter offered Somoza's resigna-
tion and threatened to hold back postwar
reconstruction assistance. Again, the op-
position refused. Finally on July 17,
Somoza saw that defeat was inevitable. He
resigned and fled to Miami.
II. CARTER'S POLICY DIRECTLY AFTER THE WAR
The high command of the National Guard
fled to Miami with Somoza. The National
Guard itself disintegrated and its members
fled to foreign embassies in Managua, Red
Cross centers, Honduras and Costa Rica.
Many who did not succeed in finding refuge
were arrested. The U.S. government offered
political asylum to National Guard offi-
cers,3 although Somoza was encouraged to
leave the U.S. and did. These officers
were not subjected to criminal proceedings
for the hundreds of My Lais in which they
had been involved. These same people later
set up training camps for counterrevolu-
tionary exiles in Florida in the last
months of the Carter administration.
In late 1979 and early 1980, the House
Committee on Foreign Affairs held hearings
on Carter's plan to give Nicaragua $75
million in postwar aid. Several witnesses
argued against the plan. One witness was
Dr. Cleto DiGiovanni, introduced respect-
fully as a "special consultant on foreign
affairs to the private sector in Central
America."4 Three months later when his
testimony was published, DiGiovanni's bio-
graphical sketch indicated that after
leaving college, he "served three years
with the U.S. Navy in the Special Opera-
tions Group in Viet Nam, then entered the
Central Intelligence Agency. With CIA, he
served in the Far East, in Europe, and in
South America in a variety of operational
and managerial assignments, including sta-
tion chief abroad and clandestine opera-
tions chief of one of the geographical di-
visions at the headquarters level. He
left CIA at the end of 1978, and since
early 1979 he has spent considerable time
in Central America" as consultant.
DiGiovanni testified that he did not
think it "realistic to believe that uncon-
ditional aid given Nicaragua, even if it
should reach... moderate elements, would
be used by them in any way not consistent
with the goals and traditional orientation
of the frente [Nicaragua's ruling body]
and its members," which DiGiovanni viewed
as Marxist. "Under these circumstances...,
why not withdraw aid... rather than pro-
vide money to [the government] which would
help it solidify its power within the
country.... The credibility of anti-
Somoza, anti-Communist Nicaraguan exile
forces seeking to overthrow the Sandinista
government has yet to be established. What
could happen in the foreseeable future is
that the population within the country,
without outside intervention, becomes dis-
enchanted with its government's policies,
and we should be prepared to take advan-
tage of that situation should it occur."
But DiGiovanni's recommendations were
not immediately followed by the U.S. After
intense White House lobbying, Congress
eventually followed the line advocated by
Viron Vaky.5 Vaky argued that aid was the
best leverage available to the U.S. for
keeping Nicaragua nonaligned, "pluralis-
tic" and "moderate." He testified that the
assistance "will go a long way toward
strengthening the survival, and the capac-
ity to operate, of elements which can con-
tribute to pluralism. That is, the private
sector.... If we do not participate and
assist those elements, such as the private
sector, such as many of the moderate demo-
cratic elements in the government itself
..., we will abandon the field to other
nations, such as Cuba and the Soviet
Union...."
The administration was not yet proposing
direct subsidies of those private sector
organizations, such as COSEP, with direct
political objectives, but instead was al-
locating 60 percent of its loan money for
use by the Nicaraguan government through
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private companies rather than public agen-
cies. Moreover, at this point private sec-
tor organizations still exercised re-
straint in criticizing the government and
were still part of the government. To as-
sure the committee, the administration
stated it had privileged information of
exchanges between COSEP and the Nicaraguan
government, probably obtained from COSEP
contacts, in which COSEP voiced concerns
and which were said to have been "frank
and [have] covered a wide variety of sub-
jects, both of a political and economic
nature."6
Agency for International Development
(AID) documents repeat Vaky's themes. The
"U.S. interests" in offering the $75 mil-
lion reconstruction package to Nicaragua
were put this way: "Nicaragua's Government
of National Reconstruction faces enormous
problems as it attempts to rebuild and re-
structure its shattered economy. U.S. as-
sistance can accelerate reconstruction,
bolster moderate economic policies, and
help to create a positive relationship
with the new Government."7 The package
consisted of $70 million in long-term, low
-interest loans, and a $5 million grant.
The AID director for Nicaragua testified
that over 60 percent, or about $45 mil-
lion, would be "made available to private
sector enterprises for the purposes of im-
porting equipment, raw materials, farm ma-
chinery, and so forth from the United
States" - that is, as export subsidies to
U.S. companies. The remaining loan money
would be channeled by the Central Bank in-
to various construction and agricultural
projects throughout the country."8
Even more interesting, though, is the $5
million grant, about which little has been
said publicly. The allocations from this
$5 million grant appear in Table I. The
scholarships under category 6 were admin-
istered under the LASPAU program. Prior
to this, LASPAU funding had come entirely
out of regional funds. AID used an ongoing
program in this case to create a special
program for Nicaragua. Notice also the
"operational program grants" under catego-
ry 2. The money for "agricultural coopera-
tives" was intended to offer "technical
and financial assistance... [to] benefit
96,000 small farmer cooperative members."
Of particular importance is the $300,000
grant to the Social Action Committee of
the Moravian Church (headquartered in
Bethlehem, Pennsylvania) which would
14 -- CounterSpy -- May-June 1982
"reach some 40,000 low-income people in
the Atlantic zone" - that is, Miskito In-
dians. These points will gain importance
when compared with later AID grants.
The final part of the AID package was a
"publicity campaign." "Extensive publici-
ty will be given to the program loan and
the activities it will finance. In addi-
tion to television, radio, and press cov-
erage of the basic loan agreement, there
will be similar coverage of sub-agreement
signing's. Forms and contracts used in the
various programs will identify the U.S.
Government as the source of the funds.
THE $5 Matroip (hurt
The $5 million grant will finance:
1. Agricultural technical assistance (title XII)__________________ $
1,500,000
2. Operational program grants for private and voluntary agencies--
1,400,000
a. Rivas Agricultural School (CARE)--------------------
(440,000)
b. Agricultural cooperatives:
(Moravian Church) -------------------------------
(800,000)
(CARE) -----------------------------------------
(235,000)
(Technoserve) -----------------------------------
(210,000)
e. Preschool education: (CEPAD-Church World Services).
(180,000)
d. Salvation Army activities___________
(85, 000)
3. Technical assistance in municipal development-----------------
1,000, 000
4. Technical assistance fund to finance U.S. experts--------------
500,000
5. Assistance to the Central American Institute of Business Ad-
ministration (INOAE)_____________________________________
300,000
0. Scholarships for poor students at the American School ----------
300,000
Signs will be placed at all construction
activities identifying the project as U.S.
