Nicaragua

H

International Organizations

Nicaragua is a founding member of both the United Nations (UN) and the Organization of American States, the most important regional diplomatic group. It is also a member of many specialized UN agencies.

VI

History

At the end of the 15th century, western Nicaragua was inhabited by several indigenous peoples related by culture and language to those of central Mexico. They were primarily farmers who lived in towns, organized into small kingdoms. In eastern Nicaragua, a much smaller group of Native Americans that had migrated from Colombia and Panama lived a less sedentary life based on hunting and gathering.

A

Colonial Period

Italian Spanish explorer Christopher Columbus sighted Nicaragua in 1502, but the first Spanish expedition, headed by Gil González Dávila, did not arrive until 20 years later. The conquest he began was completed from 1523 to 1524 by Francisco Fernández de Córdoba, who founded the cities of Granada and León. The conquest proved disastrous for the native population. Many died from diseases carried to the region by Europeans, such as measles, to which they had no immunity. Many of the survivors were enslaved; an estimated 200,000 were shipped off to labor in the mines of Peru and other parts of Spain's empire. Of an estimated 1 million indigenous people before the conquest, a 1548 census found only 11,137 Native Americans left in western Nicaragua.

For most of the colonial period Nicaragua was part of the Captaincy General, or Kingdom, of Guatemala. The kingdom was largely autonomous but was technically part of the Viceroyalty of New Spain, the huge Spanish territory based in Mexico. Far from the regional center in Guatemala, Nicaragua became a colonial backwater that exported small amounts of indigo and cacao. Its potential as a transit route between the Pacific and Atlantic brought some trade, but it also attracted the attention of English buccaneers such as Sir Richard Hawkins, who plundered Nicaragua and other Spanish colonies in the 1590s.

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The British began to extend their influence over the inhabitants of Nicaragua's Caribbean coast as early as 1633. In 1655 a British expedition sacked Granada, and 30 years later another expedition looted Granada and León. The failure of a military expedition in 1780 ended British efforts to expand into western Nicaragua, but they retained control over the Miskito native peoples along the Caribbean coast, even creating a puppet Mosquitia Kingdom in 1687. British influence did not end until 1893.

In the mid-18th century Spain introduced commercial reforms into its American colonies. In an effort to expand trade, it allowed colonies to trade more freely with Spanish ports and with one another, and this expanding trade promoted production of export crops. These policies, combined with a growing desire among colonists to control their own affairs, divided upper-class Nicaraguans into two factions: Liberals favoring reforms, who included merchants centered around León, and Conservatives opposed to reforms, who were concentrated near Granada and included large landowners. This rivalry was a dominant element of Nicaraguan politics well into the 20th century.

B

Independence and the 19th Century

Independence came slowly to Nicaragua, as movements to break away from Spanish rule arose in many colonies in the early 1800s. An 1811 uprising was crushed by colonial officials, and only when Spanish authority collapsed in Mexico in 1821 did Nicaragua, along with most of Central America, break with Spain. After the region declared independence, it was briefly part of the Mexican Empire of Agustín de Iturbide, but when he fell in 1823, Nicaragua and four other states formed a federation, the United Provinces of Central America.

This effort to unite the region was doomed by conflicts between Liberals and Conservatives and by rivalries among the member states. Liberals and Conservatives advocated different political, economic, and religious policies. Liberals promoted free-market capitalism, a strong central government, and limited power for the Catholic clergy, while Conservatives favored the traditional economic and social structure, dominated by large landowners and the church. Facing these divisions, the federation began to break apart in 1838, when Nicaragua and other members seceded and became independent states.

In the 1840s and 1850s Nicaragua was dominated by rivalries between León’s Liberals and Granada’s Conservatives and by a struggle between the United States and Britain for control over the transit route across Nicaragua. The discovery of gold in California motivated U.S. investors, led by wealthy industrialist Cornelius Vanderbilt, to create the Accessory Transit Company to transport U.S. citizens across Nicaragua. The company's network of carriages and boats took passengers from the Caribbean to the Pacific by way of the San Juan River and Lake Nicaragua. By 1852 a third of those traveling to California by sea used this route. To protect U.S. interests, the administration of President James Polk negotiated the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty with the United Kingdom. In the treaty, both nations agreed not to seek exclusive control over transit routes across Central America. The treaty proved unpopular in the United States and later administrations tried to have it revised.

Meanwhile, Conservative-Liberal rivalry in Nicaragua had broken out in open civil war. The Conservatives were winning, so the Liberals asked an American adventurer, William Walker, to recruit a private army to aid them. Known as filibusters, Walker’s troops began arriving in 1855 and soon took control of the country, shoving aside leaders of both parties and installing Walker as president (see Filibustering Expeditions). This move alarmed other Central American countries. They formed an army to drive Walker out, with support from the British and from Vanderbilt, whose business Walker had seized. Walker surrendered in 1857.

