The Sandinistas

The number one reason the U.S. involved themselves with El Salvador was because the Communist political party started becoming a magnificent threat to the nation. Communism is the belief directed from Karl Marx, where everyone is essentially treated equal. In El Salvador during the 1980s, the Communist group, the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (a.k.a. FMLN), and three other political parties were pushing for more power. Since these groups were

Americas Watch. 1991. El Salvador’s Decade of Terror: Human Rights since the Assassination of Archbishop Romero. New Haven and London: Yale University Press.

Today’s violence in El Salvador consists of ruthless gang members. According to CRS (Congressional Research Service) about 30,000 kids have joined the maras and it will continue to increase. Due to the gang violence, children are fleeing the country to prevent from becoming victims or recruited, furthermore families are streaming into the U.S to seek asylum. Alike today, El Salvador experienced the same immigration crisis back in 1980 when the civil war was the cause for Salvadorans to immigrate to the United Sates. Repression and violation of human rights was the root cause, now gang violence is the root cause striking a similar pattern of the effects of violence. In 1980, El Salvador’s right-wing government had death squads to kill citizens for suspicion of supporting a social reform. Military soldiers attacked many villages, including El Mozote in which men, women, and children were tortured and subjected to sexual violence.

Also, the growing presence of the Soviets and Cuba in Nicaragua escalated the cold war and in order to ‘draw the line” the Reagan administration “doubled economic aid for El Salvador to a hundred and forty four million dollars” (pg 40). According to Danner, “the priorities of American Policy in El Salvador had become unmistakable” (pg 41).Second, The American government was “opposed to dispatching American combat forces to Central America” (pg 22) and in order to prevent another Nicaragua, Congress agreed to “reform” the Salvadoran Army by financing, training and arming its troops to fight the FMLN. As Danner notes, “the Americans had stepped forward to fund the war, but were unwilling to fight it”. Third, the Monterrosa led Atlacatl led batallion through American funding descended in El Mozote with “the latest M-16’s, M-60 machines guns, 90 millimeter recoilless rifles, and 60- and 81 millimeter mortars”(pg 39) and with a list of names massacred an entire village because “communism was cancer”(pg 49). The U.S. government was clearly responsible for the Massacre at El Mozote because without the funding, supporting, and training of El Salvador troops the war would have been tilted in the guerillas favor as they had managed to hold the disorganized army in certain areas. In contrast to neighboring departments El Mozote and its inhabitants of born-again Christians did not fit in as guerilla sympathizers. In fact, the training at American hands

In the book The Last Colonial Massacre: Latin America in the Cold War, author Greg Grandin traces Guatemala’s evolutionary period from the late 19th century to the early 1980s. What he dubs as ‘the last colonial massacre,’ the Panzós Massacre of 1978 was the mass murder by the Guatamalan army of 35 Q’echi-Mayan men, women and children who had gathered in the town square demanding democractic representation, land reform and higher wages. Outrage over this massacre led many Guatemalan peasants to join the communist Guerilla Army of the Poor (EGP) which prompted violence and repression by the US backed right-wing government. Grandin’s thesis is that Cold War terror unleashed or excused by the United States, weakened the advancement of democracy

Reading the book Harvest of Empire by Juan Gonzalez, has been very informative to me and has changed my perspective on U.S. foreign policy. Each account of the families from the different Latino countries has similar underlying trends that can be found because of the U.S. involvement in their countries. Every single instance of U.S. involvement in Latin American countries seems to evolve around the idea of greed and profit. The U.S. is like a business that only cares about the income of money and not about the morality of their actions. On top of all the injustice the U.S. government has employed, they don’t bother to own up to their mistakes and they tend to sweep their involvement under the rug. For example, the Iran-Contra scandal mentioned in the book of the Reagan administration was the result of using drug money from Iran to buy weapons for the Nicaraguan contra rebels against the Sandinista government of Nicaragua. It infuriates me that the U.S. would support a dictator that suppresses the rights of its citizens and all the while they want to take down the established, popular Sandinista government. The U.S. wants to do all this so that the new government will support U.S. interests in Nicaragua. When the scandal was uncovered, all Reagan could say was “I’m sorry” and “It won’t happen again” even though our involvement had the result of many lives lost in that war/rebellion. Unfortunately, this theme did not only occur in Nicaragua