-financed. And plaques will be affixed to
public buildings (e.g., the agricultural
school.)"9
III. NICARAGUA RECOVERY PROGRAM II:
A SHIFT IN U.S. POLICY
By November 1980, when AID's Congressional
presentation for fiscal year 1982 was
written, U.S. policy toward Nicaragua had
undergone a marked shift. Aid to the pri-
vate sector was now to become more fo-
cused. And its aim was no longer simply
companies but also business organizations.
The "U.S. strategy and interests" for Nic-
aragua was now put this way: The principal
U.S. interest "is the evolution of a plu-
ralistic society with a mixed economy, not
hostile to the United States.... The AID
strategy is to assist in establishing the
economic framework within which Nicara-=
gua's forces of moderation can operate and
prosper.... The program also supports the
private sector, which is the strongest
force of democratic pluralism in Nicara-
gua, activities of other private and vol-
untary organizations (PVOs) and people-to-
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people projects which strengthen contacts called for a cutoff of aid to Nicaragua
between the United States and Nicara- during his campaign, when the new adminis-
gua.1010 tration did suspend assistance several
According to the document, the FY1980 days after assuming office, it spared the
AID program, detailed in Section II and at $7.5 million grant program. No better tes-
the time just being completed, "concen- timony.of its importance could have been
trated on the recovery of the economy made than that of Alfonso Robelo, a busi-
through support of both private and public ness executive and leader of the Nicara-,
sector organizations (including PVOs) guan opposition party, MDN, in a Caracas
which encouraged political and economic speech on January 25, 1981. "The U.S. gov-
moderation.... The $5 million grant for ernment," he said, "should continue trying
the Nicaraguan Recovery Program I... pro- to aid the Nicaraguan people, and should
vides support to private sector organiza- be creative in looking for channels paral-
tions for cooperative development, agri- lel to the Sandinista government, such as
cultural institutional development, cooperatives and other private sector
scholarships for low-income students, and groups."11
technical assistance and training." AID Reagan's position paper during the Pres-
was "continuing its strategy initiated by idential campaign called the Nicaraguan
FY1980" for the next fiscal year, but government a "totalitarian Marxist re-
placing "a greater emphasis on support to gime." Clearly, Reagan and his advisors
key private sector organizations." did not see themselves as "containing" the
The new $7.5 million Nicaragua Recovery revolution by continuing the grant money
Program II grant planned for FY1981 was but rather by rolling it back. In fact,
designed to strengthen private sector or- officials of several of the organizations
ganizations by funding technical assis- that have received U.S. money were taken
tance to the confederation of business into custody by Nicaraguan security forces
associations [COSEP] and its member orga- in late 1980 and charged with plotting to
nizations, lending capital to the indepen- overthrow the government.
dent cooperative association (FUNDE), as- Reagan's program quickly came to have
sisting Red Cross and church'community de- three facets. Underlying the economic fac-
velopment projects, supporting independent et of cutting off loans to the government
labor unions through the American Insti- and blocking loans from international
tute for Free Labor Development, reinforc- lending institutions of which the U.S. was
ing the Central American Business School a part,was the rationale that Nicaragua
(INCAE), and funding U.S. professional ex- supported "terrorism" in El Salvador and
change activities [LASPAU]...." It is im- was thus not eligible for U.S. economic
portant to note that AIFLD, like LASPAU, aid under the law. The military facet of
was an ongoing program under the Latin the program consisted in ignoring the
America and Caribbean Regional Program. camps in Florida and, later, California in
These new funds under Nicaragua Recovery which Nicaraguan counterrevolutionaries
Program II were funds targeted toward Nic- were being trained. There were also re-
aragua over and above the traditional ports that administration officials made
share of AIFLD money going to Nicaragua. contact with counterrevolutionaries based
in Honduras. The political facet was to
IV. REAGAN ADMINISTRATION POLICY bring new faces and much money to the U.S.
embassy in Managua to bolster America's
Carter administration planners were cer- friends in Nicaragua.
tainly aware that many organizations they
were targeting for assistance were now Po- V. OUR MEN IN NICARAGUA
litical organizations - not simply organi-
zations with business interests. After Much as the U.S. embassy in Tehran became
all, U.S. officials had been in contact an important hub for espionage against the
with OOSEP for well over a year, and the new government after the Iranian revolu-
Managua embassy had been substantially up- tion, so the Managua embassy took on a new
graded. Ambassador Pezullo's testimony in importance after the Nicaraguan revolu-
Congress revealed detailed knowledge of tion. In the rating of embassy assignments
Nicaraguan organizations and trends. by the State Department, the Managua em-
The Reagan administration quickly became bassy went from lowest to highest. The CIA
aware of this fact. Although Reagan had moved a large number of officers into the
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embassy, and the fact that the Subcommit-
tee on Evaluation of the House Intelli-
gence Committee has had an ongoing study
of intelligence on Nicaragua since late
1978 reveals a high level of U.S. con-
cern.12
The AID grant money is distributed out
of the Managua embassy. It is useful to
look at five recipients.
? FUNDE, the independent association of
cooperatives in Nicaragua, receives "oper-
ational support." U.S. officials hope the
money to FUNDE will offset the power of
the Sandinista organization of coopera-
tives.
? COSEP also receives "operational sup-
port." It is unknown how these funds are
used. In November 1980, the Vice President
of COSEP, George Salazar, was killed by
security officials when he resisted arrest
for involvement in a conspiracy to over-
throw the government. In late 1981, four
top officials of COSEP were arrested for
agitating and violating civil emergency
laws when they accused the government of
adhering to "a plan to transform this rev-
olution into a Marxist-Leninist adventure"
and of "preparing a new genocide," even
though 60 percent of the economy remains
private and 80 percent of foreign credit
and exchange goes into private hands.13
They were released in early February 1982.
Nicaraguan government officials regard
COSEP as counterrevolutionary. Yet as it
represents Nicaragua's business community,
they need its cooperation in rebuilding
Nicaragua. An official at the U.S. embassy
in Managua says that "COSEP is the inter-
nal bellwether for our policy. Its surviv-
al is key to our role here."
? The Chamber of Industry is another
business organization which receives AID
"operational support." Then-vice president
Leonardo Somarriba was implicated in the
plot broken up in November 1980.