Walker’s fall brought the Conservatives back to power. Under their rule, which lasted until 1893, the capital was moved to Managua in an effort to dampen the rivalry between Granada and León. Coffee became the dominant export crop, and railroad construction was begun. United States interest in a possible canal across Nicaragua grew slowly, but an 1884 treaty that would have given the United States exclusive canal rights was never ratified by the U.S. Senate.

In 1893 a Liberal general, José Santos Zelaya, seized power. He continued as president until 1909, putting down Conservative revolts and making Nicaragua a major player in Central America's power struggles. He tried to improve public administration and develop the economy, promoting the beginning of banana exports. Railroads and ports were improved, schools were expanded, and the military was modernized. An agreement with the British led to their final withdrawal from the Caribbean coast. But hopes that the United States would build a canal were dashed when the administration of President Theodore Roosevelt selected a route through Panama instead (see Panama Canal). Relations between the countries deteriorated, and U.S. officials became convinced that Zelaya was an unstable element in the region who should be replaced.

C

The Intervention Era, 1909-1933

In 1909 the United States encouraged a revolt against Zelaya, then used naval forces to prevent him from crushing the uprising. Zelaya resigned, but U.S. pressures continued until his successor turned over power to a coalition government. This coalition proved unstable, and in 1912 U.S. Marines landed and imposed order, defeating a Liberal force and ensuring that Conservative Adolfo Díaz remained president. A small Marine unit stayed in Nicaragua until 1925, making it clear that revolutions would not be tolerated. This enabled the Conservatives, a minority party, to rig elections without fear of being overthrown.

Allied with the Conservatives, the United States and its interests soon dominated Nicaragua. Conservative leader General Emiliano Chamorro signed the Bryan-Chamorro Treaty, which gave the United States exclusive rights to build a canal across Nicaragua in exchange for $3 million. Chamorro became president in 1916. The United States never planned to build a canal but wanted the treaty to ensure that no other nation would be able to do so. For Nicaraguan nationalists, this treaty became a symbol of U.S. exploitation of Nicaragua. United States officials and businesses also came to dominate much of Nicaragua's economy and banking system.

In the early 1920s the United States sought to promote political stability in the country so that the Marines would not be needed to prevent revolts. The United States tried to create a professional Nicaraguan military that could maintain order and tried to reform corrupt election practices. After elections brought a weak Liberal-Conservative coalition to power in 1925, the Marines left. Civil war immediately erupted as Chamorro, the defeated Conservative candidate, ousted the Liberals from government and took over the presidency himself.

Chamorro's takeover created a conflict for the United States government. It did not want the Liberals to win the war, especially when they seemed to be getting support from a revolutionary government in Mexico. At the same time, it wanted stable government in Nicaragua, and it also wanted to deter coups, such as Chamorro's. Therefore U.S. officials worked to force Chamorro from power, and former Conservative president Díaz again took office. The Liberals continued to win the civil conflict, however, and in 1926 and 1927 the United States again landed thousands of Marines in Nicaragua to support the Conservative government. Former U.S. secretary of war Henry Stimson then negotiated a peace agreement, under which Liberals were given some government posts; the United States agreed to supervise the 1928 elections; and troops of both sides were disarmed. They were to be replaced by a new, U.S.-created and U.S.-trained force that combined police and military, known as the National Guard.

One Liberal general, Augusto César Sandino, refused to accept this agreement. He formed a rebel army and carried on a guerrilla campaign against the U.S. presence until 1933. This made him a symbol of nationalism to many Nicaraguans and others who opposed U.S. intervention.

In 1928 U.S.-supervised elections brought Liberal general José María Moncada to power. The marines remained in Nicaragua until early 1933 because of U.S. concerns about Sandino and the time needed to train the National Guard. Plans to improve the economy fell victim to the worldwide depression of the 1930s and to a massive earthquake that destroyed Managua in 1931. The United States supervised the 1932 presidential elections, which were won by Liberal leader Juan Bautista Sacasa. The Marines then withdrew, giving command of the National Guard to a Liberal politician, Anastasio Somoza García, who was married to Sacasa's niece.

Sandino quickly negotiated a truce with the Sacasa government, ending his rebellion. Tensions between the National Guard and Sandino mounted steadily, however, and in 1934 Sandino was murdered by Guard officers. He became a hero to many Nicaraguans, and his name was adopted more than 40 years later by revolutionaries trying to overthrow the government and change Nicaraguan society, the Sandinistas.

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