The (Ab)Use of Human Rights: Executive-Legislative Struggles over U.S. Nicaragua Policy in the 1980s (original) (raw)
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1993
the chief opponent to the government of Nicaraguan President Anastasio Garcia Somoza, began his usual drive through the streets of Managua, still ravished from an enormous earthquake six years earlier. SUddenly, a green pickup truck obstructed the path of his Saab, and forced Chamorro to the curb of the road.' Three gunmen then jumped out of the truck, carrying a machine gun and a rifle and proceeded to fire eighteen shots into the car at point-blank range, pummelling Chamorro. 2 This incident resulted in a watershed for American Foreign policy towards Nicaragua. Anthony Lake, Director of Policy Planning in the united states Department of State under President Jimmy carter, stated that after Chamorrp's death, "Nicaragua began to emerge from the ranks of small Central American nations with whose dictators the Carter administration had an uncomfortable, ambiguous relationship.~,3 Looking back on the situation, questions remain. Why, under Carter, did the united States initially support Somoza, a man notorious for human rights abuses? Furthermore, what events caused a change in policy, toward Nicaragua, and how real was that change? The events in Nicaragua between 1977-1979, indicate that the Carter Administration based its foreign policy, not on a new approach, human rights, but rather on an old obsessionorder and stability. This obsession can also be seen in u.S. policy toward Nicaragua in the early part of the century. While some Carter Administration officials concerned themselves more with issues of human rights, and democracy, they clashed, with 2 those more concerned with order, stability, protection of u.s. property, and communism. This struggle proved detrimental to the administration's policy toward Nicaragua. In recent years there have been many works pUblished on the Sandinistas and the fall of the Somoza dynasty. Few works center on the change in u.s. policy toward Nicaragua. Two stand out: Condemned to Repetition, by Robert Pastor, and Lake's Somoza Falling. Pastor served as a policy expert toward Nicaragua for the National security council, (NSC) under carter. 4 These books do not delve deeply into the ironies and contradictions of the Carter Administration's foreign policy (due probably to their close association with the administration). Furthermore, they do not look into the early history of Nicaragua, in particular, the rise to power of the Somoza dynasty. It remains crucial to look at the u.s. foreign policy toward Nicaragua not only for understanding the current situation in that country, but also to gain insight on foreign policy in general. But, in order to understand fully the circumstances surrounding the Carter Administration's policy visa -vis Nicaragua, one must consider the ascent of the Somoza dynasty.5 THE EARLY YEARS-1823-1927 CIVIL WAR AND THE ENTRANCE OP THE UNITED STATES The united states' entrance into Nicaragua began in 1848. At this time the British maintained a foothold in the country, around the Mosquito Coast. In 1848 miners discovered gold in California. This in turn created a u.s. desire to secure
Histories
In November 1986, a Lebanese weekly published an article stating that high level officials within the administration of U.S. President Ronald Reagan had sold weapons to an embargoed Iran and diverted the profits to counterrevolutionary forces fighting the government of Nicaragua. Both of these facts violated domestic and international law. What ensued was the Iran-Contra scandal that almost ended Reagan’s presidency and jeopardized the credibility of U.S. foreign policy. Drawing from periodicals from the U.S. and international presses, as well as U.S. Congressional records, this article demonstrates that studies on the origins of Iran-Contra have overlooked one critical cause of the scandal—a lawsuit that Nicaragua presented against the United States at the International Court of Justice in April 1984. While the case “Nicaragua v the United States of America” played an important causal role in the history of the Iran-Contra affair, its importance goes beyond mere causality. As this ...
Preface & Introduction to Sandinista Nicaragua's Resistance to U.S. Coercion
Sandinista Nicaragua's Resistance to U.S. Coercion: Revolutionary Deterrence in Asymmetric Conflict, 2017
How was the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) of Nicaragua able to resist the Reagan Administration’s coercive efforts to rollback its revolution? Héctor Perla challenges conventional understandings of this conflict by tracing the process through which Nicaraguans, both at home and in the diaspora, defeated U.S. aggression in a highly unequal confrontation. He argues that beyond traditional diplomatic, military, and domestic state policies, a crucial element of the FSLN’s defensive strategy was the mobilization of a transnational social movement to build public opposition to Reagan’s policy within the United States, thus preventing further escalation of the conflict. Using a contentious politics approach the author reveals how the extant scholarly assumptions of international relations theory have obscured some of the most consequential dynamics of the case. This is a fascinating study illustrating how supposedly powerless actors were able to constrain the policies of the most powerful nation on earth.
