The War is Not Over

Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega was widely criticized in this country for his response to the U.S. House of Representatives' February 3 vote against contra aid. Apparently, administration officials and members of Congress had expected the Sandinista leader to gush with gratitude, to thank Uncle Sam for bringing peace to his beleaguered country, or to otherwise ingratiate himself.

But Ortega did nothing of the sort. Instead, he spoke in what American reporters called a "militant" and "starkly unconciliatory" tone, noting that the vote against contra aid "doesn't mean the war is over."

Journalists and politicians trying to understand Ortega's remarks suggested that perhaps his hard-line approach had been directed toward disaffected Sandinista party militants. That may, indeed, have been one reason Ortega didn't mince words. But the fact is that, at least on one score, Ortega was right. The war is not over.

It is a message that all of us -- especially those who have been working for years to end contra aid and to bring peace and justice to Central America -- would do well to heed, even as we celebrate a rare political victory. As we continue to work for peace, we must neither overestimate the importance of a vote against contra aid nor underestimate the resistance to peace of the contras and other repressive forces in Central America.

Less than 24 hours after the House vote, the truth of Ortega's message and the limited significance of congressional action were already being made evident. On the afternoon of February 4, a bus carrying some 60 civilian passengers was traveling from Ocotal to the town of Quilali, Nicaragua. The bus was full of children, who had just been released from a nearby hospital, and parents anxious to get them home.

But contras were waiting in the bushes along the roadside, and they activated a remote-controlled claymore land mine as the bus drove over it. While bodies were still flying from the force of the explosion, the contras opened fire on the children and other passengers.

Seventeen Nicaraguan civilians -- 10 men, two women, and five children -- were killed in the attack. Another 21 children were wounded, according to reports by Witness for Peace. Sixteen-year-old Bertilda Rivera, who suffered a punctured lung in the attack, asked, "Why did they ambush us if we were in a civilian bus?"

Bertilda's question is one that tens of thousands of civilian Nicaraguans have asked during the six years of the Reagan administration's proxy war against Nicaragua. According to statistics gathered by the Nicaraguan government, an average of 15 people a day have died in the war during those six years. Fifteen people a day in a nation of three million people.

Just two days after the mine attack, the contras struck again. Sandinista authorities in the nearby town of Wiwili had organized a march to protest the Quilali attack. About 50 residents, including children and four men in Sandinista uniforms, were walking along the outskirts of Wiwili shouting anti-contra slogans when a contra threw a grenade into the crowd. The blast killed nine of the marchers and injured 32, almost all of them civilians.

THE CONTRAS AND THEIR SUPPORTERS have made it clear that they refuse to be stopped by a single, narrow vote of the House. The same day that the contras killed 17 Nicaraguan civilians, private U.S. citizens were announcing plans to continue contra support. Denouncing the House's vote for peace as a "vote for continued communist tyranny," they pledged to raise millions of dollars in private contra aid, saying they hoped the contras would use some of the money to buy weapons.

Two of the private contra fundraisers represented conservative U.S. evangelical groups. They talked about doing God's work. But many evangelicals in Nicaragua see "God's work" quite differently. Norma Martinez is an evangelical Christian whose husband Felix was killed in the Quilali attack. She has five children to raise, alone now. "God grant us that the United States will stop giving aid to the people who did this," she said.

The fighting and the misery it brings continue in Central America. Even as we take one small step for peace, the enemies of peace continue -- and increase -- their work. We can be saddened and frustrated by this, but we shouldn't be surprised. The United States and its puppet Central American governments have long demonstrated that despotic power for a rich few is more important than a just peace for the poor majority. And for forces more interested in power than in peace, the mere prospect of peace is threatening.

That is why the Reagan administration has tried to kill the Arias peace plan; it knows that the full implementation of the plan would lessen U.S. influence in Central America. And that is why fighting in all the region's wars has increased since the signing of the peace accords. Because the provisions of the peace plan might limit or deny them power, the contras have conducted more raids and killed more civilians; the Salvadoran rebels have blown up more bridges; the Salvadoran military has fought more battles; and government-supported death squads in El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras have resumed assassinations, kidnappings, and torture.

During the House debate on the contra aid proposal, nearly every representative who argued against it said something about "giving peace a chance." But peace must be given far more than just a chance if it is to become a reality. For the sake of our sisters and brothers in Central America, we must work to build upon that foundation -- however shaky it may be -- and, as scripture says, "make every effort to do what leads to peace."

On this score, our brothers and sisters of the Christian base communities in Nicaragua recently offered wisdom and encouragement in a letter to U.S. Christians:

What we see coming for this year are the powers of death and injustice. But we also glimpse the presence of the God of life and of peace ...

We shall have peace, if the spirit and the letter of the [peace accords] are observed ... We shall have peace, if there can be a direct dialogue between the governments of the USA and Nicaragua ...

We advise you that those millions of dollars [that have been] approved for death will not in the long run destroy our revolution, nor the hopes, nor the mystique of the struggle of our people, because these hopes are also based on the certainty we have in the resurrection of Jesus, which guarantees the triumph of just causes over a system based on self-interest and personal gain ...

We want to reach out our hands to touch yours, to unite our hearts and to sing songs of struggle and hope. We place ourselves in the care of God, believing that those who trust in God will not be disappointed.

Vicki Kemper was news editor of Sojourners when this article appeared.