The case for negotiations
Berryman, Phillip
ONE VIEW OF THE OPTIONS IN EL SALVADOR The case for negotiations PHILLIP BERRYMAN Two DAYS after Ronald Reagan's election there surfaced in Washington a "dissent memo" purportedly the work of...
...can bring the military to the negotiating table, if necessary by threatening to pull the plug...
...Most of the deaths-human rights and church groups say at least 80 percent-are those of civilians killed by official forces or right wing groups operating with impunity...
...could participate in...
...The most difficult problem is a procedure for stopping the violence...
...Frankly it caught all of us off guard...
...I don't have to remind you that you inherited this situation late in the day-more than eleventh hour, I'd say a quarter to twelve...
...According to press accounts, U.S...
...In October, Colonel Adolfo Majano, an original junta leader broke a long silence to advocate a negotiated solution...
...After all, on March 30, 1981 the army published a list of 138 "traitors," including virtually every well-known opposition leader...
...With our troops and firepower we could stop the left...
...Our normal aid programs were a few million a year...
...In Leiken's assessment one-third of the people in El Salvador support the opposition, at most one-fifth support the government, and the "neutrality" of those remaining includes "an overriding hatred of the military" and a feeling of "what could be worse than what we have...
...The U.S...
...We've got to distinguish clearly between places like this and, say, Saudi Arabia...
...It will be hard-next to impossible-to get that from the IMF and the big banks and you can imagine the response in Congress if we have to foot the bill...
...While the U.S...
...They're sympathetic but they don't want to get bogged down in something unwinnable, especially if it looks like they're doing our 'dirty work.' 4. Negotiate...
...The Guard, which is made up of veterans, is better than the army, but there are only 6,000 Guardsmen...
...On July 16, 1981, PHILLIP BERRYMAN is currently preparing a book on the role of the church in Central American revolutions...
...However, they're going to need lots of foreign aid, and the main source will have to be Western Europe...
...Intriguingly, it is Leiken's concern about Soviet expansionism which makes him argue for a negotiated settlement...
...A new government would certainly carry out a genuine land reform, including the expropriation of the coffee lands, the backbone of the agro-export sector...
...Ultimately only the United States (directly and through international banks) will be able to foot the bill...
...In the U.S...
...Thus far, the administration seems to be heeding neither the Leikens, nor foreign governments, nor Congress...
...Partly in response to the clamor for negotiations and to the public response to what looked like a headlong plunge into Indochina II, the Reagan administration, echoed by the Duarte government, now stresses a "political" solution, which in effect means a March 1982 election of a constituent assembly, which would draft a new constitution and prepare for direct elections to be held later, probably in 1983...
...Duarte is a figleaf for the military...
...But remember, according to our analysis, there's a very high probability of it going that way anyhow...
...While the FDR/FMLN has expressed its willingness to negotiate, and junta president Jose Napoleon Duarte at one point hinted his openness, the army, which effectively rules the country, has firmly refused...
...Right now it's a war of attrition...
...Domestically, direct involvement would generate a very large protest movement, especially the religious lobby...
...The choice is between negotiations, where we might have some influence, and seeing a very hostile regime come in-admittedly with a basket-case of a country...
...A deepening U.S...
...Our aid last year was more than total U.S...
...Such an election will merely serve to give superficial legitimacy to the Duarte/military regime (assuming Duarte and the Christian Democrats last until March), while it pursues its primary objective, a military defeat of the opposition, which also remains the real goal of the Reagan administration...
...You'd have to take a lot of heat from some of your supporters if you accepted a negotiated solution...
...We stand to lose more, the longer this drags out...
...More to the point, these people are not really dependent on outside arms deliveries...
...Here they're mainly peasants and are very highly organized, far more than the Sandinistas...
...support is almost the only legitimizing factor for the government...
...Some call the military situation an impasse but in this kind of war if you're not winning, you're losing...
...The August 28th Mexican-French recognition of the FMLN/FDR (Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front/Revolutionary Democratic Front) as a "representative political force" was clearly aimed at having them included in any solution to the country's problems...
...Its labeling is serving the administration in what is rapidly becoming an eerie re-enactment of what happened with Cuba over twenty years ago...
...This is not Argentina or Uruguay where you had urban middle-class guerrillas...
...It would be ready-made for those who are opposed to the administration on other grounds...
...As reasonable as this might seem abstractly, it is questionable how many officers and troops would feel free to remain to form part of a new armed forces...
