SANDINISTA FOREIGN POLICY Strategies for Survival by Robert Armstrong, Marc Edelman, and Robert Matthews George Black, Coordinating Editor
"I, RONALD REAGAN, PRESIDENT OF the United States of America, find that the policies and actions of the Government of Nicaragua constitute an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national...
...Non-alignment was spelled out in the original 1969 program of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN...
...It is not a strategy for furthering Moscow's interests, although of course enhanced Soviet influence may precisely be the consequence of a refusal by Washington to take the new Third World nationalism seriously on its own terms...
...Until now, non-alignment has been the Sandinista government's chosen strategy not only to achieve development but to defend national security...
...Their difficult experiences with Cuba and with various African governments has made them aware of their limits...
...The Sandinista government benefits from the increased economic clout of the larger Third World nations...
...Robert Matthews' article describes that endeavor, and for the first time recounts the full story of the FSLN's repeated attempts to secure military aid from the West from 1979 to late 1981, when the Reagan Administration killed any hope that military supplies might be obtained outside the Soviet bloc...
...T HOUGH MUCH OF THE WORLD HAS changed, the attitudes of the United States, unfortunately, have not...
...It goes to the phenomenon of Third World nationalism itself, and of the United States' capacity to accept nationalism as the legitimate expression of powerful and enduring forces...
...Robert Armstrong's article traces the origins of Nicaraguan non-alignment and the role of Marxism in Sandinista ideology...
...Since the Reagan Administration came to power, its policies have aimed to thwart Nicaragua's strategy of diversifying its dependency...
...Marc Edelman's article, the most comprehensive and sober rebuttal of that assertion we have yet seen, reveals a clear pattern: each increase in aid from the socialist and radical non-aligned nations has come in response to a new act of aggression from the United States...
...It is undergirded by strong traditions of national resistance, nationalism, and-within the Latin American Left-independence from Moscow-oriented Marxism...
...Since the Reagan Administration came to power, its policies have aimed to thwart Nicaragua's strategy of diversifying its dependency...
...The ability of Mexico to supply much of Nicaragua's oil, or of Algeria to purchase Nicara- guan sugar after the United States' quota was cut, are two cases in point...
...Nor have they been more successful in promoting economic diversification...
...14 REPORT ON THE AMERICA5 Rctpo4 t n4 Aelica4 Sandinista Foreign Policy any hope that military supplies might be obtained outside the Soviet bloc...
...N ICARAGUA'S CONCEPTION OF NONalignment also benefits from 30 years of Third World experience, in which several countries, notably Cuba, have depended heavily on the Soviet bloc to guide and assist their development...
...Yet even here, Washington's refusal to recognize the legiti- macy of nationalism has led to a disgraceful chapter in this country's history: five years of sordid and di- visive warfare, with no end in sight...
...The challenge which Nicaragua poses to the United States is not the prospect of a Soviet satellite two hours' flying time from Miami, but the challenge of nationalism...
...so too has the Soviet preoccupation with arms control...
...It removes the debate over Nicaragua's foreign relations from the vacuous world of photo-opportunity politics and returns to history as the surest way of understanding the present...
...But the question extends beyond Nicaragua...
...THOUGH MUCH OF THE WORLD HAS changed, the attitudes of the United States, unfortunately, have not...
...Edward Zorinsky, liberal chairman of the Western Hemisphere Affairs Subcommittee of the Senate Foreign Relations Commit- tee, hailed the new Sandinista government as a "dedicated, impressive group of people whose driv- ing force is Nicaraguan nationalism...
...Others have called it the "diversification of dependency" through relations with countries of distinct ideology and development...
...Important shifts in the international balance of power, meanwhile, have offered Nicaragua political and diplomatic space in which to pursue non-alignment, to an extent that was not available to Cuba in 1959...
...The challenge which Nicaragua poses to the United States is not the prospect of a Soviet satellite two hours' flying time from Miami, but the challenge of nationalism...
...And the exclusive reliance on generally inferior Soviet-bloc technology has limited the scope for growth which access to Western technology might have allowed...
