The Third World War: The Untold Story

by John Hackett

  The crisis was averted in the most unexpected manner; partly because the United States engaged in eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation with Cuba, but also because Venezuela (at first to America’s horror) went Social-Democratic in December of 1983. Thereafter a Venezuelan-Mexican alliance became an important stabilizing force in the region, and in the nick of time brought peace and compromise to it. If it had not, if at this juncture the Caribbean had become a Soviet lake and Central America a Soviet base area, the Western Alliance would almost certainly have gone down in the Third World War.

  For all elephants that need to tread delicately in this post-war world, possibly as dangerous and unstable now in 1987 as at any time in living memory, the story carries disturbing lessons. It also carries a message of hope.

  As the decade of the 1980s opened, the forces of change in Central America were not all revolutionary or Cuban-supported. There were also moderates and reformists trying both to stop the revolutionary tide and to implement reform in countries that had for generations been oppressed by too few rich families and too many soldiers, and where there were some of the lowest per capita incomes in the world.

  To the left of centre among these moderate reformists was the Socialist International, closely related to the social democratic parties in Venezuela, Costa Rica and Mexico, and influential with groups in El Salvador. It had at one time also been influential with the rulers of Nicaragua, but Sandinista Nicaragua was slipping under communist control. To the right of centre was the Organizacion Democrata Cristiana de America (ODCA), presided over by a Venezuelan (Aristides Calvani) and influential with President Duarte of El Salvador and with several political parties in the Caribbean.

  The Cubans and Soviets decided to try to cause trouble for ODCA (ie, El Salvador and Venezuela) first.

  Already in 198 °Cuba’s leaders had held a secret meeting with Central American Marxist leaders up country in Nicaragua, to discuss their intended polarization of the region. They could by then celebrate a considerable triumph.

  This triumph had been the military victory of the Sandinista movement in Nicaragua, and the overthrow of the Somoza dynasty.

  The United States was completely isolated in its last lukewarm attempt to preserve ‘Somocism without Somoza’. The importance of this event was threefold and to the United States Administration deeply unsettling. It showed that a guerrilla movement in Central America could fight successfully against a US trained, politically demoralized army like Somoza’s National Guard. It brought to power a mainland government in a Central American country that had a strong pro-Cuban faction in its midst. The Sandinistas in Nicaragua, until they turned almost entirely communist, clearly enjoyed wide popular support.

  At the 1980 meeting in Nicaragua of rising Marxists the voice was that of Fidel Castro, but the hand belonged to the Soviet Union’s President Brezhnev, who was already propping up Cuba’s ineffective economy to the tune of forty million dollars a week. The Soviets had become attracted during 1980 by the possibility of drawing the United States into a deep trap just outside its southern backdoor, where it could flounder ineffectually while critical events beyond its control unrolled elsewhere.

  Soviet strategists believed that both Central America and the Caribbean were now ripe for revolution. They saw that Cuba could be used as the springboard of a powerful politico-strategic movement of support for subversive forces throughout the area. This diversion would tie down US forces and compromise American prestige, allowing the Soviet Union to strike more decisive blows and develop its own initiatives in other areas of the world. It would be difficult for the US to cast the issue of Central American conflict in purely East-West terms and so involve its allies. The Soviets were confident that American public opinion would hysterically oppose a major commitment of troops for a counter-insurgency war in an area to which American TV commentators could commute almost daily. The outlook as seen from the Kremlin was good.

  Despite the appalling mess into which his economy had sunk, Fidel Castro started the 1980s in buoyant mood. The emigration of more than 125,00 °Cubans out of his island, after the port of Mariel was opened in the spring of 1980 to all who wanted to leave, had strangely given him a political respite. It had enabled him to get rid of some thousands of hard-core criminals and a good many mental patients. Almost all of the Marielitos had settled in Florida, bumping up the murder rate in Miami and the trade in drugs through the state to become the worst in America. Politically, by exporting at the same time the best of his opposition, Castro was again able to unite around him the different factions of the Cuban political elite: the military, the radical-revolutionaries and the remaining and wetter of the moderates, the latter led by the Minister of Economics Carlos Rafael Rodriguez.

