The media war against Nicaragua

Abstract

“Hostility” describes U.S. policy toward the Nicaraguan government virtually from the time the new revolutionary junta came to power in July 1979 until February 1990, when the Nicaraguan people voted the Sandinista Front for National Liberation (FSLN) out of power. They were elections largely shaped by the U.S. war against that regime. The U.S. sponsored a counterrevolutionary army (the “Contras”) whose terror campaigns devastated the Nicaraguan infrastructure, and provoked the outrage even of many Americans, including some U.S. political leaders. Critics of U.S. policy demanded a change from war to peace. For a time, Congress partially heeded these calls, and barred direct U.S. support for any kind of violent overthrow of the Nicaraguan government.