? AIFLD has represented the AFL-CIO in
Nicaragua since 1965. Most of its funds
have come from AID, about $1.6 million be-
tween 1965 and 1979; $824,000 of that be-
tween 1973 and 1979.14 AIFLD was involved
in setting up both the Confederation of
Labor Unification (CUS) and the National
Confederation of Labor (CTN), both of
which received AIFLD money before and af-
ter the war. Both have taken public posi-
tions against government policy. More im-
portantly, they are alternatives to the
unions organized by the Sandinistas among
16 -- CounterSpy -- May-June 1982
urban and rural workers, which are by far
the strongest in the country. U.S.-spon-
sored unions clashed head-to-head with
Sandinista unions in many council elec-.
tions and thus represent a source of non-
government power. In late 1981, Richard
Martinez, who once organized Brazilian
workers in preparation for the 1964 CIA
coup there, identified an AIFLD represen-
tative in Nicaragua as a "conscious CIA
agent."15 He also found the activities of
AIFLD and the unions it sponsors to be
similar to activities he had organized in
Brazil 16 Thereafter the Nicaraguans re-
fused to renew the visa of the AIFLD re-
presentative, and now AIFLD and the AFL-
CIO are gradually pulling out of Nicara-
gua.
? The Wisconsin Partners is described
as a health and educational program of the
Social Action Committee of the Moravian
Church with the Miskito Indians in eastern
Nicaragua. The Social Action Committee has
received AID money for this program since
1980. A clergyman arrested for aiding some
Miskitos and Somocistas in insurgent ac-
tivities testified that he had obtained
money for arms and supplies from the So-
cial Action Committee. The U.S. embassy
maintains close contacts with these Ameri-
cans in the isolated Atlantic coastal re-
gion.
VI. MILITARY PRESSURES IN SEPTEMBER AND
OCTOBER 1981
In addition to the ongoing political oper-
ations, the military pressures continued,
now disguised as diplomatic negotiations.
In mid-August 1981, the State Department's
chief of Latin American affairs, Thomas
Enders, proposed in Managua that the U.S.
and Nicaragua hold discussions to overcome
differences. According to the Washington
Post, the Reagan administration asked that
the Sandinistas stop funneling arms to the
guerrillas in El Salvador; that the size
of the Nicaraguan army be expanded no
further than the 15,000 to 17,000 troops
that the Sandinistas officially acknowl-
edged to be in uniform, and that Nicaragua
stop importing heavy weapons from Cuba and
the Soviet Union and permit some interna-
tional body to verify this.
In return the U.S. made two offers.
First, the administration would enter into
a non-aggression pact with Nicaragua. Sec-
ond, it would close down the camps in
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Florida where Nicaraguan exiles were
training to overthrow the Sandinistas.
Not surprisingly, the U.S. offers were
not well-received. The Sandinistas re-
sponded that the U.S. was merely offering
to do what it ought already to be doing:
to refrain from attacking Nicaragua and
to close down the training camps. The San-
dinistas themselves unilaterally pledged
not to attack the U.S., independently of
any pact. They pointed out the administra-
tion's past public statements that it did
not have jurisdiction over the training
camps under U.S. laws. Either it did or
it did not, and if it did, it should en-
force the laws.
The Nicaraguan government further stated
that what equipment Nicaragua was receiv-
ing and what efforts were being undertaken
to expand its army and militia were neces-
sary to protect the revolution from the
United States, from Nicaragua's Central
American neighbors, and from the former
National Guard members in Honduras. More-
over, the.U.S. was told that Nicaragua was
not helping the guerrillas in El Salvador
militarily, although it was Nicaragua's
duty to aid the revolution in ways short
of military aid.
Finally, in responding to the U.S., the
Sandinistas listed several complaints:
that the U.S. was joining Honduras in na-
val maneuvers to practice intercepting
arms coming into Central America for Nica-
ragua and the Salvadoran guerrillas; that
the columnists Evans and Novak had been
fed the lie that 600 Cuban soldiers had
arrived in Nicaragua; that the State De-
partment had not repudiated the lie; and
that the Reagan administration opposed the
Nicaraguan proposal for a negotiated set-
tlement of the Salvadoran conflict.
VII. THE NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL
DECISIONS
Secretary of State Alexander Haig took
these Sandinista responses of late October
1981 to be a rejection of the U.S. propos-
als and revived public attacks by accusing
Nicaragua of renewing its support for the
guerrillas in El Salvador. The Nicaraguan
government responded that the U.S. admin-
istration was inventing the evidence and
doing so to justify American military in-
tervention in El Salvador. About a week
later, Haig spoke publicly for the first
time about mounting evidence of the "to-
talitarian character of the Sandinista re-
gime." Testifying before the House Foreign
Affairs Committee in late November, Haig
refused to rule out a military blockade of
Nicaragua or assistance to Nicaraguan ex-
iles trying to overthrow the Sandinistas.
Haig's remarks were carefully orches-
trated and immediately followed the first
decision by the National Security Council
(NSC) in mid-November to implement a large
-scale program to deal with opposition to
U.S. policies in the "Caribbean Basin."
The program included increased subversive
operations inside Nicaragua, support for
paramilitary operations against the San-
dinistas from the outside, economic pres-
sures, military threats, contingency plan-
ning for military intervention, increased
intelligence activity, propaganda efforts,
more military aid to El Salvador and more
pressures on Cuba, and joint planning with
America's friends in Latin America.
The Reagan administration had already
canceled direct loans to Nicaragua, but
even greater economic pressures were pos-
sible. The U.S. could oppose loans and
debt renegotiations for Nicaragua by in-
ternational lending bodies. Nicaragua re-
portedly received several hundred million
dollars in such loans during Carter's last
year and renegotiated a debt of about $490
million. The Reagan administration has al-
ready attempted to block several multilat-
eral loans to Nicaragua. It is also known
to have considered certain trade sanctions
against Nicaragua.
A number of direct U.S. military mea-
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sures have been approved. The Pentagon re-
portedly began contingency planning
against Nicaragua in August and has been
ordered to continue.18 These plans are
said to involve naval blockades to stop
arms shipments to Nicaragua or to strangle
its economy. In addition to the maneuvers
with Honduras, in November the U.S. and
other NATO countries held large Caribbean
maneuvers codenamed READEX-1 as a warning
to Nicaragua and Cuba.19 Haig continues to
refuse to rule out direct military actions
against Nicaragua, although it is general-
ly acknowledged that actions like block-
ades would be ineffective. More maneuvers
like READEX-1 are planned.
To make more intelligence activity pos-
sible, it was reported in mid-February
that CIA stations in the region have been
increased in strength "in recent weeks."20
Aerial reconnaissance was increased. The
destroyer Deyo carrying surveillance
equipment was deployed off the western
coast of Nicaragua and El Salvador in No-
vember and has since been replaced by an-
other such ship.21 The Pentagon is plan-
ning to reopen the Naval Air Station in
Key West, Florida, as a command center for
intelligence gathering in the Caribbean
Basin ,22 and Defense Secretary Caspar
Weinberger has been secretly negotiating
with the governments of Honduras and Co-
lombia to establish U.S. bases there for
use in "regional emergencies."23
Propaganda efforts were approved to cre-
ate a perception in the U.S. of a threat
from Nicaragua to the rest of Central
America. To this end, the State Department
has released "facts and figures," said to
have been classified to bolster Haig's ac-
cusations about growing "militarization"
in Nicaragua.24 A campaign of "disinfor-
mation" was also reportedly approved by
the NSC.25 Accusations that the Sandin -
istas are aiding the rebels in El Salva-
dor.. may be part of this campaign.