  Castro now saw an opportunity to stage a comeback to the Latin American mainland, break away from the regional isolation in which Cuba had found itself for many years, and open an outlet for the energies of the powerful Cuban armed forces after their African adventures. He told his fellow Marxists in Nicaragua that in the United States he would now be mobilizing his racial assets. There were going to be black and Hispanic riots if the new conservative Administration in Washington cut its welfare spending, as it almost certainly would. In Central America the main target was civil war in El Salvador, at least in part as a reaction against the return to power of the Christian Democrats in Venezuela.

  Until December of 1979 Venezuela was ruled by the Social Democrats, who were careful to avoid confrontation with Cuba. After the election in that month it was ruled by the Christian Democrats who had campaigned for a policy of open confrontation against Cuba and for closer ties with the US. It appears from information available in Havana, where leaks were as common as in Washington at about the same time, that in 1981 Castro sent a memorandum to Brezhnev in Moscow, of which the gist is as follows: ‘The Government in Venezuela is the key US ally in this region. Without Venezuela the US could be isolated in Central America and we could probably bring forward revolutions in El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras-while the radicalization of the Sandinista Government would go much faster. The Venezuelan Government has adopted a very anti-Cuban line. It recognizes the spread of communist influence in Central America and the Caribbean as a serious security risk. It is capable of mobilizing the help of other Latin American countries, notably Brazil, in order to face that threat. Luckily we have two advantages. First, there is strong domestic opposition in Venezuela to this Government’s policies. Secondly, this Government has made a fool of itself by being the decisive influence in bringing a Christian Democrat stooge to the presidency of El Salvador. The Americans think that this man will (a) be an adequate figure in holding his military junta in check (actually he is too weak); (b) look like a charismatic moderate, although in fact he is unconvincing on American television, especially when he tries to speak English; (c) be accepted by Mexico (which he won’t). It is against El Salvador that the revolutionary forces of communism now need to strike.’

  This assessment was not entirely different from that being made on the other side of the hill. A document laid before the new President of the US at this time (and finding its way, as was not unusual then, almost at once into the hands of newsmen) ran as follows: ‘Faced with a dilemma between revolution and repression in Central America, the United States must try to find a middle course. While helping the military governments in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras the US must also: (a) pressure those governments into implementing reforms aimed at undermining support for the revolutionaries; (b) urge them to reduce the levels of ‘official terrorism’; (c) protect the present El Salvador Government from an extreme right-wing coup; (d) oppose resolutely, and if necessary by military means, the direct despatch of Cuban troops to the guerrilla movement in El Salvador; (e) try to wean the area’s Social Democrats away from supporting the communists. The first approach must be to Social Democratic Mexico.’

  The approach to Mexico did not work. A special US adviser in Mexico City has since made public t
hat he filed back the following report: ‘We are caught on the horns of a dreadful dilemma. The Mexican analysis of the Central American and Caribbean situation differs fundamentally from that of the US. The Mexicans think subversion in this region is the result of socio-economic backwardness and political oppression. They believe that the military governments of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras cannot survive much longer. They say that stability in the area will be best served if these dictatorial regimes are quickly replaced with centre-left popular governments, willing to implement agrarian reform, to institute democratic freedoms, and to dismantle secret armies under right-wing control.

  ‘The Mexicans do not differ from us about what the ideal solution to the crisis would be, but they disagree on the methods to accomplish it. Mexico will not support the Government in El Salvador. The Mexican ruling party has close connections with the Socialist International. It believes that social change is inevitable and that opposition to the military regimes offers the best hope for long-term stability.’

  It is possible that the US Ambassador exaggerated Mexico’s real beliefs. When talking to a distinguished but unofficial American, the Mexican President asked, ‘Why on earth did the US allow those communist Sandinistas to take over Nicaragua?’

  ‘But,’ said the surprised professor, ‘Your Excellency made speeches in favour of the Sandinistas.’

