A Tentative Peace: How Long Will It Last?

NEWS

NICARAGUA

Issues that divide the contras and Sandinistas have also caused division among Christians.

In spite of last month’s truce between Nicaragua’s Sandinista government and the contra rebels, disagreements continue. And the same issues that divide Nicaraguans have polarized American evangelicals. Some view the agreement as a defeat for U.S. policy, a concession to Marxism-Leninism. Others believe it could lead to a peace acceptable to Western democracies.

CHRISTIANITY TODAY interviewed five Christians with informed but varying perspectives on Nicaragua: Richard Millett, Michael Cromartie, Steve Wykstra, Ervin Duggan, and Vernon Jantzi.

Millett, professor of history at Southern Illinois University, has testified before Congress 16 times on issues related to Central America. He is senior adviser for Central American affairs to the International Peace Academy. Cromartie is research associate for Protestant studies at the Ethics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C.

Wykstra is professor of philosophy at Calvin College. Duggan, who served in the state department during the Carter administration, is on the executive board of Presbyterians for Democracy and Religious Freedom. Jantzi, currently on a sabbatical leave from Eastern Mennonite College in Virginia, has served since 1964 in various missionary capacities in Costa Rica and Nicaragua.

Their comments on specific aspects of the Nicaragua debate are summarized below.

Pursuit Of Democracy

Those interviewed agree that democracy, as defined by the Arias peace plan (see sidebar on p. 36) is best for any country, and that Marxism is ultimately incompatible with democracy. “Societies that favor liberty over equality do a better job providing both liberty and equality than societies that favor equality over liberty,” said Cromartie. “It’s right for Christians to be for democracy.”

Millett pointed out, however, that Nicaragua has no tradition of democracy and that “most U.S. politicians didn’t care about democracy in Nicaragua until the Sandinistas showed up.” Millett said, “For 40 years, we defined Nicaragua under Somoza as an acceptable democracy.”

Jantzi added that in evaluating Nicaragua, “we sometimes incorrectly assume that democracy exists elsewhere in the region. If democracy is understood to mean people having a real say over what happens to them and the resources of their society, then there is no democracy in Central America, except possibly Costa Rica.”

Soviet Influence

“No one would dispute that Nicaragua is more friendly with the Soviet Union than other Central American countries are,” said Jantzi. Wykstra pointed out that in their literature before and after the 1979 revolution, “the Sandinistas held a very positive view of the ‘Soviet experiment.’ ” He added, “Marxism appeals to people because it offers a solution to their problems. Christians need to understand this in order to succeed at influencing people not to embrace Marxism’s ideological conclusions.”

Millett believes that it is a mistake to view the Nicaraguan conflict primarily as an East-West struggle. He said pluralism in Nicaragua, though limited, is greater than in most Soviet client states.

Duggan noted that “Soviet military assistance to Nicaragua since 1979 has been estimated by most experts at more than $2 billion.” Millett said it is difficult to put a dollar amount “on used weapons.”

“The Soviets have been very clear in their limits of commitment to this area,” Millett said. He added, however, that had the U.S. not displayed an interest in the region, Cuban and Soviet presence would have been accelerated.

Duggan observed that “naïve Christians of my acquaintance argue that the Sandinistas were ‘driven into the arms’ of the Soviets by a hostile United States.” Duggan was a member of the state department policy-planning staff during the Carter years. He said the U.S. gave Nicaragua more than $100 million in aid “to encourage [the Sandinistas] to embrace Western-style democracy. It was to no avail.”

Sandinista Motivation

The 1979 revolution to overthrow the Somoza government was in some ways atypical. It did not include, for example, overt antireligious campaigns that have characterized other Marxist revolutions. Those interviewed agree that at its highest level, the Sandinista leadership would like to establish a one-party, Marxist-Leninist state. “These people are not closet democrats,” said Millett.

Respondents disagree, however, on whether a true Soviet-style state is possible in Nicaragua. Millett observed that not everyone in the government is committed to totalitarianism. And he said Nicaraguan nationalism competes with Marxist ideology among the Sandinistas.

Jantzi maintains that economic factors eventually win out over ideology. “Their [Sandinista] economic policies simply do not work,” he said. “Economic realities will force them to be open to more diverse political influence.” Duggan, however, said that had it not been for U.S. intervention, “the Sandinistas would have extinguished all the remaining embers of democracy by now.”

Millett said an understanding of the Sandinistas is not complete without the “bottom line” of what it means to be a Sandinista: “More important than Marxism-Leninism, the bottom line is is to never publicly bow down to U.S. pressure.”

Religion And The Sandinistas

Duggan said that religion and Marxist ideology are as compatible as “Christian marriage and group sex.” He said churches in Nicaragua that support the government enjoy greater privileges than churches that remain independent.

Jantzi said, however, that governments, by their nature, demand ultimate authority. “I know people [in America] who are constantly harassed because they don’t pay the military portion of their taxes. Nonregistrants for the draft are imprisoned. Repression of church people who dissent is not limited to Marxist societies.”

Cromartie believes that because religion is so deeply rooted in Central America, the “Sandinista strategy is to co-opt the church.” Millett, however, compares the church in Nicaragua to the church in Poland: “How much luck have the Polish Communists had in co-opting that church in the last 43 years?”

