ENCYCLOPEDIA OF Espionage, Intelligence, and Security Volume ...

Americas, Modern U.S. Security Policy and Interventionsdefense launched a coup, killing Bishop and half thepolitburo, including the minister of education, who waspregnant. After the new dictator placed the entire islandunder house arrest, Reagan sent in the military to protectsome 600 U.S. students and other citizens there.El Salvador. Meanwhile, the Reagan administration hadbecome involved in another tiny country, El Salvador,which was caught in a battle between the Marxist FMLN,the right-wing ARENA Party under Roberto d’Aubisson,and the Christian Democrats under Duarte. The FMLNenjoyed considerable support from U.S. leftists, whoclaimed that Washington was backing d’Aubisson.Ironically, throughout the period from 1982 to 1984,the CIA was funneling money into efforts in favor ofDuarte and against d’Aubisson. For example, when Europeanjournalists visited the country in 1983, the CIA providedthem with negative information on the right-wingleader. Despite the fact that Washington backed the liberalregime, El Salvador remained fraught with problems, asrightist and leftist death squads battled over the country.In 1989, Duarte was voted out in favor of an ARENAcandidate.Nicaragua. The Reagan administration provided considerablymore support for efforts against a regime openlyaligned with the Kremlin: the Sandinistas in Nicaragua.U.S. actions in Nicaragua were closely tied with undertakingsin neighboring countries, and one of Reagan’s aimswas to keep the Sandinistas from exporting their revolution.In this, he would be strongly opposed by congressionalDemocrats, and by U.S. intellectuals and entertainers,many of whom visited Nicaragua and proclaimedtheir support for the regime.Beginning in 1981, the CIA began training a numberof anti-Sandinista groups, collectively known as Contras,and sponsored the production of two training manuals,Freedom Fighters Manual and Psychological Operationsin Guerrilla Warfare. When these manuals later becamepublic, their contents prompted an outcry against CIAtactics, leading to an internal investigation.The agency also conducted its own efforts against theregime in Managua, despite the Boland Amendment tothe War Powers Act of 1973, passed by Congress in December1982. Boland prevented the CIA or Department ofDefense from using funds to overthrow the Nicaraguangovernment. In 1984, Congress passed a second BolandAmendment in response to the CIA mining of harbors onNicaragua’s Atlantic and Pacific coasts. In 1986, however,Congress appropriated $70 million in aid for the Contras.(The Boland Amendment was later repealed.)At the same time, the Reagan administration and theCIA became involved in an effort to sell weapons to Iran,secure the release of hostages in Lebanon, and divertfunds to the Contras. A pro-Syrian newspaper in Lebanonbroke the story of Iran-Contra in November 1986, and formany months thereafter, the administration would becaught up in the scandal. Thanks to support for the Contras,combined with reductions in Soviet aid to the Sandinistas,the two sides signed a ceasefire agreement in 1987. TheContras agreed to free elections in February 1990, andthese resulted in the election of Violeta Chamorro, a memberof the liberal democratic opposition.Panama and Haiti. Although opponents of U.S. policy inLatin America cite early CIA alliances with Noriega, formost of his career as Panamanian dictator, Noriega wasopenly opposed to the United States and closely alignedwith Castro. He was also involved in drug trafficking, forwhich he was indicted by a Florida grand jury in February,1988.In 1989, President H. W. Bush invested $10 million inclandestine radio broadcasts against Noriega, and inDecember launched Operation Just Cause. The operation,which involved 27,000 U.S. troops, was at the time thelargest U.S. military undertaking since Vietnam. Its statedgoals were the protection of the Panama Canal and the35,000 U.S. citizens living in Panama, as well as the removalof Noriega himself, promoting democracy, andbringing an end to drug activities in the country. Theoperation resulted in Noriega’s capture and trial.Less clear were the results of a military operation inHaiti, undertaken by the administration of William J. Clintonin 1994. The purpose was to restore President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who had been deposed by a militarycoup, and in that regard, the operation was successful.However, political, economic, and social conditions on thetroubled island continued to erode, and in March, 1999,the remaining U.S. forces departed the island amid continuinginstability.The war on drugs. From Reagan’s time onward, the UnitedStates has been involved in the war on drugs to stop theflow of cocaine, marijuana, and other narcotics from Colombia,Peru, Bolivia, and other countries. The U.S. DrugEnforcement Administration (DEA) has been, and continuesto be, involved in this war, as is the CIA. The CIA hasundertaken cooperative efforts with the governments ofColombia and Peru to interdict drug traffickers. Part of thisprogram is an airborne initiative whereby CIA and nationalair force personnel shoot down aircraft whose pilotsrefuse to identify themselves. In many regards, theseefforts have been successful, and helped to reduce theflow of drugs; however, in April 2001, miscommunicationsresulted in the Peruvian shootdown of a plane carryinga U.S. missionary family. The mother and her sevenmonth-olddaughter were killed.In the post-Cold War environment, drug gangs are amuch greater threat to stability in Latin America than are30 Encyclopedia of Espionage, Intelligence, and Security