  ‘Oh,’ said the President, ‘those were politics.’

  All this helped set the springs of the elephant trap.

  The first stage of the crisis was the intensification of the revolutionary war in El Salvador. What had begun as a series of skirmishes by a small, badly-trained and poorly-equipped army against a few guerrilla bands developed into a serious war, covering large sections of the countryside. The Salvador an Army received help from the US, the guerrillas from Cuba.

  The President of El Salvador was a good man as troubled men go, and as troubled men go he went. In the elections in early 1982 only those bitterly opposed to the guerrillas dared to stand or vote, and they voted by a small majority for a coalition government to the right of the Christian Democrats. If there had been an election among Protestants in Northern Ireland at that time, a majority would also have voted that anything attempting to be centrist was ‘too soft’. Some moderates tried to join and restrain the new coalition for a while, but — under attack from their own colleagues as too gentle, and from American newspapermen as ‘accessories of the fascist murder gangs’ — they later withdrew. The resigning centre-right politicians bitterly blamed the ‘so-called moderate opposition’ for the failure of the ‘democratic experiment’, and accused them and leftist American newspapermen of wickedly contributing to the continuance of civil war.

  For a number of right-wing officers, the moderates’ departure was welcome news. Hard-line soldiers and demagogues took over power and vowed to prosecute the war against communist subversion until the guerrillas were completely exterminated. There were brutal murders of people even vaguely attracted to the opposition movement. Many moderate-minded people then foolishly joined the communists, and the civil war gained in intensity and destructiveness.

  That had desperate consequences for the peasant masses of this tiny but heavily populated country. Unfortunately for the US, there could be no pretence now that democracy was being defended in El Salvador. An outright and firm decision in favour of or against the all-military government was necessary.

  The US Administration chose to favour it. With the help of American advisers and the provision of significant quantities of weapons and equipment it started a major counter-insurgency effort of the sort that could not work. El Salvador’s military, reinforced in their ‘win or die’ stand by this show of support, raised the level of violence in a war that by now had become something very like a popular insurgency. From both the Government and the guerrillas ever more widespread brutality was used against the civilian populace.

  In America, the liberal opposition exploded. The Cubans had laid their plans in 1981 for Hispanic and black demonstrations against the welfare cuts they correctly expected from the US Administration, but they had shown their usual inefficiency in not getting the demonstrations (which had already been paid for) mounted on the target date. This inefficiency now proved for the Cubans a great advantage. Just as had happened in 1968, subsidized demonstrations spread with increasing violence across America. Decent young people and others looking for political mileage also, quite understandably, joined in protests against the ‘new Vietnam’.

  By late 1983 El Salvador’s war was spreading across Central America. It looked at one stage likely to involve all of Central America’s five other republics.

  Even before the right-wing coup in El Salvador the Sandinista Government in Nicaragua was going further down the sad Cuban road. Under pressure from a deteriorating economic situation, Nicaragua started putting local and even multi-national businessmen in prison, because they were ‘slandering’ instead of aiding the national economy. The US responded by cutting off economic aid, and Venezuela followed suit. This led the pro-Cubans in the Sandinista leadership to ask for Cuban and Soviet economic and other assistance. Cuba loudly and angrily denounced the ‘US-inspired interventionist measures against Nicaragua’, and claimed that a ‘mercenary army’ paid for with US and Venezuelan money was being trained in Costa Rica ‘to make war on the Nicaraguan revolution’.

  More Cuban military advisers and weapons were rushed into Nicaragua. Mexico was not helpful at this moment. It said that America’s action in cutting off economic aid was pushing Nicaragua into the hands of the Soviet Union.