...President, I would urge you to get independent assessments of the picture I've painted here...
...In that case it was possible to find some middle ground by separating the political from the economic, achieving black majority rule, while leaving largely intact the economic power of those whites who wanted to remain...
...At the very least they can keep the economy in check, and disrupt things...
...A wrong decision could affect everything you're trying to do...
...Turning to our side, I've got to be frank: they've done very poorly in direct combat situations, and are best at controlling the civilian population...
...Obviously the Cubans have given them training and advice and must have helped them make international contacts, but we don't have real hard evidence of large involvement in arms...
...80 percent of the violence comes from official forces and the death squads which operate with impunity...
...So where does this leave us...
...So the economy's a mess: no investment, negative growth, and no prospects...
...Possibly we could have a Mugabe-type situation-not that I see us as giving them aid...
...Which brings up a point we haven't faced squarely so far...
...Worse than Somoza left the Sandinistas...
...They give him fifteen minutes to make his pitch...
...We ignored the radicaliza-tion which took place after the 1972 and 1977 election frauds...
...President, I'm going to lay it on the line...
...There has been some recent momentum toward negotiations, generated partly by the Mexican-French recognition of the FMLN/FDR as a "representative political force" and its echoes in several other governments and other bodies such as the European Parliament, as well as an FMLN/FDR proposal for a political solution put forth by the Nicaraguan government in the UN General Assembly on October 7. While some twelve Latin American governments protested the Mexican-French statement as outside "intervention," at least five of them made it clear that they favored a mediated solution...
...3. Encourage friendly countries like Chile or Argentina to get directly involved...
...Morale is impossible to quantify but you've got to realize that a lot of these people got involved through church work, so there's a religious factor...
...If I'm corroborated, I think you have to ask yourself whether the wrong kind of involvement in Central America might not end the consensus you want on the number-one priority, the economy, and actually hurt our ability to respond elsewhere where our vital interests are really at stake-and so play into the hands of the enemies of America...
...True there are only a few thousand full-time guerrillas vs...
...Time, unfortunately, is on their side...
...BY NOW, objections to U.S...
...consumption...
...for fiscal '81 it was about $140 million and soon they're going to need hundreds of millions a year...
...El Salvador is not Rhodesia-Zimbabwe...
...as the conservative Thatcher government oversaw a negotiated end to that war, the Reagan administration could surprise the world with a similar pragmatic approach...
...On September 24, 1981 he told the House Subcommittee on Inter-American Affairs that his investigatory trip to El Salvador led him to conclude that a negotiated solution is in the best interests of the United States...
...Until the administration becomes interested in the facts- even those which contradict their certitudes-there is little hope for change in policy...
...involvement in Central America could both tie it down militarily, and drive a wedge between it and its Western allies...
...As he sees it, the Soviet Union's main strategic objective is to weaken the Western Alliance...
...Support our side at the present level...
...Since hard evidence-as opposed to insistent assertions-of large-scale arms shipments to Salvadoran rebels from Cuba and/or Nicaragua is not forthcoming, the new basic argument may become: we must stop other countries from becoming like Nicaragua, i.e., "totalitarian...
...military aid and advisors could conceivably be replaced from other sources (e.g., Argentina) U.S...
...From the viewpoint of the official forces, the oligarchy, and the U.S., the permanence of the armed forces is essential...
...It is the same army which has ruled El Salvador directly for fifty years (with two brief civilian interludes totaling nine months), and which carried out the electoral frauds of 1972 and 1977 against moderate opposition coalitions...
...land reform has benefited only a small percentage of the peasantry...
...His plea for "elections open to all who are willing to renounce violence and abide by the procedures of democracy'' is evidently aimed at U.S...
...What, then, impedes a negotiated solution...
...As for the Soviets, our estimate is that they are mainly expecting to recover when we fumble...
...With a death toll already of 25,000 people-one out of every 200 Salvadorans-it seems obvious that a solution which could spare the country further bloodshed and the concomitant ruin of property and productive capacity, is in the interests of everybody...
...The Duarte government and the military continue to insist that the opposition must lay down its arms to participate in the March election of a constituent assembly, a proposal which the FMLN/FDR understandably rejects...
...Most of the losses are on their side but it's not the guerrillas but their supporters and suspects...
...2. Get involved ourselves...
...WHILE FRIENDLY COUNTRIES could facilitate negotiations, and the United States cooperation would be a sine qua non, the chief parties to the negotiations would have to be the Salvadoran armed forces and the FMLN/FDR...
