Herbert W Armstrong

There's no mistaking it now: Central America has become the number one foreign policy concern of the Reagan Administration. Washington is stepping up both the rhetoric as well as the actual physical pressure on the Marxist Sandinista regime.

In some of the bluntest words to date, President Reagan said in a press conference that he won't be satisfied until the Sandinista rulers say "uncle," and open up the governmental process to the pro-Western forces now arrayed against them. This challenge only makes the Sandinistas cling all the tighter to power.

Secretary of State George Schulz, in a major address in San Francisco, called for the free-world equivalent of the "Brezhnev Doctrine." The latter was formulated by the Soviets in 1968 in response to the threatened break-away of Czechoslovakia from the communist world. Simply stated, the Brezhnev Doctrine affirms a once-communist-always-communist policy, that the Soviets and other bloc countries have the right to intervene in a wobbly communist state in order to "preserve the fruits of socialism. " Secretary Schulz said the U.S. and the West in general should not be afraid to restore a free-world country, having fallen under communism, to its former status.

Thus the ante is mounting. President Reagan knows he has but two choices open to him now: Let Nicaragua alone, allowing it to infect other countries in the region — for theirs is a revolution without borders — or support those indigenous contra forces fighting the Marxist government. Should the latter policy fail, the U.S. somewhere down the road will be faced with two other more painful choices: Let communism spread throughout the region — or send in American troops to redress the balance of power.

No one wants to entertain the latter option, but the Democratically controlled House of Representatives also insists on blocking military aid to the contra "freedom fighters" (as the President calls them). The Sandinistas know this reluctance well; they float phony proposals designed primarily to sound peaceful — such as offering to send home 100 Cuban advisors (out of the few thousand who are there) — in order to influence Congress to withhold arms going to their enemies.

This is a big and growing foreign policy crisis. And it is having an increasing impact on the solidarity of the NATO alliance. Washington and most European capitals view the crisis through different prisms. Simply put, the Reagan Administration perceives a genuine threat to America's national interests. Many Europeans, on the other hand, believe the U.S. is acting paranoid over the existence of a small "socialist" state. This "misunderstanding" over the true nature of the crisis in Central America has the potential of ripping NATO asunder, as American analyst Irving Kristol writes in the March 1985 issue of ENCOUNTER, a British journal of current affairs, literature and the arts. Here are key excerpts from his lengthy warning to the Europeans, titled "A Transatlantic 'Misunderstanding'":

The basic reason for the increasing tensions between the United States and its Western European allies — and not only in the case of Central America, which is more symptom than cause — is the divergence that has occurred, ever since World War II, in the political ethos [guiding beliefs] of the United States and Western Europe. This divergence can be simply stated: The political ethos of Western Europe has been significantly influenced by socialist ideas and socialist modes of thinking, while the political ethos of the United States has been only superficially affected by them....

There are two...ways in which the socialist temper caused Western Europe to recoil from a more assertive foreign policy. The first has to do with its imperial past, about which most Europeans are convinced they ought to feel guilty. They are, as a result, inhibited from any action that might even seem to be "imperialistic."... Secondly, because European socialism and European communism have a common root in Marxism, European socialism is at least partially disarmed, ideologically, when confronting militant Communism....

It is a fact that, for over a century and a half now, the nations of Central America have demonstrated an extraordinary incapacity for self-government.... The nations of the region are either in turmoil or in potential turmoil. And now there is a new element, in the form of Soviet-Cuban intervention in that turmoil, with the intention of establishing Marxist-Leninist regimes in the area, and throughout the Southern hemisphere as well.

Do such regimes necessarily constitute any kind of threat to the United States? Europeans tend to think that the U.S. government is indulging in hysterical exaggeration when it asserts they are.... Why, they ask, cannot the United States live amiably with neighbouring nations that have different socio-economic systems? The answer is, of course, that the United States has little trouble doing just that. There have been left-wing and quasi-socialist regimes established in Peru, Bolivia, even in Mexico, and they have not precipitated any kind of crisis in U.S. foreign policy. But Marxist-Leninist regimes, actively supported with military aid and economic subvention by the Soviet Union, are a new kind of challenge. These tend to be totalitarian tyrannies, not the more familiar left-wing dictatorships or one­ party left-wing governments. With massive Soviet assistance, they are enduring tyrannies — as enduring as the Soviet tyranny itself. And they (i.e., Cuba and Nicaragua) are active Soviet allies in this hemisphere — which is to say, they are active American enemies....

