Media myths about the Sandinistas and Reagan

Tom Ricker has a good post on 5 Ongoing Media Myths about Nicaragua and Reagan that is worth reading in its entirety. Here are his five myths:

The FSLN and the revolution are one and the same

Nicaragua was governed by a Marxist totalitarian regime during the 1980s

The context of the Contra War is irrelevant to discussing alleged violations of civil liberties

He said/they said

Activists may have been well meaning, but were naïve

I'm not sure that the FSLN had any intention of sharing power with any other actor following the July revolution. Following the October 1979 coup in El Salvador, the moderates resigned from the junta believing that either the government was not in charge of the military or that it was ordering the military to continue its repressive policies. In Nicaragua, the moderate (non-Sandinista) members of the junta resigned when it was clear that the new government was to pursue the interests of the FSLN and not necessarily all those who supported Somoza's overthrow. The FSLN alienated progressive, but non-Sandinistas, early on. They alienated some of their international supporters, like Costa Rica, for criticizing their system of governance and dependence on the US while minimizing the role that they played in the revolution.

The Soviets provided some sophisticated weapons to the FSLN to defend the revolution and I'm pretty sure that it was earlier than the mid-1980s. I did find it interesting though that the post omitted any mention of Cuba. Yes, the US was concerned that Nicaragua would give the Soviets a foothold in Central America. Cuba was already in the Soviet camp. The Sandinistas' non-aligned foreign policy was clearly more aligned with the Soviets than with the US or the non-aligned movement of the time. Between 1979 and 1981, maybe even 1982 in the case of El Salvador, it was unclear whether the Salvadoran and Guatemalan governments would collapse to revolutionary pressure.

US-Sandinista relations probably would have deteriorated anyway but the proximate cause was Nicaragua's funneling of weapons to the FMLN in El Salvador. The US told the Sandinista leadership that it would not try to destabilize its revolution as long as it did not try to export it to other countries. It warned the Sandinistas that they would not look kindly upon arms transfer to the Sandinista. The Sandinista leadership did not believe the US. Why should they have?  They also felt that they needed to support the FMLN because of all the assistance that it had provided to them during late 1970s. The FMLN sent millions of dollars to the Sandinistas and hundreds of guerrillas to fight in the revolution.

But overall I pretty much agree with Ricker's main points.