The Nicaragua decisions are thought,
apart from their long-term aims of making
Nicaragua more amenable to U.S. policies,
to have the important short-term aim of
assisting the increasingly unsuccessful
U.S. policy in El Salvador. American plan-
ners probably hope that intimidating Nica-
ragua, and perhaps gaining some conces-
sions, will demoralize the guerrillas in
El Salvador. The elections there, not sur-
prisingly, are said to be jeopardized by
the on-going war, and the CIA has info;-med
18 -- CounterSpy -- May-June 1982
Reagan that the Salvadoran government can-
not win without outside troops.
Argentina and the U.S. are reportedly
training Salvadoran soldiers in "infiltra-
tion" techniques that sound a bit like Op-
eration Phoenix techniques of the Vietnam
war.26 And although Leopoldo Galtieri, Ar-
gentina's new president, has denied that
he made any offers, El Salvador's Defense
Minister Garcia has stated that he would
accept Argentine troops in El Salvador.27
It has been reliably reported that
Galtieri made the offer to traveling am-
bassador Gen. Vernon Walters, former depu-
ty director of the CIA in September.28
Another joint effort being pushed by the
U.S. is the creation of the "Central Amer-
ican Democratic Community," consisting now
of Costa Rica, Honduras and El Salvadof,
which Nicaraguans and many other observers
believe will take on a military character.
Venezuela, Colombia and the U.S. have be-
come observer members..It is reported that
Guatemala will be asked to join soon.29
Already there have been joint meetings of
military representatives from Guatemala,
Honduras and El Salvador that indicate co-
ordinated military planning. The U.S. is
reportedly backing these meetings.
VIII. CONSTANTINE MENGES AND COVERT
POLITICAL OPERATIONS
According to the Washington Post, the CIA
has proposed "a secret $19 million plan to
build a broad political opposition to the
Sandinista rule in Managua, and to create
'action teams' for paramilitary and polit-
ical operations and intelligence gathering
in Nicaragua and elsewhere."31 Just sever-
al weeks after the first NSC decisions,
the Boston Globe reported that the NSC had
decided to "press covert action in Nicara-
gua and El Salvador to infiltrate hostile
elements both to gain intelligence and try
to destabilize" the Sandinista government
and Salvadoran insurgent forces. The Wash-
ington Post did not know if the CIA pro-
posal had been implemented but noted that
U.S.-backed paramilitary operations along
the Honduran border had reportedly begun.
Outside the evidence of the AID grant
program discussed above, very little is
known about what specifically this $19
million would be used for. Neither is it
clear where AID would stop and the CIA
would step in. The CIA figure, however, is
nearly three times the size of the Nicara-
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gua Recovery Program II and nearly twice
the $10 million Nicaragua Recovery Program
III. This $10 million program appears to
have been partially implemented. Sources
at AID report that $2.4 million of the
FY1982 budget has been spent as of Febru-
ary 1982. They say that no public docu-
ments exist on these latest AID efforts as
the program is "in constant flux."
The Globe reported that while "no one
will talk about the details of the covert
activities, it was pointed out that one of
the lessons of Vietnam was that the Viet
Cong thoroughly infiltrated the South
Vietnamese government and armed forces and
were able to exploit their inside knowl-
edge and positions to considerable advan-
tage." The Post stated: "As reportedly
contemplated by the CIA,_ non-Americans
would be used for the most part in imple-
mentation of its plan, but the possible
use of American personnel to undertake
unilateral paramilitary actions against
some unspecified 'special Cuban targets'
also was envisaged."32 Baltadano, in his
public confession of anti-government plot-
ting (see box), claimed to have met with
Reagan advisors while preparing the plot.
Perhaps playing a key role in the CIA
plan is Constantine Menges who, according
to a public relations officer at CIA head-
quarters, is the National Intelligence Of-
ficer for Latin America at the CIA and
formerly of the Hudson Institute.33 In
1981 he wrote, citing the "lessons of Por-
tugal," that there is "an urgent need for
a program of increased support for the
genuine democratic groups in Nicaragua,"34
and that throughout Central America there
is "a need to work with transnational
groups such as parties, trade unions, civ-
ic, business, and religious organizations
to strengthen those genuinely democratic
and moderate forces which exist within
each country."35
Menges claimed that although "the Commu-
nist and radical left groups have made a
hidden but nevertheless intense. effort" to
consolidate power in the Sandinista ruling
council, "the much more loosely organized
democratic groups represented by various
independent political parties, non-Commu-
nist business and labor associations, most
of the Catholic Church, and most of the
population have been steadily weakened by
a strategy of ambiguous but unremitting
harassment and persecution. As a result,
Nicaragua today is nearly under the con-
trol of the Communist groups."
"After the revolutionary victory in July
1979," Menges wrote, the "obvious next
question was whether the Cuban-supported
Marxist-Leninist groups or the genuinely
democratic forces would prevail in Nicara-
gua." Menges derides Mexico and social
democrats for ignoring their "revolutionary
experiences." "Many Latin American social
democrats also shared in the 'Cuban mis-
take:' endorsing Castro without establish-
ing a separate power base... and many Eu-
ropean social democrats... would have
cause to remember... the Portuguese expe-
rience. There, following the 1974 revolu-
tion which ended the five-decades long
Salazar/Caetano regime, the Communist Par-
ty with strong covert Soviet support moved
quickly to dominate most government orga-
nizations, trade unions, and communica-
tions, and seemed to be heading inexorably
toward dictatorial power. Only the failure
of a Communist coup attempt in 1975 and a
concerted effort by democratic parties and
governments in Europe to help both the
Christian Democrats and the social demo-
crats and oppose the Communists resulted
in the free elections of 1976 and the
functioning democracy that Portugal has
today." Paying heed to their "revolution-
ary experiences" would have meant, "in
Nicaragua, an effort on the part of Mexico
and the social-democratic parties to
strengthen the genuinely democratic groups
and to prevent the covert Cuban strength-
ening of the Marxist-Leninist groups."
"This did not happen," Menges concluded.
But the U.S. appears willing to put its
hand in the pie if Mexico and the social
democrats do not. Importantly, Menges ne-
glects to mention the rightwing political
domination in present-day Portugal. Nor
does he mention the crucial role that
Western intelligence agencies, including
the CIA, played in rolling back the Por-
tuguese revolution.
