Managua: Keep Planning

The Bush Administration is finally moving to implement a new U.S. policy toward Nicaragua and its Sandinista government. Initial reports indicate that President Bush’s approach will be more balanced and constructive than the hostile military stance that failed so miserably under Ronald Reagan. But while a new Nicaragua policy is certainly welcome, support for the plan will depend on what emerges when the White House gets more specific on some crucial points.

Secretary of State James A. Baker III has been briefing key members of Congress on the new Nicaragua strategy in an effort to generate bipartisan support on its behalf--something Reagan rarely achieved during the eight years he spent trying to oust the Sandinistas. Baker says the new Administration is willing to support recent diplomatic efforts by Central American leaders to negotiate a reduction of the tensions between Nicaragua and its neighbors. The United States is even prepared to offer financial assistance and other economic benefits, like lifting a U.S. trade embargo against Nicaragua, as an incentive towards peace. But this will happen only if the Sandinistas make good on promises to restore freedom and democracy inside Nicaragua prior to the election of a new government in early 1990. That is a reasonable stance.

However, Baker also has told Congress that the Administration wants to keep sending food, clothing and other forms of “humanitarian” aid to the Contra rebels fighting to overthrow the Sandinistas. While the Administration has given up Reagan’s fantasy that the Contras will somehow, some day, defeat the Sandinistas militarily, Baker argues the Contras must remain a viable force in order to keep pressure on the Sandinistas.

There is a superficial logic to Bush and Baker’s carrot-and-stick approach to the Contras that may appeal to many in Congress. Unfortunately, it overlooks some harsh realities about the current situation in Central America. The government of Honduras, the U.S. ally that has been the Contras’ chief base of operations, is increasingly restive over their presence. What assurances can Bush offer the Hondurans that the heavily armed fighters now living on their borderlands will be disbanded once they are no longer needed? Contra military commanders have so far indicated no willingness to give up their goal of defeating the Sandinistas, no matter how remote the odds of achieving it. What is to keep renegade Contras from pursuing their own agenda--fighting a futile war that could eventually degenerate into banditry or even terrorism? That could be what the Bush Administration and Congress are risking if they simply renew aid to the Contras, even if it is restricted to humanitarian aid, without having an alternative plan ready.

Certainly the Contras must not be abandoned outright. They have been surrogate fighters for the U.S. government for too long to be treated shabbily. There is precedent from the Vietnam War and the failed Bay of Pigs invasion for helping defeated surrogates. But, so far, the Bush Administration has given no sign that it has even thought about this eventuality. Before Congress agrees to provide any more aid to the Contras, it must insist that Bush’s new Nicaragua strategy include a specific plan for withdrawing the Contras from the battlefield.