Central America Back to Square One

By William R. Doerner

The wars in Central America have never had much in common except for the angst they give the U.S. And so it was not really surprising that the same week that saw a daunting shift to the right in El Salvador also brought forth the first bipartisan U.S. policy toward Nicaragua this decade. The Bush Administration seems unsure how to manage the collapse of the long U.S. effort to build a strong centrist government in El Salvador. But it has accomplished a sharp break with the Reaganite past in cementing an accord with the Democratic Congress to wind down the futile contra war in Nicaragua. The reversal leaves U.S. policy with an uncertain future.

In El Salvador, Alfredo Cristiani, candidate of the Nationalist Republican Alliance (ARENA) party, left all rivals for the country's presidency far behind by polling an outright majority, 54% of the estimated 1 million ballots cast. Cristiani's victory, however, was muted by a voter turnout of only about 50%. The high rate of abstentions translated in part to support for the boycotting Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (F.M.L.N.), the Marxist guerrilla force that has battled for power for the past nine years.

The real loser was the centrist Christian Democratic Party of incumbent President Jose Napoleon Duarte, who is terminally ill with cancer. Having lost control of the legislature to ARENA a year ago, the Christian Democrats will hand over the chief executive's office on June 1.

The other big loser was the U.S., which has given its public support and $1.5 million a day in aid to Duarte since 1984, when his election inspired hope that the war might end. Washington desperately wanted to build the Christian Democrats into El Salvador's bulwark against the political extremes, both the Communist insurgents and ARENA, the paramilitary organization turned political party that has been closely linked to death squads responsible for thousands of political murders. But the well-intended Duarte failed either to negotiate a peace or restore his country's shattered economy; his government was widely despised as both inept and corrupt.

El Salvador's election, while fairer than some previous exercises, was nonetheless seriously flawed. Election-related violence took the lives of at least 30 civilians, including three journalists, two of them killed by army troops. Guerrilla forces effectively paralyzed public transportation and staged several attacks in outlying towns. The vote was thus held down not only by sympathy with the F.M.L.N. but also by fear of it.

Fredy Cristiani, 41, sports an image of moderation but comes from a traditionally rightist background. He is the product of privilege and a 1968 graduate of Washington's Georgetown University who heads family-owned coffee and pharmaceutical businesses. Cristiani became active in ARENA a year before the 1984 presidential election. Its candidate then, party founder Roberto d'Aubuisson, was strongly opposed by the U.S. because of his alleged ties to the notorious death squads. Party leaders, eager to transform ARENA's tough image, chose Cristiani to personify the new nonviolent party.

/ But skeptical Americans wonder whether D'Aubuisson is gone for good. He remains a Deputy in the legislature and leader emeritus of the party. D'Aubuisson himself is unabashedly confident. "Why shouldn't I have influence?" he asks.

Since his election, Cristiani has assiduously subscribed to a program of moderation, including immediate negotiations with the revolutionary guerrillas, a goal that the U.S. also now supports. "Why wait?" he asks. His yearlong campaign, however, was short on specifics. He ran instead under the appealingly vague slogan "The Change We All Want." Says Cristiani to the U.S.: "All we ask is, Judge us from our track record, not by perceptions."

Publicly, the U.S. reacted cautiously to ARENA's victory. The State Department reminded Cristiani that "our relationship with the new government will depend on its adherence to democracy and respect for human rights." Privately, officials fear El Salvador will once again find itself polarized between ultra-right and far left, with no centrist, reformist government to protect the disenfranchised masses against the violence of both.

Ironically, the U.S. is finding it easier these days to deal with Nicaragua. Late last week the White House announced a "gentleman's agreement" with Congress to allot $4.5 million a month in humanitarian aid to the Nicaraguan contras for the next eleven months while diplomats work at pushing the Sandinista regime toward democracy. The bargain ends, for the moment at least, a fractious eight-year battle between the Democrat-controlled Congress and the Executive Branch over how to handle Central America. The product of intense lobbying by Secretary of State James Baker, the agreement to fund the contras but not any more fighting may mark a sea change in U.S. policy. "I think we all have to admit," said Baker, "that the ((Reagan)) policy basically failed because we were not united."

The parties could split again: at Democratic insistence, the agreement contains a provision for cancellation in November if the contras provoke violence. But for now the Democrats and Republicans have both signed on to a plan that guarantees the 12,000-man contra army will remain intact through next February, when the ruling Sandinistas have promised to hold democratic elections. That much had been an emergency goal for Bush, since the current U.S. contra-aid program is scheduled to expire this week. Congressional Democrats, who have grown resistant to such assistance since the Iran-contra scandal, accepted this program because it effectively sets a date for the contras' disbandment and does little to interfere with the Esquipulas peace plan, adopted in August 1987 by all governments in the region.

The new aid for the contras is clearly a kind of mustering-out pay designed to keep the contras, currently bivouacked in Honduras, fed and clothed for another year, until a more permanent solution is worked out. To that end, the plan calls for the "voluntary reintegration" of the contras into Nicaraguan political life or their "voluntary regional relocation," language that makes it evident they are finished as a fighting force, barring an act of major treachery by the Sandinistas.

Baker's next step will be to hold out a list of economic and diplomatic incentives to reward democratic reforms in Nicaragua. Such a list has not yet been compiled, but the rewards will probably include the presence of an American Ambassador in Managua for the first time in nearly a year, a gradual lifting by Washington of its almost four-year-old trade embargo, and loans through the Inter-American Development Bank.

Baker's advisers have also tentatively concluded that any successful policy in Central America must include an end to Soviet support of the Sandinistas and the F.M.L.N. Thus Baker expressed revived interest in a 15-month-old proposal by Moscow for both superpowers to stop funding their clients in the region, originally rejected by Washington because it implied equal rights to intervene in hemispheric affairs. Washington still considers the idea of joint cutoffs merely the "starting point for negotiations," but at least it is willing now to respond constructively to the Soviet initiative. The important thing is that on this and other matters the U.S. is once again using diplomacy -- after recognizing the failure of its halfhearted military pressure -- to seek solutions to problems in a region vital to its security.

With reporting by Ricardo Chavira/Washington and John Moody/San Salvador