CENTRAL AMERICA- Roots of Terrorism

Roots of Terrorism Edmond de Clermont How can the Reagan administration defend arming, training and .supporting these surviving elements of the Somoza government, one of the most corrupt and repressive the hemisphere has experienced? How can Washington even pretend that an 'insurgency' so tainted can develop anything like popular support among Nicaraguans? How can the people of the United States accept without protest a gangster operation that shames rather than defends democracy.1 THE answer to the profound moral issues raised by Tom Wicker of The New York Times have their roots in earlier gangster operations throughout Latin America whose goals were the brutal annihilation of democratic opinion and institutions for the ultimate, overriding, and extensive purpose of safeguarding US corporate interests. Indubitably, the anti-Arbenz Putsch (1954) proved to be one of the most toxic exhibits. It was to be followed by others, not least of which was the terrorism of a US-backed Pinochet and its extensions in Central America today. It would, therefore, on the evidence be difficult to sustain that the US government has anything in common with human rights and democratic aspirations.