...Admittedly the above paragraphs do little more than outline areas for discussion...
...We think it's fair to estimate they have 200,000 active supporters, people working and ready to die...
...One procedure might be to define very clearly such atrocities, lay down procedures for bringing those guilty to trial, and allowing a period for people to leave the country...
...I know you're concerned about Cuban and Soviet involvement...
...In conclusion, Mr...
...El Salvador itself is peanuts...
...Somoza's Guard plain fell apart during the transition-they ran away in their underwear...
...The most obvious effect of the so-called 'reforms' has been to give the military a bigger piece of the action: they've gotten more lands themselves, they get protection money from peasant co-ops, and they're speculating in real estate and black market dollars as the wealthy try to get out...
...should keep a low profile in negotiations and let Mexico and other countries, Latin American and European, work it out...
...ONE VIEW OF THE OPTIONS IN EL SALVADOR The case for negotiations PHILLIP BERRYMAN Two DAYS after Ronald Reagan's election there surfaced in Washington a "dissent memo" purportedly the work of disgruntled members of an interagency task force on El Salvador...
...We should recognize that El Salvador's leaders will not-and should not-grant the insurgents through negotiations the share of power the rebels have not been able to win on the battlefield...
...IT was ONLY after writing the foregoing exercise of imagination that I came across the remarkable congressional testimony of Robert Leiken, the director of the Soviet Latin America project at the Georgetown Center for Strategic and International Studies...
...Some guidelines for economic reforms would have to be agreed upon...
...True, the bishops are on our side-except for Rivera y Damas who tries to stay in the middle-but at the local level there's a lot of church involvement...
...Some calculate the right have taken $5 billion out of the country since 1978...
...It is not at all easy to imagine what kind of negotiations are possible...
...In fact, they're getting cash out themselves, hedging their bets...
...A lot more people might be killed...
...Only a clear presentation, based on facts, of the ultimate unworkability of present policy might have some effect...
...Secretary of State Haig's almost daily characterizing of the Nicaraguan government as "totalitarian" and blustering threats about military options, seem to be aimed at providing a new rationale for escalation in Central America...
...They've been hitting soldiers, Guardsmen, police, and government collaborators hard, and we've got an increasing morale problem...
...Finding a possible middle ground seems intractable in El Salvador...
...Unfortunately the U.S...
...Enders indicated that "negotiations on electoral issues among eligible political parties" (his emphasis) would be the only kind the U.S...
...There are serious divisions among them, which might emerge later...
...Besides criticizing the Carter policy, it advocated a "Zimbabwe option...
...The basic problem is that the opposition is just too strong now...
...Yet from the viewpoint of the opposition and even from ordinary people, most of whom have seen their family members or neighbors killed, often with cruel tortures, a solution which allowed large numbers of those responsible to escape punishment might seem excessively lenient...
...They don't hold any major towns but they do have control of a large strip in the north, about 30 percent of the country and our side has not been able to dislodge them permanently from the areas they hold...
...No one with on-the-ground experience in El Salvador can believe that its present leaders are "willing to compete with the insurgents at the polls...
...withdrew support...
...policy in El Salvador take a predictable line: the notion of a "reform" government caught between extremes of right and left is a myth...
...Granted that seeing El Salvador fall to leftists is a blow...
...However, I'd suggest you put the blame where it belongs, on the Carter administration...
...You did your best with an impossible situation...
...investment there, so in dollar terms we're already losing...
...So by early 1980 the die was cast...
...the opposition is not a hard core of Marxist fanatics but is broadly based and has a great deal of support, especially from grass-roots Christians...
...You can imagine the international outcry: Afghanistan, after all, is on the Russian border while El Salvador is a thousand miles from Brownsville...
...As unpalatable-indeed unthinkable-as a negotiated approach must be to the Reagan administration, its planners must face starkly the real alternatives: a long, costly, dirty, bloody war, which "winning" would mean killing perhaps 2-4 percent of the population of El Salvador, with a consequent international outcry and large-scale domestic dissent-and a real danger of a regionalized conflict with unpredictable results-versus a negotiated process which should result in a government which could bring stability to El Salvador and would be able to work out a practical modus vivendi with the United States.ork out a practical modus vivendi with the United States...
...I'd say we've got four possibilities: 1. Continue as we are...