...Third World nationalism will provoke immeasurably greater challenges elsewhere-the Philippines, Chile and South Africa are only the most obvious cases-and the costs of opposing it will be correspondingly higher...
...Though that commitment is powerful, the threat posed to Nicaragua's national security by the Reagan Administration places it in jeopardy...
...Those who once loftily bestowed the benefit of the doubt on the Sandinistas now point to a photograph of Daniel Ortega in Red Square and cry "betrayal...
...It finds the roots of Nicaragua's contemporary foreign pol- icy in the country's unique history of U.S...
...That experience has demonstrated that such strategies are not necessarily any more appropriate than capitalist models to the real social and economic conditions of underdevelopment-as for example when state pro- duction is introduced into primitive peasant economies...
...N ICARAGUA'S CONCEPTION OF NON- alignment also benefits from 30 years of Third World experience, in which several countries, notably Cuba, have depended heavily on the Soviet bloc to guide and assist their development...
...this issue of Report on the Americas asks how we got there...
...Europe has become a more independent international actor and has offered the Sandinistas trade, aid and diplomatic backing...
...Nicaragua's commitment to non-alignment, however, is deeply rooted in the essential task which the revolution has set itself, and that is to build a new national identity from the rubble of Somocismo...
...The socialist countries have grown both more cautious and more realistic about their involvement...
...If Nicaragua cannot practice non-alignment and remain secure, then national survival must dictate a change of course...
...Recognizing that to overcome their dependency would take decades, the Sandinistas have tried with all four to establish trade, aid and military relations...
...policies and practices in the Caribbean Basin...
...Europe has become a more independent international actor and has offered the Sandinistas trade, aid and diplomatic backing...
...U.S./Nicaraguan relations are fast approaching their moment of crisis: the option of the contra war, murderous but inconclusive, is fast running out of steam, beset by obstacles in Congress and on the battlefield...
...Non-alignment is the expression of a worldwide phenomenon of Third World nations seeking their political and economic independence and equitable relations with the developed world...
...The Reagan Administration has worked hard to paint a picture of Nicaragua rushing headlong from day one into the arms of the Soviet Union...
...The socialist countries have grown both more cautious and more realistic about their involvement...
...Soon the Reagan Administration will be forced to choose: either invade Nicaragua, brandishing the picture from Red Square as justification, or recognize the Sandinistas' right to exist, and negotiate...
...it has since been repeated on innumerable occasions...
...In the United States, non-alignment is a poorly understood term...
...so too has the Soviet preoccupation with arms control...
...They have forced it instead to concentrate almost exclusively on the preservation of national security...
...Though that commitment is powerful, the threat posed to Nicaragua's national security by the Reagan Administration places it in jeopardy...
...SINCE JULY 19, 1979, THE NICARAGUAN government has committed itself to a nonaligned foreign policy...
...Some commentators have called this approach "standing on four legs...
...Important shifts in the international balance of power, meanwhile, have offered Nicaragua political and diplomatic space in which to pursue non-align- ment, to an extent that was not available to Cuba in 1959...
...The ability of Mexico to supply much of Nicaragua's oil, or of Algeria to purchase Nicaraguan sugar after the United States' quota was cut, are two cases in point...
...It is undergirded by strong traditions of national resistance, nationalism, and-within the Latin American Left-independence from Moscow-oriented Marx- ism...
...policies have so repeatedly frustrated Nicaragua's ambitions as a nation over the past 80 years...
...Its leaders are the first to acknowledge that their policies must reflect the reality of their location in the Caribbean Basin, where the United States faces less real checks on its power than in other parts of the world...
...To meet its national security needs, Nicaragua has also sought-though with less success-to diversify its "military dependency...
...If Nicaragua cannot practice non-alignment and remain secure, then national survival must dictate a change of course...
...The Reagan Administration, with consummate cynicism, has used the results to charge that Nicaragua is aligned with the Soviet bloc...
...Washington's pressure both on Nicaragua and on many of its new-found allies have worked to the detriment of the diplomatic balance that the Sandinistas sought...
...abuse and in a tradition of rebellion against foreign domination that owes little or nothing to Moscow...
...Nicaragua is a tiny country...