As Charles Bergquist observes, "Crises in Colombia tend to generate cycles of violence instead of mutations in the political regime." The reason is simple: regime changes in Colombia tend to produce very little change in anything other than nominal rule. Since Colombia's independence from Spain in the early 19th century, Colombia has seen a series of civil wars and secessions (Venezuela, Ecuador, and Panama the last coming rather conveniently at a time when the U.S. was prepared to pay millions for a canal through its nation preparation that later resulted in a multi-million dollar redress to Columbia). Colombia's political history, therefore, has been colored by outside influences pulling on the two dominant liberal and conservative parties, with violent exchanges, and long periods of instability being the consequences. While regime changes have occurred, they have not produced significant improvements. Rather, Colombia in the 20th century has become a nesting ground for paramilitary forces and drug traffickers, with U.S. Central Intelligence operatives contributing heavily to the violent conflict that has risen between regimes. This paper will examine the regime types that preceded the Rojas Pinilla regime in mid-20th century Colombia, analyze their similarities and differences, and discuss the extent to which Rojas Pinilla reached his goals and objectives.

Located on the Pacific Coastline, El Salvador is the smallest country in Central America, and the most populated. The United States of America foreign policy on El Salvador is best explained by President Obama’s approach on Latin America where the United States is focused on economic growth and equality, energy and climate control, and regional and citizen security (Foreign Policy, 2012). This is best explained using the international level of analysis and neo-liberalism where the global structure and economic interdependence provides the foundation of America’s foreign policy. To ensure that one can see the transparency in United States methodology I will provide the history of El Salvador, the creation of United States interest in El

Throughout 1939-1971, El Salvador was run by a military-style dictatorship, causing those who had land and wealth to be stripped from them just because they could. According to Encyclopedia Britannica the persistence of this dictatorship can be partly credited to Augustin Farabundo Marti, who forced the Salvadorian Communist Party (2017). Proving to be a catalyst for conflicts for years to come.

The Central American counties of the Northern Triangle: Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador are considered the most dangerous countries in the world that are not at war. The region is very unstable due to weak governments and gangs. The gangs in these countries rule the streets taking innocent lives, sex trafficking and rapimg women and children, while the government does little to stop them. The violence started at different times in these countries. In Honduras during the 1980s the right- winged rebel group, the Contras housed themselves in the country. El Salvador’s violence dates back to 1979 with the Civil war. This war was between the government’s military and the leftiest

In “The Centerfielder” by Sergio Ramirez we get a representation of the government in Nicaragua at the time, during a time of the Somoza dictatorship. The representation of the government given from the short story is not one the government itself would be particularly proud of. Sergio Ramirez makes his government look cruel and inhumane to its citizens; throughout the whole short story there are glimpses of how it is the government treats their people, and the way they execute business when it comes to dealing with their prisoners. The short story takes place at prison, where a man is being interrogated for suspicion of his son being in collaboration with the Sandinista forces.

The ELN operate in Columbia additionally, they have ties to Cuba, as well as other Latin American countries. The objective of the ELN is to topple the current Colombian government and establish a communist model (Stanford, 2012). The ELN’s motivation stems primarily from the revolution in Cuba, as well as a large Catholic influence.

Because of the devastating 6.2 earthquake in Nicaragua and the 5.0 and 5.2 aftershocks on December 23rd, 1972, the U.S. government has began to send funds and aid because we felt the urge to help all of the homeless, hurt, and poor people of the new and disimproved Nicaragua. Some might argue that sending the Nicaraguans our money and aid is a bad choice because they are communist or because we are doing it for other reasons such as to get things out of helping but this isn’t the first time we have sent finances and medical aid to Nicaragua, the U.S. and Nicaragua have been involved with each other over the past many years now. We have also tried to help them with the rebel contras groups.

“Violence has been a prominent social response to the application of structural adjustment policies throughout Latin America. There are societies in which, things fall apart; the center cannot hold. Violence is a shared disease that seems to arise in all societies where there are profound social differences and exploitation…Many Latin American societies are condemned to bloodletting by the precedents of violence and gross injustice that characterize their culture and their history.”

Latin American states prior to the 1950s never before experienced the fundamental changes characteristic of social revolutions. Specifically, this mode of revolution requires popular uprisings of the masses in order to transform an existing socioeconomic and political order. That being said, the responsibility of a state is to further develop its nation. Together with providing a modernized economic development and an effective political framework meant to organize and stabilize its communities. Furthermore, its social responsibility is to cultivate a national identity based on shared values, behaviors, and beliefs. For one thing, economic development demands the remodeling of the country’s wealth, education, urbanization, and industrialization