IX. U.S. BACKING FOR PARAMILITARY ACTIONS
AGAINST NICARAGUA
In mid-December, the Reagan administration
reportedly informed Congress that the CIA
was involved in paramilitary covert action
aimed at Nicaragua. The U.S. was also pro-
viding assistance to Argentine advisors,
perhaps fifty of them, working with the
Somocista counterrevolutionaries in Hondu-
ras.36 About this time attacks on Sandin-
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ista positions escalated dramatically. Ex- dicted this would be possible within sev-
ile leaders in Honduras told reporters eral months. "Senior intelligence sources"
that "the war against Nicaragua has be- were said to expect support from Chile,
gun."37 A number of sources indicate that Argentina, Colombia and Venezuela. One of-
the Somocistas are being aided by the Hon- fical reported that "Venezuela would like
duran military, which has essentially re- to see the government of Nicaragua re-
gained power in Honduras despite the re- moved. Venezuela already is supporting a
cent cosmetic election there in which ci- [rebel] group in Costa Rica."39
vilians were elected to government of-
fices.38 Nicaraguan Foreign Minister X. STEADMAN FAGOTH AND THE MISKITO INDIANS
Miguel D'Escoto alleged that the U.S. was
arming 6,000 Somocistas in twenty camps in The Indians of eastern Nicaragua have tra-
collusion with Honduras, Guatemala and Ar- ditionally been isolated from the rest of'
gentina. the society. The Sandinistas tried to im-
About this same time, a possible scenar- pose central authority on the east, up-
io for a naval blockade was reported. Con- graded their military presence, and
tingency plans were said to have been brought Cuban doctors, teachers and sol-
drawn up to support Somocista attackers in diers into the area. These measures creat-
Honduras and Costa Rica. If they succeeded ed much hostility. Relations with the cen-
in controlling a small piece of territory, tral government plunged when it was dis-
the U.S. could set up a blockade around closed that the Indians' representative on
Nicaragua in conjunction with other Latin the national governing council, Steadman
American nations to "prevent foreign in- Fagoth, had been an informer for Somoza
terference." White House officials pre- and he was arrested. He was released after
Terrorist Attacks
Counterrevolutionary groups failed in an sabotage of a Cuban plane in 1976 costing
attempt to blow up a Nicaraguan jetliner, 73 lives.
and a sabotage plot directed against key In a live TV presentation on January 12,
industrial plants was exposed by State Se- Cerna and Interior Minister Tomas Borge
curity during December and January. Mean- showed the local and foreign press the ev-
while, attacks by armed bands in remote idence of a plot to blow up Nicaragua's
regions along the Honduran border cost the only oil refinery and cement works. The
lives of more than 20 Nicaraguans and leader of the team aimed at the cement
nearly 30 soldiers are missing in action. works, William BaZtodano, a Nicaraguan
A timebomb exploded under a seat in an civil engineering student, told how he had
AeroNica 727 jet blowing a two foot hole crisscrossed the Americas seeking support
in the fuselage while the plane was sit- for his organization, the Nicaraguan Demo-
ting on the ground in Mexico City on De- cratic Union - Revolutionary Armed Forces
cember 12, 1981. The captain and two of Nicaragua (UDN-FARN). In one trip to
flight attendants were injured. The plane the U.S., he and his brothers, Fernando
had been delayed and had the bomb exploded and Edmundo Chamorro RappachoZZi, held
in flight a crash with more than 100 per- press conferences in Miami announcing
sons aboard would have been a near cer- their intent to fight against the Nicara-
tainty. [A second bombing at Managua air- guan government. In Washington, they had
port in late February 1982 killed three meetings with unnamed government officials
people and injured four others.] to explain their intentions. In another
After investigations by Nicaraguan and trip to Argentina he claimed that after
Mexican authorities, Nicaragua's security three meetings with high military officers
chief, Lenin Cerna, declared that the they were given $50,000. This money and
bombers were connected with the Cuban ex- more raised among wealthy exiles in Miami
ile group CORU, also responsible for the was used to finance the plot and to supply
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demonstrations by Indian supporters. The
belief that Fagoth thereafter began to
plot with Somocista counterrevolutonaries
was confirmed when Fagoth was discovered
to be among the survivors of the crash
last year of a Honduran military plane
transporting top Honduran military lead-
ers. The Sandinistas have since charged
that Indian groups were joining Somocistas
in raids from Hondoras. After 26 people
were said by the government to have been
killed in these raids around the first of
the year, Sandinista soldiers began evacu-
ating Indians from the border area, some-
times forcibly.40
As has been shown, the Moravian Church
project with the Miskitos has been funded
through AID. The latest disaster relief
plan put out by AID indicates that there
are fifty "locals" of the Moravian Church
on the Atlantic Coast. Not surprisingly,
former U.S. Ambassador to Nicaragua,
Lawrence Pezullo stated: "We have very
close communication with our people over
there. "41
Nicaraguan officials have charged that
Moravian Church leaders were working with
Fagoth, Somocistas, Honduran officer Major
Leonel Luque Jimenez and unnamed Argentine
officers, to foment an uprising and de-
clare independence for the eastern part of
Nicaragua.42 Ten clergymen had been ar-
rested or were being sought in mid-Febru-
ary 1982. Vice Interior Minister Rene
Rivas stated: "The Moravian Church, as a
church, was involved in counterrevolution-
ary action. The pastors persuaded the
young people to go over into the [train-
ing] camps, preaching a primitive brand of
anticommunism."43 As stated above, the So-
cial Action Committee, funded by AID, was
used by these clergymen as a source of
money for the insurgency.
Fagoth reportedly sought contact with
U.S. officials in Miami and Washington
immediately upon being released from jail
in early 1981. It is not known what con-
tacts took place. However, in "recent
military training camps for UDN-FARN in President Herrera Campins. Relations with
Honduras. Venezuela are very important to Nicaragua
Upon entering Nicaragua in early January both for inexpensive oil and for political
with a Honduran passport supplied by a support against U.S. intervention. Venezu-
Honduran military officer, Baltodano was eZa supports the Salvadoran junta and op-
spotted by Nicaraguan security who follow- position parties in Nicaragua but has op-
ed him for several days before arresting posed U.S. attempts to isolate Nicaragua.
him and other members of the plot. Timing incidents like this could be used to di-
devices, arms and 312 sticks of dynamite vide the two nations.
were captured and in following days 14 A rising number of attacks by counter-
were arrested. revolutionary groups along the Honduran
The most alarming aspect of the plot was border has resulted in many deaths and
the cooperation of four diplomats - three growing tensions in border areas. The
Venezuelans and one Salvadoran - in the worst hit area was the remote northeastern
conspiracy. According to Baltodano, the region inhabited by indigenous Miskitos. A
plot was planned in the Salvadoran consul- military post was overrun before Christmas
ate in Costa Rica. In Nicaragua, it was leaving seven soldiers dead and 27 mis-
coordinated with the Venezuelan military sing. Health workers, teachers, and grain
attache and two other diplomats. Further buying agents have been targeted too, in
testimony about this was given by Julio an apparent effort to terrorize anyone
Gonzalles Ferron, a Spaniard with Venezue- cooperating with the government.