From a purely military point of view, the movement of countries such as Cuba and Nicaragua into the Soviet camp is not at all such a trivial matter. Cuba today is, after the United States, the largest and most powerful military force in the Western hemisphere — much more powerful than Canada or Brazil, for instance.... In addition, Cuba has provided — and is continuing to expand such provision — submarine bases for the Soviet fleet and airfields where Soviet planes can land. In the strict and narrowest sense of us national security — i.e., defence of the continental homeland — Cuba is no threat. It will never invade the United States. But should there be a Soviet-American confrontation, those Soviet bases and Cuba's own military strength — to say nothing of its strategic location on the sea lanes — would surely count for something.

And there is another consideration. Yes, there really dominoes out there (and they are especially there in Central America)....All revolutions in Central America have some indigenous roots. But that insurrection in El Salvador could not be so threatening were it not for Cuban and Nicaraguan assistance to the rebels. And if a Marxist-Leninist regime is once established in El Salvador, what will happen to Honduras, Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Panama, where embryonic revolutionary movements are already active? And what, eventually, will happen to Mexico itself? These are all very shaky regimes, rife with corruption, and with ineffectual military establishments. Their vulnerability is acute.

These nations are well aware of their vulnerability, which is why they are now engaged in the so-called "Contadora process," trying to act as peace-making mediators for the region. But, though everyone expresses pious approval of such mediation, the sad truth is that it is more political theatre than anything else. These countries have no independent "leverage" on the situation-­ they are simply too weak. And there are no "misunderstandings" to clear up, since the United States and the Sandinistas understand each other well enough.... [And] economic assistance does not really provide an answer to the immediate threat of Marxist­ Leninist insurrection....

To some degree, the European attitude is little more than a desperate hope that it can keep comfortably aloof from the turbulence of a world-wide ideological conflict.... Whatever the sources of the European perspective and European conduct...one thing is clear: America's European allies are fast approaching a moment of decision. The United States is not going to remain committed to the defence of Western Europe, at the risk of nuclear annihilation, if Western Europe is not equally committed to the defence of America's interests. In the debate over Central America, the very existence of NATO itself is at stake....

So our allies in Western Europe should start thinking with some care about Central America. As things now stand, they are too inclined to be frivolous, distancing themselves publicly from American policy in order to appease anti-American political opinion at home, while at the same time offering private assurances of solidarity. It is a shortsighted tactic — as any such appeasement generally is. A major clash between the United States and Europe over Central America could soon lead to overwhelming pressures in the United States for a redefinition of its role in NATO — even to the point of the withdrawal of U.S. forces from the European continent. This prospect is something Europeans should ponder most seriously.

It should be obvious also that Moscow has every incentive to keep the pressure on the U.S. in Central America. It sees renewed hope for one of its most sought-after objectives: the removal of U.S. ground forces from Western Europe. Only after this occurs can the process of confederating the nations of Western and Eastern Europe begin.

In the February 8, 1985 WALL STREET JOURNAL, John R. Silber, president of Boston University, wrote an opinion piece entitled "Plain Talk Behind Closed Doors in Central America." Dr. Silber was a member of the Kissinger Commission, which drafted recommendations regarding the war-ravaged region. Dr. Silber said that the Sandinistas distort history, as all communists do, to justify their need for massive arms to defend the revolution. He also divulged the fears that most of the other leaders of the region have but are afraid to speak of openly. Nicaragua's growing might intimidates them, and nowhere is there absolute confidence that the U.S. presents an effective counterforce. Excerpts of Dr. Silber's article follow.

The U.S. did not force the Sandinistas into their military build­up. The U.S. did not encourage the Sandinistas to censor the press, install block committees, forbid free labor unions, imprison and harass their opposition and ultimately hold a sham election. We in the U.S. should not reproach ourselves for forcing the Sandinistas into Marxism and militarism — for we did not. Our error was in failing to perceive that after the revolution the Leninist Sandinistas who had the guns would set up a dictatorship and blame their betrayal of the revolution on us....

