Peace Is Possible if U.S. Draws Soviets Out of Nicaragua

As the summit meeting between President Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev was taking place, Nicaraguan Maj. Roger Miranda Bengoechea, a former aide to Comandante Humberto Ortega, made damaging statements about the Sandinista leadership. In an effort to preserve the atmosphere of good will between the Soviet and American leaders, the White House allowed a small group of journalists to interview Miranda on the condition that the story be printed only after Gorbachev’s departure.

The denunciations are morally embarrassing and politically costly. They underscore the fact that corruption is not alien among the Sandinista leadership as well as the secret plan of raising military forces to the staggering level of 600,000 troops. Their Marxist mentors abroad, as well as their subordinate cadres at home, will surely notice that the hedonism and turpitude of members of the national directorate of the Sandinista Front of National Liberation have corrupted the revolutionary ethos. The scandal has buoyed the heretofore embattled Nicaragua policy of the Reagan Administration. For a change, the Sandinista camp is under fire.

But two observations are in order, one more obvious than the other. First, the two most powerful adversaries on the face of the Earth engaged in diplomacy even as they continued to compete for souls and strategic points around the globe. Second, the major’s “revelations” were actually a detailed corroboration of something that we have known for a long time: The Sandinista upper crust is corrupt and bent on expanding militarily with Soviet assistance.

Having said this, let us now look at three of the various responses that the major’s defection and press interviews have elicited in the United States and Nicaragua.

The American press, which normally receives detrimental information about the Sandinistas with cynicism, has indulged in hyperbole. Calling the young officer, as Time put it, “the most important Sandinista defector ever” is simply inaccurate. In 1981 Comandante Eden Pastora was the first to abandon the ranks of the Sandinista elite and to denounce its excesses and contradictions. Once a living legend, Pastora now lives in oblivion. Nevertheless, he remains the highest-ranking defector, and six years ago had the potential to be the most dangerous.

Then there is the letter to the editor of Miami’s El Nuevo Herald in which Sen. Bob Dole (R-Kan.), drawing from Miranda’s “revelations,” portrayed the peace initiative of Costa Rican President Oscar Arias Sanchez as a naive proposal. To be sure, if the Sandinistas do triple the size of their army, they will impose on the isthmus the kind of peace that reigns in cemeteries. Should this come to pass, the Arias plan would be merely one more of the dead. But since such military expansion cannot take place without Soviet assistance, it would be much more effective and logical if Dole were to take up this issue directly with the Soviet Union.

Those who aspire to be the next American President must face this unavoidable fact. After all, if the Sandinistas cannot be trusted to deal fairly with Arias and the other Central Americans, they cannot be trusted when and if they do negotiate with Contra leaders. In the meantime, if the Sandinistas continue their military buildup, it is inhuman to pit the Contra army against such a giant for naught.

For his part, Daniel Ortega posed a hypothetical case in order to justify the military expansion even within the context of the Arias plan: If the Nicaraguan people should “go insane” and elect an opposition party, the Sandinista rulers would surrender the government, not power. Ortega’s statement goes to the heart of the problem with the Sandinistas: They absolutely refuse to envision the more plausible case in which they, the rulers, go insane but the people do not have the power to oust them. For Nicaraguans this is not an impossibility or a far-fetched scenario. Cruelty applied on a massive scale is something that we remember. The last Somoza used the National Guard to kill and maim thousands before he finally relinquished the power that he thought was rightfully his. Today, so much misery caused by Sandinista zealotry must be the product of madness. This is one reason why our national folklore now includes the saying, Somoza y los Sandinistas son la misma cosa (“Somoza and the Sandinistas are birds of a feather”).

The Miranda account has underscored the need for democracy in Nicaragua. As a first step toward that end, we must stop the tragedy of campesinos killing campesinos. The Arias plan is still the most logical and humane way to achieve this specific goal. But it could become a casualty of partisan agitation.

To scuttle the Arias plan without a more effective substitute to achieve peace would reflect a total disregard for the Nicaraguan people. The division of labor suggested herein would enhance the effectiveness of the peace process. The Nicaraguan opposition must deal with the Sandinistas, since only the reconciliation of the indigenous opposing bands can give us social peace. Central Americans should demand the end of regional subversion directly to Fidel Castro. And it is in the interest of the United States to face up to the Soviet Union in order to safeguard stability in this hemisphere. The rational solution is for the United States to force, through direct negotiations, the end of Soviet involvement in Nicaragua, rather than raising the cost for Moscow with Nicaraguan lives by sponsoring a war of attrition.

The Sandinistas’ stance of “power is not at stake” was articulated by the same enfant terrible , Humberto Ortega, as early as 1980. And the Sandinista threat of “igniting” the whole of Central America if invaded by the United States is also very old. Everyone knew that the Sandinistas would try to use the peace process to put the rebels out of action, just as it is no secret that the resistance wants to oust the Sandinistas from power. Isn’t this the reason for the civil war? It is a mistake to think that the Arias plan is a trap to catch the enemy. It is, instead, one last opportunity to reach a peaceful solution.