Zan citizenship who owns a Managua pickle The Sandinista response is to increase
factory. A videotaped confession of his the number of troops in border areas and
participation was shown and a search of encourage factory workers to watch over
his house turned up fake rubber stamps their plants. Borge warned Nicaragua's en-
for altering passports and an ID card nam- emies, "we are sleeping with one eye
ing him as a member of Venezuelan military open." A Christmas amnesty for 540 of the
intelligence. 4,000 ex-National Guardsmen serving jail
Borge said he was sure that the govern- terms was cancelled after others that had
ment of Venezuela had nothing to do with been previously pardoned were implicated
the plot and felt that the CIA had to be in the increasingly frequent counter-rev-
behind something Like this. The foreign olutionary moves.
minister flew to Venezuela to confer with - by Larry Boyd, via APIA -
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weeks several United States military offi-
cers stationed [in Honduras] have visited
the Honduran Army command post in Puerto
Lempira [where exile groups provided para-
military training for Miskitos], while
the local United States mission [in Hondu-
ras] appears to have established direct
contact with Mr. Fagoth and other anti-
Sandinista leaders."44
Fagoth came to Washington on February
22, 1982 to speak with the press and the
government. His trip was sponsored by the
American Security Council, but his sched-
ule was handled by the State Department.
He was introduced at an American Security
Council briefing by an aide to U.S. Ambas-
sador to the U.N., Jeane Kirkpatrick. In
his appearances Fagoth falsely charged
that the Sandinistas are guilty of geno-
cide, had set up concentration camps, and
had carried out massacres and other atroc-
ities against the Miskitos. In response to
questions about his spying for Somoza and
being on the Honduran military aircraft,
he demanded proof that he had done these
things. He claimed to be involved in a po-
litical and not a military struggle. When
asked why then he had in a January 1, 1982
radio address over Radio 15 September (a
clandestine radio station operated for
Miskitos from Honduras) praised those who
had in 1981 died "fulfilling a noble mis-
sion for the liberation of our fatherland"
and had vowed that 1982 would be the year
of liberation, he denied having made the
address. However, the speech was translat-
ed and printed in the U.S. Foreign Broad-
cast Information Service.45 Fagoth later
repeated his charges to a U.S. Congres-
sional committee.
"Sandinista repression of the Miskitos"
is now a recurring theme in U.S. govern-
ment statements about Nicaragua. President
Reagan used it in his February 1982 speech
to the OAS; Jeane Kirkpatrick told the
Senate Foreign Relations Committee in
March that the Sandinista "assault" on the
Miskitos is "more massive than any other
human rights violation that I'm aware of
in Central-America today," and assured the
Senators that Somoza, even though a "per-
fectly clear cut dictator" was less re-
pressive than the Sandinistas. Secretary
of State Haig cited a photograph of burn-
ing bodies published in the rightwing
French Le Figaro as evidence of "atrocious
genocidal actions" against the Miskitos.
The photo was captioned "The massacre of
22 -- CounterSpy -- May-June 1982
fiercely anti-Castro Miskito Indians...
last December." Steadman Fagoth had used
the same photograph in his Washington
press conferences. However, as it turns
out, in reality the photo was taken in
1978, when Somoza was still in power, and
depicts Red Cross workers burning bodies
of war dead as.a hygienic measure. Figaro
editor Henri-Christian Giraud later ac-
knowleged.that the caption under the pho-
tograph had been a "deplorable mistake."
An American Indian Movement (AIM) dele-
gation which visited the Miskito region in
late 1981 publicly supports the relocation
of the Miskitos away from the border area,
for their own safety. This is the first
time that AIM has endorsed the relocation
of an indigenous people. AIM charges that
the real danger to the Miskitos comes from
the U.S. government which wants to use the
Miskitos in its war against Nicaragua, as
the CIA used the Hmong tribe to fight the
U.S. war in Laos.46
XI. THE WAR WILL GO ON
Nicaragua should be prepared for a long
fight. For the stakes are quite high for
the Reagan administration, should it give
in. As a "senior State Department policy
maker" explained: "We're on a collision
course.... If we do nothing there will be
another communist regime in this hemi-
sphere and they [the Republicans] won't be
reelected. If we do something it undoubt-
edly will cause a negative public reac-
tion, particularly among liberals in this
country who are still suffering from the
post-Vietnam syndrome."
"The administration is going to have to
face up to a fundamental decision in the
next six months: whether to allow Nicara-
gua to consolidate its Marxist-Leninist
regime, which already has become a base
for subverting the whole hemisphere, or
act to stop it."
1) See Richard Fagan, "bateline Nicaragua: The End
of the Affair," Foreign Policy, Fall 79, pp.178-191;
Noam Chcrosky and Edward Herman, The Washington Con-
nection and Third World Fascism,- South End Press,
Boston, 1979, pp.283-296. William LeoGrande, "The
Revolution in Nicaragua: Another Cuba?," Foreign Af-
fairs, Fall 79, pp.28-50.
2) House Committee on Foreign Affairs, United
States Foreign Policy. Toward-Nicaragua, June 79, pp.
59, 73.
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3) New York Times (NYT), 7/1/80.
4) House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Assessment
of Conditions in Central America, 5/20/80, pp.77-89;
see CounterSpy, vol.5 no.2, pp.54-55.
5) House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Special Cen-
tral American Economic Assistance, 11/27/79, pp.43-
44, 50.
6) Ibid., p.62.
7) AID Congressional Presentation for Fiscal Year
1981, p.260.
8) cf supra, #5, p.30.
9) Ibid., pp.32-33.
10) AID Congressional Presentation for Fiscal Year
1982, pp.208-210, 218.
11) NYT, 1/26/81.
12) House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Review of
the Presidential Certification of Nicaragua's Con-
nection to Terrorism, 9/30/80, p.16.
13) NYT, 11/17/81; 11/30/81.
14) cf supra, #5, p.26.
15) The Guardian (New York), 12/2/81, p.13.
16) "La CIA es Como un Cancer," Sobriania (Managua),
Oct. 1981, pp.43-46.
17) Washington Post (WP), 12/10/81.
18) Miami Herald, 11/26/81.
19) Ibid.
20) WP, 2/14/82.
21) NYT, 2/25/82.
22) WP, 2/13/82.
23) WP, 3/2/82.
24) Boston Globe (BG), 12/4/81.
25) New York Post, 2/15/82,
26) NYT, 12/2/81.
27) NYT, 2/23/82. Los Angeles Times (LAT), 2/18/82.
28) The Nation, 1/30/82.
29) Latin America Weekly Review (LAWR), 2/5/82,
30) WP, 10/27/81.