...Since most of the oligarchy has already fled with as much cash as possible, a "mixed economy" might be formed on what was left behind, on the analogy of what the Sandinista government has done with what Somoza left...
...Remember we caught one of these guys trying to sell the mob 10,000 guns in this country a few years ago...
...Could the junta thing have worked...
...At present our intelligence shows that right away it was taken over by military types who didn't want any real changes...
...Then there's corruption...
...18,000 in the Guard and the Army but there's no hard and fast line between the guerrillas and their supporters...
...That should make them act somewhat responsibly...
...In the event, the opposite tack was taken, El Salvador being made into a "test case'' of United States resolve in the face of Soviet expansionism...
...But there are lots of questions: Once we were there how would we get out...
...At present the FMLN/FDR proposes negotiations which would be "comprehensive," facilitated by outside governments, and which would be fully reported to the Salvadoran people...
...Our job would be to bring the military to the negotiating table-ultimately threatening to pull the rug out from under them if necessary...
...The basic reason is simple: cut our losses...
...Representatives have held informal discussions with Mexican and French diplomats...
...If that fundamental issue could be resolved, others could indeed be negotiated...
...We had 1300 casualties the first five months of this year, and our intelligence indicates that very few honest-to-God guerrillas were killed...
...If there were to be a new armed forces and police made up of members of the present official forces and the FMLN, those responsible for atrocities would have to be excluded...
...Even more important, a protracted struggle would cost hundreds of millions of dollars, and eventually billions, simply for government payroll and to prop up the economy...
...Maybe with guerrillas put down in several countries and the fall of Allende, we didn't take the left seriously enough, especially in these tiny Central American countries...
...United States responsibility is crucial-only the U.S...
...Congress there is an increasing interest in negotiations as an alternative to the administration's fixation on a military win...
...Would we get bogged down in Guatemala, where, I don't need to tell you, the problem is very serious...
...Unfortunately the Reagan circle with its ideological certitude seems impermeable to the "specificities" of the Salvadoran case...
...This point appears to offer little room for negotiation from either side...
...The problem is the opposition would probably win, sooner or later, and the longer and bloodier it goes, the more radical it would come out, and the more likely they'd simply go to the Soviets...
...Also, they're going to inherit a mess...
...It is only realistic to recognize that extremists on both left and right still oppose elections...
...On November 5, the House Inter-American Affairs Subcommittee, some of whose members are quite conservative, voted 9-0, urging the president to "press for unconditional discussions" among all contending parties to assure free elections...
...So while it's not likely, you can even speculate on some kind of turn-around subsequently...
...They broke from the Communists over ten years ago...
...It should be possible to assemble a "government of national reconciliation," made up of individuals widely recognized as honest and not implicated in the previous violence...
...In the meantime, there have been repeated efforts to promote a negotiated solution, from Panamanian General Omar Torrijos, who sought to bring together reform-minded officers and some sectors of the left, to the Socialist International, and several governments (especially Mexico), to Archbishop Rivera y Damas of San Salvador...
...Assistant Secretary of State Thomas Enders stated that the Salvadoran government is attempting to "overcome . . . divisions . . . by establishing a more democratic system...
...He clears his throat and begins: "Mr...
...We think something similar might happen here if the U.S...
...However, let us imagine for a moment, that suspecting that something is going wrong, Reagan and his kitchen cabinet decide to bring in a "professional" as opposed to one of their ideologues...
...Curiously, a force for restraint on the Haig State Department's press for a military solution may be coming from an unexpected source-the Pentagon...
...Valid as these considerations may be, they are hardly calculated to move the Reagan administration, fixated as it is on a military victory...
...That's over a whole year's GNP...
...We're coming to a fork in the road in our El Salvador policy and there's a lot at stake...
...Some kind of political process, including elections, would enter the negotiations...
...Number one, the main left groups are not pro-Soviet...
...But they should be-and are-willing to compete with the insurgents at the polls...
...press has made little effort to get an inside view of what happens in Nicaragua and has tended to take certain elements out of context (some parts of the private sector, and La Prensa, their mouthpiece) as a litmus test on which to base a complete judgment...
...Underneath their superficial toughness these Central American armies are unreliable...
...military planners are asking whether the problem is fundamentally military or political-so much so, that they speak of a "role reversal" vis-a-vis the State Department...
...While the stress on elections perhaps clouds the issue, the unanimity of the vote may be taken as pointing toward an alternative approach...
...There are a couple of potentially mitigating factors...
Vol. 108 • December 1981 • No. 23
