II.

Background

From 1936 to 1979 Nicaragua was ruled by the Somoza family, Latin America’s longest-lasting dictatorship. Founded by Anastasio Somoza García, family rule had been continued by his sons Luis Somoza Debayle and Anastasio Somoza Debayle. The Somozas were able to stay in power because they controlled the National Guard, the nation’s combined military and police force, which had been created by the United States. The family also cultivated U.S. support for their regime, naming the capital’s main street for President Franklin D. Roosevelt and letting the Central Intelligence Agency use Nicaragua as a base for launching the unsuccessful 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba.

The Somozas used their power to make themselves the richest family in Central America, controlling much of Nicaragua’s wealth for their own benefit and profiting by corruption. Their rule provided stability that contributed to impressive economic growth in the 1950s and 1960s, but the majority of Nicaragua’s people did not share in this progress and lived in conditions of extreme poverty. Those who opposed the Somozas were often imprisoned, exiled, tortured, or killed. Political repression and corruption worsened after Anastasio Somoza Debayle became president in 1967.

The extent and cost of the Somozas’ corrupt rule became clear when an earthquake devastated Managua, Nicaragua’s capital, in 1972. As many as 10,000 people died in the earthquake, hundreds of thousands more were left homeless, and much of the city was destroyed. The Somozas and the National Guard stole relief funds and made huge profits by speculating in land used to house desperate refugees. Their actions, combined with worsening economic conditions, convinced most Nicaraguans that a change of government was needed.

The major group trying to overthrow the Somoza government was the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN). It was founded in 1961 by a small group of university students, headed by Carlos Fonseca, Silvio Mayorga, and Tomás Borge. They received encouragement and support from Cuban revolutionary leader Fidel Castro, in part because of the Somozas’ role in the Bay of Pigs invasion. While influenced by Marxist and Leninist ideology (see Communism), the FSLN had no direct ties to Nicaragua’s Communist Party. They took their name from Augusto Sandino, a Nicaraguan general who led a guerrilla campaign against U.S. intervention in the country from 1927 to 1933 and was murdered by Somoza’s National Guard in 1934. The Sandinistas opposed the Somozas and U.S. influence over Nicaragua, and called for radical social and political change to redistribute wealth and power. They gained support among some rural Nicaraguans and students, but their early efforts at guerrilla warfare were defeated by the National Guard, costing both Fonseca and Mayorga their lives.

Other Nicaraguans who tried to oust the Somozas also failed. By the 1970s prominent business leaders and Catholic Church officials joined the criticism of the Somoza regime. Most of the political opposition formed a united front headed by Pedro Joaquin Chamorro, editor of La Prensa, the nation’s largest newspaper. Increasingly, they concentrated their efforts on influencing U.S. policy to force Somoza from power. They found support from Democrats in the U.S. Congress and, beginning in 1977, from the administration of President Jimmy Carter, whose foreign policy emphasized respect for human rights.