  Some rather more sinister folk began to fear (or hope) the same thing. In Guatemala, a well-organized and equipped guerrilla army made the military apprehensive that a full-scale revolutionary war might develop very soon. The trouble spread to Costa Rica, a country possessing no armed forces but only police, long admired for its domestic tranquillity and its pacifist international stand. Reductions in the standards of living in Costa Rica’s hitherto well-off and civilized society, and the fall in the prices of coffee and other exports, set the stage for the appearance of something unheard of in that country — tiny, but highly efficient, terrorist groups. The same happened in Panama, where the death in 1981 of the spectacular General Torrijos had left a power vacuum that contributed to the resurgence of left-wing revolutionary activities. Rioting near the Panama Canal caused grave disquiet among senior officers of the US Navy.

  Foolishly, Guatemala now intervened in El Salvador, and Honduras in Nicaragua. In the late summer of 1983 the Guatemalan military government, faced with a major guerrilla insurgency of its own, sent forces through the frontier to help Salvadoran Army units engaged in fierce battles with the guerrillas in the northern part of the country.

  Honduras allowed attacks to be launched on Nicaraguan border areas by former Somocista National Guardsmen. Consequent clashes between border guards developed into sharp, bloody encounters throughout the months of September and October 1983. No war was declared. Hondurans accused the Sandinistas of promoting revolution in their country. The Nicaraguan Government denounced a Honduran ‘invasion’ and mobilized popular militias ‘for the defence of the fatherland’. The Organization of American States (OAS) called a meeting in October which passed a weak resolution ‘condemning all aggressions’. The war in Central America was suddenly looking like a trans-national one of left against right. National boundaries might be about to lose their significance.

  At this moment it began to look as if there would be a Venezuela-Guyana war as well.

  The Venezuelan general elections were due at the beginning of December 1983. During the Christian Democrat period in El Salvador, Venezuela had acted as a hard-line ally of the US. Its own people did not like this. Public opinion polls even at this stage showed that only 10 per cent of Venezuelans thought that their country should get involved in El Salvador and help the junta. Nearly 60 per cent thought that Venezuela should continue to give aid for the reconstru
ction of Nicaragua.

  The struggle which began with Cuba-leaning Guyana at this time was welcomed by some extreme right-wing nationalist groups in Venezuela, plus some of the Venezuelan military, but it was really initiated by Cuba-leaning politicians in Guyana itself. A quarrel between these countries is always easy to ignite, because Venezuelans think that two-thirds of the land area of Guyana should actually belong to Venezuela. Some Guyanan politicians wanted to integrate their country more closely with Cuba because this would advance their own careers. They could feel fairly certain that the movement of armed bands across the disputed areas, spilling occasionally over the frontier, would trigger a reaction from Venezuelan generals. The trigger was pulled, and the reaction came. The spectre had now been raised of a war on the South American mainland.

  Guyana asked for Cuban military help, and new teams of Cuban ‘advisers’ quickly turned up. All the other Caribbean countries tried to persuade Venezuela and Guyana to come to terms peacefully, and their general mood was against Venezuela. A left-wing inspired campaign against ‘Venezuelan imperialism’ spread throughout Trinidad, Tobago, Curacao, anti-colonialist Grenada, Dominica and even Jamaica. It was embarrassing to the US that its key ally in containing subversion in Central America and the Caribbean should start to lose sympathy in both regions as a result of a ninety-year-old territorial dispute with a black-dominated, English-speaking Caribbean country. Cuba did not miss the opportunity to show its anti-colonialism. It prepared to station military units on the mainland ‘at the request of a friendly government, threatened by foreign aggression’.

  In November of 1983 America’s fortunes in Central America therefore seemed at their lowest ebb. The US Administration, committed to a policy of containment of subversion, but not opposed in principle to moderate change, had almost given up hopes that any middle-of-the-road alternative was feasible in countries torn apart by extremists from left and right. Mexico persisted in its anti-US stand, willing to take risks with the centre-left and more extreme left-wing movements. The Venezuelan Government had lost most of its capacity for action as the election approached, and it was unpopular internationally because of its border disputes with Colombia as well as Guyana. The Soviet Union was delighted to see the United States caught in the elephant trap and wallowing ineffectively, while the Soviet Union’s Cuban ally was recovering political prestige and gaining opportunities to intervene militarily at the request of ‘friendly governments’, as it had done in Africa.