31) WP, 2/14/82.
32) Ibid.
33) In a phone interview with the author on 3/1/82;
Menges was also identified as a CIA officer in SAIS
Review, winter 1981-82, p.229.
34) SAIS Review, summer 1981, p.31.
35) Commentary, August 1981.
36) LAT, 2/5/82.
37) The Nation, 1/23/82, p.70.
38) LAWR, 2/5/82, p.7.
39) San Francisco Examiner, 12/20/81.
40) WP, 2/5/82.
41) Saul Landau memo on Nicaragua, Institute for
Policy Studies, 1/25/82.
42) LAWR, 2/12/82, p.12; FBIS, 2/8/82, pp.P8-Pll.
43) WP, 2/5/82.
44) NYT, 2/21/82.
45) FBIS, 1/4/82, p.P7.
46) "All Things Considered," National Public Radio,
3/4/82.
Resuming the Vietnam War
by John Kelly
El Salvador won't be America's next Viet-
nam. Vietnam will, if the Vietnam National
Salvation Committee (VNSC) has its way.
In recent testimony before the U.S.
House Subcommittee on Asian and Pacific
Affairs, the VNSC laid out its conspiracy
to resume the Vietnam war, which it claims
is in accord with the Reagan administra-
tion's worldwide "offensive," "roll-back"
strategy. Quite simply, the Committee ad-
mits that it is aimed at "overthrowing"
the Vietnamese government through "psywar
[psychological warfare] and armed opera-
tions, combined with diplomatic and polic-
ital (sic) actions abroad."
Taking it upon itself to speak for the
U.S. government, the VNSC told the Subcom-
mittee that "it is obvious that the United
States can no longer stick to the tradi-
tional policy of containment, whereas the
front line now passes in Latin America, in
El Salvador i.e. at the doorsteps of the
United States. Washington has chosen a
resolutely offensive strategy in order to
solve the dilemmas of the policy of con-
tainment. The roll-back strategy applies
above all to the areas which are not cov-
ered by the Yalta [Agreement]."
While it is not known whether the U.S.
government supports the VNSC, the Commit-
tee says that it "looks forward naturally
to moral support and material assistance
from the great powers of the Asia Pacific
area namely China, the U.S., Japan and
ASEAN [Association of South East Asian
Nations]...." rt is significant that the
U.S. Justice Department has not prosecuted
the VNSC despite its apparent violation of
(John Kelly is co-editor of CounterSpy and
author of the forthcoming book, The CIA in
America.)
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the U.S. Neutrality Act. At a minimum, the
Reagan administration's inaction allows
the VNSC to use the U.S. as a base of op-
erations.
The Chinese government, according to the
VNSC, fully supports resumption of the
Vietnam war, and VNSC spokesperson Truong
Nhu Tang says he was recently invited to
the People's Republic of China (PRC) where
he met with Prime Minister Zhao Ziyang and
Cambodia's Prince Norodom Sihanouk. After-
wards, the VNSC claimed that "China now
has chosen to destabilize pro-Soviet Indo-
china by arming all anti-Hanoi resistance
movements, communist and anti-communist
alike, and also separate ethnic minority
groups."
Troung Nhu Tang, once a Comptroller Gen-
eral of the Vietnam Industrial and Commer-
cial Bank and former Director General of
the National Sugar Factory, testified be-
fore the House Subcommittee on October 15,
1981. His submitted written statement was
a potpourri of buzz words sure to warm the
cockles of the heart of an:V Reaganite. Re-
ferring to Vietnam alternatively as a "new
East Germany" and a "new Cuba," Tang as-
serted baldly that Vietnam "had become an
integral and organic part of the Soviet
Union" with the will and the means for
"exporting the revolution beyond the bor-
ders of Indochina." Laos and Cambodia,
said Tang, "are thus destined to be ab-
sorbed by Vietnam in a kind of Indochina
pact, a miniature model and tropical ver-
sion of the Warsaw pact." A la General
Haig, Tang claimed that "Hanoi used toxic
gas and chemical weapons to exterminate
the Hmuong in Laos." For good measure,
Tang threw in a Libya connection and the
charge that the Vietnamese-Soviet friend-
ship "directly endangers the commercial
and military fleets of the West, chiefly
Japan and China (sic)."
enemies." More specifically, "the U.S.
this time should support the opposition
and peoples' movements" in Vietnam immedi-
ately. For "now is the best time with the
greater chance of success for the West."
In the same breath, Tang urged and de-
nied that he was urging the U.S. to become
involved in a second Vietnam war. "I am
not coming here to urge you to be in-
volved in the new war, but it is a unique
way to stop Soviet hegemonists less expen-
sively and most effectively."
A serious contradiction running through
Tang's presentation was his contention
that Vietnam was no longer a sovereign
country because of its alliance with a
foreign power, the Soviet Union, and yet,
the way to restore Vietnam's sovereignty,
he proposed, was through identification
with the United States. Ironically, Tang
himself observed that "during the war
years in Viet Nam, many of us had admired
Hanoi's role, independent from the China-
Soviet conflict." Now he proffers U.S.
assistance to the VNSC's war as a means to
keep China allied with the U.S. and away
from the Soviet Union which, said Tang,
"must be more important than keeping Hanoi
from Moscow. The U.S.-China relationship
is therefore the decisive factor...." It
would thus appear that by its own admis-
sion the VNSC's war of independence is di-
rected towards making Vietnam dependent on
the United States, and not a war for inde-
pendence at all.
If the U.S. helps the resistance move-
ment in Vietnam, the Vietnamese will
stay in the country to fight for their
own independence and liberty; they
will not risk their lives to leave the
country any more. It is the best and
most effective way [to stop the refu-
gee flow]."
A second VNSC witness at the Subcommittee
hearing was Doan Van Toai, author of the
book, The Vietnamese Gulag. Toai is pres-
ently doing research at the Fletcher
School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts Uni-
versity in Medford, Massachusetts. Like
Tang, Toai went to great lengths to pre-
With this philosophy as a preface, Tang sent himself and the VNSC as former sup-
.told the Subcommittee that the U.S. should porters of the National Liberation Front
"view the supporting of resistance move- (NLF) who subsequently "saw the light."
ments in Afghanistan, in Vietnam, in Cam- Toai wrote about Truong Nhu Tang that
bodia and in Laos as the global strategy "there is no one whose revolutionary cre-
of the allies fighting against the common dentials are more secure...." About him-
24 -- CounterSpy -- May-June 1982
The fighting for independence of a
country first belongs to the determi-
nation and decision of that people,
and second depends on foreign assis-
tance.
