THIS IS THE
HOMEPAGE
for more than 167 multi-page "Serial
Intelligence Reports" (IR-Docs) that
were the principal vehicles by which
information on the war against the
Sandinista "bandits" was shared among
members of the US Marine Corps and
Guardia Nacional de Nicaragua.
These documents were thus key
instruments their overall
counterinsurgency campaign against the
rebel movement, and contain a goldmine
of information on myriad aspects of the
war.
Ironically, as sophisticated
and extensive as the Marine-Guardia
intelligence gathering apparatus was, it
was nowhere near as effective as the
Sandinista "grapevine" system of
communication. This was one of the
key realities and major ironies of this
asymmetrical war: a huge
imbalance with regard to intelligence
and information. As the Marines &
Guardia recognized, Sandinista
intelligence capacities were far
superior to their own, and constituted
their key strategic advantage throughout
the war — an advantage
that eroded over time but
that remained strong until the peace accords of
February 1933. As intelligence analyst
Major Hans Schmidt acknowledged in February
1928, "There is no doubt but that Sandino and
the generals operating with him are reliably
informed as to our every movement. Their knowledge
is so complete as to enable them to avoid us at
every turn." (B-2
Report, Managua, IR28.02.19)
While the
rebels, as a rule, did not
commit their intelligence to paper, the
Marines & Guardia did — the good intel,
the questionable intel, the lousy intel
— all bundled up together in each of
these fascinating reports. The
information from various stations &
reports compiled in these serial
intelligence reports constitutes one of
the most valuable sources for historians
seeking to reconstruct the complex
events of the Sandino rebellion and the
counterinsurgency that sought to crush
it.
There were several types of
Serial Intelligence Report:
B-2:
Brigade Intelligence (the Marine Corps
2nd Brigade was the unit deployed to
Nicaragua)
R-2:
Regiment Intelligence (numerous
regiments in the 2nd Brigade)
Bn-2:
Batallion Intelligence (several
batallions in each regiment)
GN-2:
Guardia Nacional Intelligence, starts
September 1930 best I can tell.
Transcription
of these documents is still in
progress (they are generally of such
poor quality that they cannot be scanned
and OCR'ed). For the available IR-Docs,
scroll down to January 1928:
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