Many citizens of the U.S. are still reluctant to accept the realities of the situation. Central Americans, on the other hand, are acutely aware of the threat on their doorsteps. When members of the Kissinger Commission met in private with high­ ranking civilian leaders in Central America, we were told of their deep concern over the military buildup in Nicaragua and the massive Soviet-Cuban presence there. Without exception, these leaders agreed that the government of Nicaragua is determined to export revolution....

In Panama, the leaders made it clear to us that the Panama Canal may well be under attack within three or four years — if nothing is done to contain the situation in Nicaragua. Yet publicly, the leaders of Panama have been reluctant to speak of such a possibility. Costa Rican leaders, both of the ruling National Liberation Party and of the major opposition party, have spoken of economic and political subversion caused by Nicaraguan infiltrators in Costa Rica, of an international Sandinista propaganda campaign against Costa Rica, and of the inability of the Costa Ricans to match Nicaraguan military might in order to defend their country from Sandinista adventurism. Yet these leaders, too, have been reluctant to speak frankly about their concerns in public.

President Suazo Cordova of Honduras spoke with the Kissinger Commission of the necessity of supporting El Salvador and of the threat to his country from Nicaragua. He has, since that time, been outspoken in his position; there is no essential difference in what he says publicly or privately. He told us: "As far as peace negotiations are concerned,...how can you have rational negotiations between a belligerent and hegemonous nation — greatly superior in arms — and four nations who are militarily weak?... Mark my words, if El Salvador falls, Honduras and Guatemala will fall. And if that happens, one day your own capital will face the bombs of the terrorists of international communism."

Ethiopia — Let the Starving Continue

No one in the world doesn't have some sketchy knowledge of the plight of the hungry millions in Ethiopia, and now the southern Sudan. The Sudan has its own famine, plus it is home to many starving northern Ethiopians who have fled there since the Ethiopian government would not direct food to their region, held in rebel hands. Rock entertainers in both Britain and the U.S. have made records, the proceeds of the sales of which are intended for famine relief. At the recent NBA professional basketball all-star game in the U.S., players donated their paychecks to the same cause. Meanwhile, the Russian-backed military government in Add is Ababa seems to place its priorities elsewhere, as this article, entitled "Arms Deliveries at Famine Port Delay Grain for 16 Days," in the February 1, 1985 DAILY TELEGRAPH reported:

Fresh controversy has arisen over Ethiopia's handling of famine­ relief shipments at the Red Sea port of Assab. A Danish grain ship had to wait 16 days while Soviet ships unloaded arms for the Ethiopian Army. And some 7,000 tons of grain destined for famine victims in rebel-held areas was confiscated while in transit.

Ethiopian port officials seized the cargoes of two European ships on Jan. 22, according to the BOSTON GLOBE newspaper. Officials in Washington confirmed that the grain on board the West German and Belgian ships had been impounded after port authorities found the vessels were sailing on to Port Sudan, further up the Red Sea, to unload part of their cargoes. The Sudanese port is the main access point for food aid to guerrilla-controlled areas of Ethiopia in the provinces of Eritrea and Tigre.

Ethiopian policy now appears to be to confiscate all food cargoes from ships bound for Sudan which call in at Assab first. The food is then diverted for famine-relief in Government held areas. An American official said: "The issue is not that the food is going to waste. The point is that the food is not getting to the places where we estimate one-third of the total drought-affected population lives."

Neither West Germany nor Belgium has made any formal complaint to Ethiopia, an omission that clearly irritates the United States Administration. The official said: "We get no support from donor countries on the need to pressure Ethiopia on this point. They want to placate Ethiopia for fear of jeopardising their programme in the rest of the country."