...Latin American nations are more willing politically to challenge the United States, even if their effectiveness is limited...
...Until now, non-alignment has been the Sandinista government's chosen strategy not only to achieve development but to defend national security...
...Latin American nations are more willing politically to challenge the United States, even if their effectiveness is limited...
...Third World nationalism will provoke immeasurably greater challenges elsewhere-the Philippines, Chile and South Africa are only the most obvious cases-and the costs of opposing it will be correspondingly higher...
...it was reaffirmed in 1978...
...But the question extends beyond Nicaragua...
...Washington's pressure both on Nicaragua and on many of its new-found allies have worked to the detriment of the diplomatic balance that the Sandinistas sought...
...all too often, mono-crop agroexport remains the dull outcome of such experiments...
...Whatever name it is given, the core of Sandinista foreign policy is to end the almost exclusive ties to the United States which have defined Nicaragua's place in the world through the whole of the 20th century...
...The Sandinista government benefits from the increased economic clout of the larger Third World nations...
...In August of that year, just one month into the Nicaraguan revolution, Sen...
...I, RONALD REAGAN, PRESIDENT OF the United States of America, find that the policies and actions of the Government of Nicaragua constitute an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States and hereby declare a national emergency to deal with that threat...
...Today, the congressional consensus has swung violently against Nicaragua's revolutionary experiment...
...It goes to the phenomenon of Third World nationalism itself, and of the United States' capacity to accept nationalism as the legitimate expression of powerful and enduring forces...
...The Reagan Administration, with consummate cynicism, has used the results to charge that Nicaragua is aligned with the Soviet bloc...
...Nicaragua is a tiny country...
...That is where we stand today...
...The Reagan Administration has worked hard to paint a picture of Nicaragua rushing headlong from day one into the arms of the Soviet Union...
...Nor have they been more successful in promoting economic diversification...
...In the closing years of this century, the United States will face two options: it can accommodate itself to coexistence with nationalism, or it must be prepared for endless, and probably unwinnable, war on the nations of the Third World...
...Nicaragua's commitment to non-alignment, however, is deeply rooted in the essential task which the revolution has set itself, and that is to build a new national identity from the rubble of Somocismo...
...Nicaragua's strategy of non-alignment is based on developing a broad spectrum of ties with the Third World, Western Europe, the socialist countries and the United States...
...policies have so repeatedly frustrated Nicaragua's ambitions as a nation over the past 80 years...
...Diversifying trade relations is the easiest part...
...Its leaders are the first to acknowledge that their policies must reflect the reality of their location in the Caribbean Basin, where the United States faces less real checks on its power than in other parts of the world...
...Marc Edelman's article, the most com- prehensive and sober rebuttal of that assertion we have yet seen, reveals a clear pattern: each increase in aid from the socialist and radical non-aligned nations has come in response to a new act of aggression from the United States...
...In the closing years of this century, the United States will face two options: it can accommodate itself to coexistence with nationalism, or it must be prepared for endless, and probably unwinnable, war on the nations of the Third World...
...The test is a particularly severe one for this country because U.S...
...The test is a particularly severe one for this country because U.S...
...And the exclusive reliance on generally inferior Soviet-bloc technology has limited the scope for growth which access to Western technology might have allowed...
...all too often, mono-crop agroexport remains the dull outcome of such experiments...
...They have forced it instead to concentrate almost exclusively on the preservation of national security...
...But even if clearly grasped, and stripped of conservative suspicions that it hides a more sinister agenda, it would still challenge historic U.S...
...That experience has demonstrated that such strategies are not necessarily any more appropriate than capitalist models to the real social and economic conditions of underdevelopment-as for example when state production is introduced into primitive peasant economies...
...The wording of that declaration on May 1 of an economic embargo against Nicaragua is some measure of how far we have travelled, and how far elite opinion has changed, since the summer of 1979...
...Yet even here, Washington's refusal to recognize the legitimacy of nationalism has led to a disgraceful chapter in this country's history: five years of sordid and divisive warfare, with no end in sight...
...Their difficult experiences with Cuba and with various African governments has made them aware of their limits...
Vol. 19 • May 1985 • No. 3