Wykstra warned that Marxist-Leninist governments are not alone in trying to use the church: “There are well-documented incidents in which the Central Intelligence Agency has not only recruited missionaries for intelligence gathering, but has also exploited religious conviction to destabilize governments. Christians cannot afford to be naïve and uncritical about this.”

Another aspect of the religion debate is the role of sincere Nicaraguan Christians who have been criticized for supporting the government. Wykstra notes that these people had to make hard choices. “Like the revolutionaries,” he said, “they opposed a cruel dictator. They could either leave the country or try to mold the revolution.” Cromartie expressed the concern that “the leaven doesn’t influence the ideology; the ideology uses the leaven.”

Contra Support

Cromartie said “the resistance supplied by the freedom fighters has prevented a totalitarian state until now.” Wykstra said while that may be true, he nevertheless believes U.S. military support for the contras was morally wrong. He says his case rests on factual evidence of moral reprehensibility on the part of the contras.

“This is a moral nonnegotiable,” said Wykstra. “I believe as a Christian that it is wrong to sponsor a group that commits moral atrocities as routine policy, even if one calculates that this will prevent a greater moral evil.”

Cromartie said the question of the moral nature of the contras is still unsettled for him. Regardless, he said, “not to choose the lesser of two evils is to allow the greater evil to triumph.”

Millett maintains the U.S. supported “the wrong people, at the wrong time, in the wrong way, and for the wrong reasons.” Labeling the contras “thugs,” he said the U.S. should not have used military force as long as it could be reasonably argued there was a peaceful solution: “By supporting the contras, we gave the Sandinistas an excuse for everything they’ve done since.”

Millett added, however, that “just because you can demonstrate a policy is dumb doesn’t mean you can solve it by pulling the plug on the contras. That would have sent the wrong message to the world.” Millett believes the best approach is to provide only humanitrarian aid to the contras. He faults the U.S. for not exercising its moral force to cut down on contra-sponsored terrorism.

Recent History

July 1979

The Sandinistas take over Managua two days after the fall of dictator Anastasio Somoza.

August 1980

The Sandinistas postpone national elections.

August 1981

The contra efforts are launched.

November 1984

Opposition groups boycott national elections.

July 1985

Contras begin to make military gains.

October 1986

U.S. Congress approves $ 100 million in contra aid.

August 1987

Five Central American countries agree on a peace plan devised by Costa Rican President Oscar Arias. It calls for freedom of the press, open access to political power, and full respect for human rights.

December 1987

Contras launch a major military offensive, and Arias receives Nobel Prize for Peace.

February 1988

U.S. House of Representatives rejects $36 million contra aid package.

March 1988

U.S. combat troops arrive in Honduras for military exercises.

March 1988

Contras and Sandinistas reach a cease-fire agreement.

Conclusions

Christians on both sides of the debate have maintained that the other side is motivated by ideology. “In the ESA [Evangelicals for Social Action] newsletter, I’ve never seen a negative word on the Sandinistas,” said Cromartie. “I would like to see Sojourners magazine catch up with the New York Times in finding something wrong with Nicaragua’s government.”

Wykstra, however, maintains that organizations on the opposite side, such as the Institute on Religion and Democracy (IRD), have failed to reckon seriously with contra atrocities and U.S. duplicity.

“We need the IRD to inform us about how religion is processed in Soviet-style countries,” said Wykstra. “We also need Sojourners to remind us that Marxism is not the only ideological force that can co-opt religion. On specific factual disputes, such as the nature of the contras or the Sandinistas, each side tends to ignore the other’s evidence. We need more cross-examination.”

Views on the recent peace plan are mixed. Duggan said the contras have “capitulated in a barely disguised surrender” and that “Soviet and Cuban military progress in Nicaragua can now proceed in full public view, without the inconvenience of domestic opposition.”

Duggan called on U.S. Christians to “end our fixation on what the U.S. government is doing and focus on what our churches are doing.” He said, “I find it tragic that churches in America are acting as apologists for governments like Nicaragua’s,” adding that Christians “should pray for the victims of Marxist tyranny in Nicaragua. And we should prepare to open our homes and churches for the stream of refugees as communist ‘justice’ and death spread across Central America in the next few years.”

Cromartie is likewise skeptical that the recent agreement will produce peace. “More people have been killed in the twentieth century by their own leftist totalitarian governments than have died in wars,” he said. “Unfortunately, Joe McCarthy has made it difficult for us to say this. But I would think that in the 1980s it should be a badge of Christian honor to be anticommunist.”

In contrast, Jantzi is optimistic. “Permanent resolution will be brought about only by internal forces,” he said. “We should spend our energies making sure the surrounding countries make democracy work. The Sandinistas won’t be able to spread an ideology those countries don’t want. Revolution is not exported, it is imported. If there’s a demand, the supply will fill it.”

Millett believes the truce has a “better than 50–50 chance” of succeeding. He said the church should play as big a role as possible in monitoring Sandinista progress toward democracy, and he urged Christians never to sanctify the use of force by any side.

“All policies are going to be sinfully flawed,” Millett said. “They are enacted by sinful men, living in sinful societies, out of sinful motives. So there are no easy solutions, there is no cheap grace. To me, sin is the inability to predict or control the results of our actions.”

By Randy Frame.

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