United States involvement in Central America
Thank you for printing John Lenczowski's article ``International Communism and Nicaragua -- an administration view,'' [June 6]. There is a need for more people to be educated about communism. This is our greatest defense and weapon for peace. Rosemary B. Parker Walnut Creek, Calif. The facts are simpler than advanced in Lenczowski's article supporting the President's resolve to drag the US into an invasion of Nicaragua in order to install the post-Somoza terrorists (alias ``freedom fighters'').
It is true that the Nicaraguan people are not interested in Marxism-Leninism but only in having peace and getting enough to eat. Every public-opinion poll there shows that they see a much better opportunity for securing these ends now than with any successor connected with the Somoza landowners.
The United States, especially under the present administration, has consistently supported anti-populist tyrannies in every quarter of the world where this has been possible -- South Africa, the Sudan, South Korea, the Philippines, El Salvador, Honduras, Lebanon. Nicaragua is merely ``par for the course.''
The sort of involvement which is being promoted in Nicaragua would be certain to alienate almost every country in Spanish America, not to speak of our NATO allies and the ``third world.'' John Theobald San Diego
The article by John Lenczowski yields more questions than answers. He castigates communists in general, but when he tries to show that these misdeeds prove that the US should be supporting the ``contra'' forces in Nicaragua, his argument fails to hold water.
If there are refugees leaving Nicaragua, as he suggests, perhaps they are fleeing the contras. Even the Kissinger commission commends the Sandinistas as having made ``significant gains against illiteracy and disease.'' The contras have focused much of their murderous efforts against education and health workers in an attempt to discredit the Sandinista government. Roger H. Olson Boulder, Colo.
I disagree with the editorial claim that the way the Nicaraguan government has negotiated with the Miskito Indians throws doubt on their willingness to bargain in good faith on the Contadora peace treaty [``Sandinista gesture: more than meets the eye,'' June 5].
Nicaragua is the only Central American nation that has agreed to the draft treaty. The treaty was a compromise worked out by the four countries, and Nicaragua made major concessions in agreeing to it.
The US and its Central American allies objected to key sections of the treaty and met in Honduras to write up their own draft. To charge Nicaragua with refusing to compromise because it won't agree to the desires of US allies is unfair, especially since the draft of the US and its Central American allies is seriously defective. Paul E. Shannon Somerville, Mass.
It is curious to see the Monitor confusing the political successes of President Jos'e Napoleon Duarte with the Reagan administration's failed military policies in El Salvador [``Duarte's day,'' May 16].
``El Salvador,'' says the editorial, ``is the one region in Central America in which US policies clearly have been successful. The US has backed the forces of moderation; it has provided funds, equipment, and training to upgrade the Salvadorean Army, and has pressured the government to curb right-wing terrorism.''
Yet, on May 8, 1984, the Monitor ran a Page 1 report implicating the CIA with the activities of the Salvadorean death squads.
A bipartisan congressional study and reports from major newspapers and human rights organizations indicate that Reagan has supported, and continues to support, aerial bombardments of the Salvadorean countryside in an effort to drive civilians out of rebel zones. The US has provided $1.7 billion in aid to El Salvador over the last five years of which, according to the congressional study, only 15 percent has gone for social reform and economic development. Congress has a chance to reverse that trend or to deepen further the US military involvement in El Salvador and the region.
A US emphasis on a military solution only continues the physical and psychological shredding of a country that has known little else in recent years. Let's support the efforts at dialogue that Duarte began with rebel spokesmen Guillermo Ungo and Ruben Zamora, rather than -- as we have been doing -- bolstering the Army leaders who want a ``military solution.'' Chuck Pennacchio Philadelphia
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