The Contras were the various U.S.-backed and funded right-wing rebel groups that were active from 1979 to 1990 in opposition to the Marxist Sandinista Junta of National Reconstruction Government in Nicaragua, which came to power in 1979 following the Nicaraguan Revolution. Among the separate contra groups, the Nicaraguan Democratic Force (FDN) emerged as the largest by far. In 1987, virtually all Contra organizations were united, at least nominally, into the Nicaraguan Resistance.
José Daniel Ortega Saavedra is a Nicaraguan politician serving as President of Nicaragua since 2007. Previously he was leader of Nicaragua from 1979 to 1990, first as coordinator (1979–1985) of the Junta of National Reconstruction, and then as President of Nicaragua (1985–1990). During his first term, he implemented policies to achieve leftist reforms across Nicaragua. In later years, Ortega's left-wing radical politics cooled significantly, leading him to pursue pro-business policies and even rapprochement with the Catholic Church. As a part of this, his government adopted strong anti-abortion policies, and his rhetoric took on a new, strongly religious tenor, despite formerly having professed atheism.
Nicaragua is a nation in Central America. It is located about midway between Mexico and Colombia, bordered by Honduras to the north and Costa Rica to the south. Nicaragua ranges from the Caribbean Sea on the nation's east coast, and the Pacific Ocean bordering the west. Nicaragua also possesses a series of islands and cays located in the Caribbean Sea.
The Sandinista National Liberation Front is a socialist political party in Nicaragua. Its members are called Sandinistas in both English and Spanish. The party is named after Augusto César Sandino, who led the Nicaraguan resistance against the United States occupation of Nicaragua in the 1930s.
Anastasio "Tachito" Somoza Debayle was the President of Nicaragua from 1 May 1967 to 1 May 1972 and from 1 December 1974 to 17 July 1979. As head of the National Guard, he was de facto ruler of the country between 1972 and 1974, even during the period when he was not the de jure ruler.
Benjamin Ernest "Ben" Linder, was an American engineer. While working on a small hydroelectric dam in rural northern Nicaragua, Linder was killed by the Contras, a loose confederation of rebel groups funded by the U.S. government.
The autopsy report stated that Linder had gunshot wounds to the back of the legs, while on the ground he suffered multiple wounds to his face and died from a close range gunshot to the head. The other two men were also executed in the same way. It is unknown if they were similarly tortured first. There was no mention in Linder’s autopsy report of grenade fragments.
Edén Atanacio Pastora Gómez was a Nicaraguan politician and guerrilla who ran for president as the candidate of the Alternative for Change (AC) party in the 2006 general elections. In the years prior to the fall of the Somoza regime, Pastora was the leader of the Southern Front, the largest militia in southern Nicaragua, second only to the FSLN in the north. Pastora was nicknamed Comandante Cero.
The Nicaraguan Revolution encompassed the rising opposition to the Somoza dictatorship in the 1960s and 1970s, the campaign led by the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) to oust the dictatorship in 1978–79, the subsequent efforts of the FSLN to govern Nicaragua from 1979 to 1990, and the Contra War, which was waged between the FSLN-led government of Nicaragua and the United States–backed Contras from 1981 to 1990. The revolution marked a significant period in the history of Nicaragua and revealed the country as one of the major proxy war battlegrounds of the Cold War, attracting much international attention.
William D. "Bill" Stewart was an American journalist with ABC News who was murdered by Nicaraguan government National Guard ("Guardia") forces while reporting on the Nicaraguan Revolution as Sandinista rebel forces were closing in on the capital city of Managua in 1979. Footage of his execution was repeatedly broadcast on network television, resulting in an uproar in the United States against the Somoza regime.
Adolfo Calero Portocarrero was a Nicaraguan businessman and the leader of the Nicaraguan Democratic Force, the largest rebel group of the Contras, opposing the Sandinista government.
El Cuá is a municipality in the Jinotega department of Nicaragua. Formerly part of the municipality of El Cuá-Bocay, it became a separate municipality in 2002. Its population rose from 43,305 in 2005 to 56,897 in 2012.
Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras, and the Crack Cocaine Explosion is a 1998 book by journalist Gary Webb. The book is based on "Dark Alliance", Webb's three-part investigative series published in the San Jose Mercury News in August 1996. The original series claimed that, in order to help raise funds for efforts against the Nicaraguan Sandinista government, the CIA supported cocaine trafficking into the US by top members of Nicaraguan Contra Rebel organizations and allowed the subsequent crack epidemic to spread in Los Angeles. The book expands on the series and recounts media reaction to Webb's original newspaper exposé.
This is a bibliography of selected works about Nicaragua.
Jewish Nicaraguans or Nicaraguan Jews are Nicaraguans of Jewish ancestry who were born in or have immigrated to Nicaragua. They are part of the ethnic Jewish diaspora.
CIA activities in Nicaragua have been ongoing since the 1980s. The increasing influence gained by the Sandinista National Liberation Front, a left-wing and anti-imperialist political party in Nicaragua, led to a sharp decrease in Nicaragua–United States relations, particularly after the Nicaraguan Revolution. In 1981, President Ronald Reagan authorized the Central Intelligence Agency to support the Contras, a right-wing Nicaraguan political group to combat the influence held by the Sandinistas in the Nicaraguan government. Various anti-government rebels in Nicaragua were organized into the Nicaraguan Democratic Force, the first Contra group, at the behest of the CIA. The CIA also supplied the Contras with training and equipment, including materials related to torture and assassination. There have also been allegations that the CIA engaged in drug trafficking in Nicaragua.
Yvan Leyvraz was a Swiss employee of Solidar Suisse and part of the international solidarity brigades in Nicaragua after the presidential election victory of Daniel Ortega and the Sandinistas and the ensuing Contra war. He was the second Swiss national to be killed by US-supported contras in Nicaragua.
Petrona Hernández López, born Maria de la Cruz, better known as Amanda Aguilar, was a revolutionary from Nicaragua.
Joan Kruckewitt is an American journalist and writer. Kruckewitt has reported on Latin America and Europe for ABC Radio, Pacifica Radio, RKO, Mutual, NBC, Monitoradio, the Canadian Broadcasting Company, and NPR. She is the author of The Death of Ben Linder: The Story of a North American in Sandinista Nicaragua and has contributed to other books.
Hugo Torres Jiménez was a Nicaraguan Sandinista guerrilla and military leader who was a brigadier general in the Nicaraguan Armed Forces. During the Sandinista National Liberation Front effort to overthrow the Somoza family regime, Torres was the only guerrilla who participated in both the 1974 Christmas party raid that freed future President Daniel Ortega among other prisoners, and the 1978 raid on the National Palace, freeing another 60 political prisoners. In the late 1990s he became a critic of Ortega, leaving the FSLN to join the Sandinista Renovation Movement and later its successor the Democratic Renewal Union, serving as vice-president of both parties. In June 2021 he was part of a wave of arrests of opposition figures by the Ortega administration. He died the following February.