2011
Bischof for his intensive and thought-provoking seminars in which this thesis originated, as well as for his continued support and understanding for a part-time student attempting to juggle a career in education with graduate work, and his inspiring intellect and knowledge of foreign policy. Thanks to Dr. Brown for her flexibility, refreshing worldview and infusion morality into intellectual undertakings. Thank you to Dr. Mokhiber for giving me a greater understanding for what it means to be a graduate student and an academic, and for his continued academic and non-academic support and flexibility.
American Foreign Policy Fiascos in Nicaragua
The US policy toward the Sandinista regime in Nicaragua represented one of the most complex and most controversial chapters in the history of American foreign policy. The tiny Nicaragua, a nation of 2.5 million, retained the complete attention of a superpower 100 times larger. In fact, few foreign policy issues commanded the attention of the foreign policy establishment as much as the Nicaraguan Revolution. For over a decade, US policy makers directed an exceptional amount of human and intellectual energy to design the lines of a complex policy. US efforts to contain the Nicaraguan revolution took the shape of an extended low-intensity conflict based on diplomatic pressure, economic pressure, intelligence operations, and a covert counter-revolutionary war, mixed with a colossal public relations campaign. The US-Nicaraguan relations stimulated severe political debates in Washington, caused one of the most noticeable Executive-Legislative disagreements, and even led to one of the most delicate presidential scandals in the political history of the United States. But why was Washington so worried about the Nicaraguan Revolution? Why did such a tiny country with no vital strategic resources, and with less than one percent of total US foreign investment, warrant so much attention from the American power elite? This article tries to offer some answers to the Nicaraguan issue through a description of the various strategies and instruments of policies used by the Carter, Reagan, and Bush administrations. 1 Keywords: American Foreign Policy / Nicaragua / Iran-Contra Affair The principal rationale behind the US long and painful interference in Nicaragua during the 1980s was that the Nicaraguan revolution was a threat to US strategic interests in the region. The ruling Sandinista Front for National Liberation (FSLN) established strong ideological and military ties with the Communist Bloc and offered support for revolution throughout Central America, which created an unprecedented threat to US security. 2 The alternative argument disputes the notion that the US-Nicaraguan conflict resulted from the communist orientation of the FSLN regime. It sees, in contrast, US 'imperialism' and 'hegemonic perceptions' as the cause of hostilities. 3 The obsession of the US with the Nicaraguan revolution would then stem from 'the threat of the good example': a successful independent socialist revolution might offer an alternative to other Third World countries, and, hence, threaten the US global economic as well as political interests.
Cold War History, 2018
This paper seeks to understand the construction of a broad alliance between the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN), a socialist inspired guerrilla group, and various Latin American liberal and authoritarian governments, mainly Venezuela, Costa Rica, Panama and Cuba, between 1977 and 1979. I will seek to understand the construction of this unusual partnership, as well as the deep conflicts and mistrust that existed between the parties during the revolutionary upheaval in Nicaragua. This process will be examined by analysing the way Cold War politics and Latin American regional tensions shaped the events leading to the Sandinista revolution. This paper tells the story of how some Latin American countries sought to avoid radical change and ended up supporting a revolution instead. It will study the reasons why Venezuela, Panama, and Costa Rica ended up supporting the Sandinista National Liberation Front against the wishes of the United States. In doing so, they built a new political paradigm that envisioned the end of the bipolar conflict. The article will further show the impact of the Carter Administration's policy of nonintervention, and later on multilateralism, and its profound impact on the Nicaraguan regional crisis. Of particular importance will be the study of the process of radicalisation of Venezuela, Panama, and Costa Rica in the context of an increased attempt by the American government to exercise non-intervention in Latin America, and the gradual, and in a certain way reluctant, involvement of Cuba in the crisis. The purpose of this work is to study how these dynamics fostered the decomposition of the bipolar paradigm in inter-American relations and the creation of a new political configuration in the region. The history of the American government's involvement in the Nicaraguan Revolution has been extensively studied by historians. 1 However, the United States was only one of the actors in the revolutionary drama. While the non-interventionist desire of the United States