The Third World War: The Untold Story

This assessment was not entirely different from that being made on the other side of the hill. A document laid before the new President of the US at this time (and finding its way, as was not unusual then, almost at once into the hands of newsmen) ran as follows: ‘Faced with a dilemma between revolution and repression in Central America, the United States must try to find a middle course. While helping the military governments in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras the US must also: (a) pressure those governments into implementing reforms aimed at undermining support for the revolutionaries; (b) urge them to reduce the levels of ‘official terrorism’; (c) protect the present El Salvador Government from an extreme right-wing coup; (d) oppose resolutely, and if necessary by military means, the direct despatch of Cuban troops to the guerrilla movement in El Salvador; (e) try to wean the area’s Social Democrats away from supporting the communists. The first approach must be to Social Democratic Mexico.’

The approach to Mexico did not work. A special US adviser in Mexico City has since made public that he filed back the following report: ‘We are caught on the horns of a dreadful dilemma. The Mexican analysis of the Central American and Caribbean situation differs fundamentally from that of the US. The Mexicans think subversion in this region is the result of socio-economic backwardness and political oppression. They believe that the military governments of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras cannot survive much longer. They say that stability in the area will be best served if these dictatorial regimes are quickly replaced with centre-left popular governments, willing to implement agrarian reform, to institute democratic freedoms, and to dismantle secret armies under right-wing control.

‘The Mexicans do not differ from us about what the ideal solution to the crisis would be, but they disagree on the methods to accomplish it. Mexico will not support the Government in El Salvador. The Mexican ruling party has close connections with the Socialist International. It believes that social change is inevitable and that opposition to the military regimes offers the best hope for long-term stability.’

It is possible that the US Ambassador exaggerated Mexico’s real beliefs. When talking to a distinguished but unofficial American, the Mexican President asked, ‘Why on earth did the US allow those communist Sandinistas to take over Nicaragua?’

‘But,’ said the surprised professor, ‘Your Excellency made speeches in favour of the Sandinistas.’

‘Oh,’ said the President, ‘those were politics.’

All this helped set the springs of the elephant trap.

The first stage of the crisis was the intensification of the revolutionary war in El Salvador. What had begun as a series of skirmishes by a small, badly-trained and poorly-equipped army against a few guerrilla bands developed into a serious war, covering large sections of the countryside. The Salvador an Army received help from the US, the guerrillas from Cuba.

The President of El Salvador was a good man as troubled men go, and as troubled men go he went. In the elections in early 1982 only those bitterly opposed to the guerrillas dared to stand or vote, and they voted by a small majority for a coalition government to the right of the Christian Democrats. If there had been an election among Protestants in Northern Ireland at that time, a majority would also have voted that anything attempting to be centrist was ‘too soft’. Some moderates tried to join and restrain the new coalition for a while, but — under attack from their own colleagues as too gentle, and from American newspapermen as ‘accessories of the fascist murder gangs’ — they later withdrew. The resigning centre-right politicians bitterly blamed the ‘so-called moderate opposition’ for the failure of the ‘democratic experiment’, and accused them and leftist American newspapermen of wickedly contributing to the continuance of civil war.

For a number of right-wing officers, the moderates’ departure was welcome news. Hard-line soldiers and demagogues took over power and vowed to prosecute the war against communist subversion until the guerrillas were completely exterminated. There were brutal murders of people even vaguely attracted to the opposition movement. Many moderate-minded people then foolishly joined the communists, and the civil war gained in intensity and destructiveness.

That had desperate consequences for the peasant masses of this tiny but heavily populated country. Unfortunately for the US, there could be no pretence now that democracy was being defended in El Salvador. An outright and firm decision in favour of or against the all-military government was necessary.