Truong Nhu Tang
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self, Toai wrote: "During the war years,
as a Saigon student leader I supported the
National Liberation Front (NLF - Viet
Cong) and opposed the American interven-
tion in Vietnam.... I was arrested many
times by the Thieu regime." Toai asserted
further that the "list of former prominent
Communist and Viet Cong leaders who have
fled [Vietnam] is extensive." He also
dismissed descriptions of Vietnamese "_dis-
sidents" as "CIA lackeys," adding that
they "are beyond the charge of CIA com-
plicity."
Toai, who even insinuated that he was a
leftist, failed to mention that he was a
U.S. agent during the Vietnam war, and
that his arrests were staged to establish
his leftist credentials - a standard CIA
ploy.
In a secret file kept by the Thieu re-
gime - obtained by Counterspy magazine -
Toai's occupation is denoted simply as
U.S. agent. Toai first worked in 1966 as
a translator for one Terry Rambo of the
Social Science Research Project which was
funded by the U.S. Department of Defense.
On December 25, 1969 he was arrested for
participating in a cultural performance
entitled "Sing for my People" - which
Thieu's police considered anti-war. Within
a few days, Toai was released. In a 1979
interview in the Vietnamese newspaper Doan
Ket, Huynh Tan Mam claimed that the arrest
had been staged.
Throughout this period (1969-70), the
secret file reports that Toai was meeting
with U.S. political officers (Moore and
Collins) in the U.S. Embassy in Saigon,
and it repeats that "the party in ques-e
tion" (Toai) was an agent working for the
U.S. government. The file also reveals
that Toai met with Nguyen Thien Nhon, spe-
cial advisor to Thieu's vice president,
who extended his "spiritual support" to
Toai.
In sum, Toai was an agent for a foreign
invader and in that capacity was surrep-
titiously working against his fellow com-
patriots and students. Undoubtedly, Toai,
as was once recommended by former CIA of-
ficial, Richard M. Bissell through "indoc-
trination," "money," and "training" de-
veloped "a second loyalty, more or less
comparable to that of the American staff."
In this regard, it is of interest to note
Toai's summary of the damage of the Viet-
nam war. In his submitted written state-
ment, he said it was "a tormenting war
which cost the U.S. 350 thousand casual-
ties, 300 billion dollars and an untold
amount in lost pride; a war which marked
America's first military defeat, a war
whose heroes [emphaeis added] have been
disdained rather [than] honored by their
people, a war that is only now being re-
assessed." He said not a single word
about the damage done to the Vietnamese
people and land by the American invaders
whom Toai called "heroes."
It is this Doan Van Toai who presents,
indeed flaunts, himself as the new champi-
on of Vietnamese independence and who as-
serts that "both left and right-wing must
respect the principle of independence and
liberty... [and] must oppose any kind of
invasion." At the same time, VNSC's offi-
cial Position Paper, which reads like it
was written at CIA headquarters, dismissed
China's invasion of Vietnam as "the armed
lesson of february (sic) 1979."
It is this Doan Van Toai who asked the
House Subcommittee: "Why today does the
United States not want to spend a very
little money in supporting the anti-Commu-
nist people? Why today does the U.S. not
want to help the Vietnamese who are fight-
ing against the Communists, while in the
past many Vietnamese were forced to fight
against the Communists by the Americans?"
While it is not known whether or not the
Reagan administration is militarily sup-
porting VNSC actions, U.S.-supported mer-
cenary forays have occurred recently in
Laos which the VNSC says is "occupied" by
Vietnam. One such raid, reportedly orga-
nized by the CIA, was carried out by Lao-
tian mercenaries who became involved in a
firefight. In November 1981, the newly-
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formed Counterterrorist Task Force of the
Pentagon, with the apparent knowledge of
U.S. Representative Robert K. Dornan (R.-
Ca.) provided former Green Beret (U.S.
Special Forces) Lieutenant Colonel, James
G. Gritz, with $40,000 and special equip-
ment for two teams of Laotian mercenaries
of former CIA agent and Lao Major General,
Vang Pao. This operation also involved
five other Americans including ex-Green
Beret, Vincent W. Arnone, a security con-
sultant from Malden, Massachusetts. The
two teams invaded Laos from Thailand on
November 15, 1981. It is not. known whether
or not they are still in Laos. The sup-
posed mission of the raid was to gather
intelligence on American prisoners of war
allegedly still alive in camps in Laos.
Vietnamese Foreign Minister Nguyen Co
Thach has accused the U.S. of using the
POW issue as a "political weapon" against
Vietnam. It should also be recalled that
CIA-directed paramilitary intelligence
forays - as the CIA likes to call them -
into North Vietnam in the 1950s helped
provoke the first Vietnam war.
Ex-Green Beret Gritz told the Boston
Globe that the Counterterrorist Task Force
had also planned two more incursions into
Laos and into Vietnam on"December 10,
1981. As part of the operation, Gritz was
to return to active duty "as the Washing-
ton, D.C., project officer and front man
for the (intelligence group) working Oper-
ation Eagle (sic)." If Gritz is correct,
this means there was U.S. government sup-
port of the raids. On December 9, 1981,
CIA Deputy Director Bobby Ray Inman was
briefed about the pending raids by Gritz
whom Inman described as "a colorful guy
with a lot of good stories."
According to the Globe, the December
10th raid was cancelled because of appar-
ent bureaucratic infighting between the
Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and the
Counterterrorist Task Force. However,
Gritz continues to organize the private
efforts he began in 1979 to invade Indo-
china to supposedly rescue American POWs.
In this endeavor, he had been provided
with full access to DIA-generated intelli-
gence from U.S. agents, satellites and re-
connaissance planes. As we saw, he also
has the ear of the CIA. Representative
Dornan's comment to the Boston Globe about
Gritz' efforts was that: "I think the
government should leave no stone unturned
in finding out if we still have prisoners
26 -- CounterSpy -- May-June 1982
alive over there, and that includes use of
the private sector if appropriate."
The Counterterrorist Task Force, for its
part, generates its own intelligence and
apparently has a virtually free hand to
undertake paramilitary actions in conjunc-
tion with mercenaries and the so-called
private sector. Its ability to engage in
provocative, war-like actions was demon-
strated by its predecessor group which un-
dertook the military incursion into Iran
to "rescue" the American hostages.
More recently, Business Week reported
that the "Front Unifie Pour la Lutte des
Races Opprimees" (FULRO, Unified Front for
the Struggle for Oppressed Races) had ini-
tiated military actions in the southern
highlands of Vietnam with U.S. arms and
weapons from the Khmer Rouge and the Chi-
nese. Reportedly consisting of Jarai,
Rhade and Bahnar tribespeople, the FULRO
claims to have a clandestine government
with Y Chok Nie Krieng as president and Y
Drun Nie as foreign minister. These mili-
tary actions conform to the stated tactics
of the Vietnam National Salvation Commit-
tee and are the war-like actions the Com-
mittee is urging the U.S. government to
support.
Provides current Information on Christian I
fIVOIVlRIMC In
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