The February 22, 1985 NATIONAL REVIEW drew attention to the contrasting impressions gained by Senator Edward Kennedy on his January trip to Africa, where he visited both South Africa and Ethiopia:

Last month Edward Kennedy visited segregated South Africa, where he vowed to fight apartheid. Then he visited famine-ridden Ethiopia, where he vowed to fight "hunger." Curiously — well, not so curiously — Kennedy didn't criticize the Marxist-Leninist regime in Ethiopia. In the time-honored Communist way, the Ethiopian regime is using the famine, and even blocking outside relief efforts, in order to subjugate recalcitrant parts of the population. The white regime of South Africa has done nothing remotely approaching this. The emaciated bodies of the Ethiopians speak as graphically of tyranny as the corpses at Auschwitz. Yet Kennedy scrupulously observed the convention of international progressive etiquette that forbids us to call the handiwork of Communism evidence of "social injustice" or "the need for systemic change."... No, these cliches of liberal analysis are reserved for capitalist societies.

Southern Africa too has (until recent flooding) been in the grips of an extreme drought. But with its modern infrastructure it was able to outlast the crisis, and provide for the needs of all its peoples. Mr. Kennedy, upon his return, wrote a very lengthy report in an issue of PEOPLE MAGAZINE about his grim impressions of visiting refugee camps in both Ethiopia and the Sudan. Nary a peep about the politics of the famine, however.

AIDS — Grim Statistics and Fanciful Solutions

In an article titled "Hysteria Yields to Grim Facts," the SUNDAY TIMES of London (February 24, 1985) published some of the latest grim statistics regarding the spread of AIDS — Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome — in the U.S. The British are very concerned over the extent of the disease in the U.S. since it is now spreading rapidly in the U.K.

Up to February 18, there were 8,495 reported cases [in the U.S.] including 4,077 deaths. It has taken five years to reach this figure. Yet this year alone experts expect it to double. Although 73% of cases are adult homosexuals, the borders of the disease are extending: 587 females and 97 children under 13 have Aids. A six-year-old boy caught the disease after sexual abuse by his father who had caught the disease from his lover. In San Francisco a 66-year-old nun died following a contaminated blood transfusion. A Florida couple in their seventies and married 50 years both have Aids. The man, a hemophiliac, was infected by a blood transfusion and he infected his wife.

Recent research into donated blood suggests that around 400,000 people and virtually every American hemophiliac has been exposed to the Aids virus. Of these it is estimated that 4% to 19% will develop Aids outright and 25% some of the symptoms. To put this in perspective, there are 12m blood transfusions a year in America.

Another report, this time from the SYDNEY MORNING HERALD of January 31, 1985, estimates that about 50 per cent of homosexual or bisexual males in a selected group in Sydney, Australia are now positive for the AIDS antibody, representing anywhere from 20,000 to 50,000 in the city.

A rather "far-out" solution to Britain's mounting AIDS crisis was advocated by the editorial staff of THE ECONOMIST, an otherwise quite conservative publication. The editors suggested (in the subhead of an editorial titled "A Plague on Homosexuals?" in the March 2 issue) that "a more liberal attitude, and less panic, could help contain Aids." They then wrote:

Acquired immune-deficiency syndrome (AIDS) is a dreadful disease. It kills by stripping the body of its defences against other diseases.... Its death-toll, mostly among homosexuals, is doubling in several advanced countries every few months. Attacking homosexuals will not help matters. The sensible response is for society to be more tolerant of homosexuality, in thought-out ways.

The reason Aids has spread so fast is that many male homosexuals are sexually promiscuous. The best single way of preventing further spread is to persuade them to commit buggery [sodomy] with fewer, and known, sexual partners. Intolerance will not achieve that. Deliberate tolerance might. So sanction sort of legal "marriage" for gays in the hope that this will give them more reasons to be less promiscuous? The Christian churches could help by focusing less on St. Paul's-hangups and on Christ's compassion.

"Tolerate and regulate" sin seems to be the approach rather than to "recognize and eliminate" it. Another example is provided by that mecca of toleration, Amsterdam. In January, the city authorities were scheduled to place into operation two new barges where heroin addicts can watch television and play table tennis while they inject themselves. The new barges (Amsterdam is located on a network of canals and waterways) were to replace a floating center set up last year that had become too small to handle the 200 to 250 addicts who were using it daily.

The stated aim of the project is to reduce the number of addicts who hang around the nearby Zeedijk drug-dealing area. But the authorities may find, true to the experience of government-sanctioned programs, that the number of addicts using their new facilities will exceed expectations, given the official tolerance granted.

— Gene H. Hogberg, News Bureau