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Marine-Guardia analyst concludes bandits have
organized a civic guard
.jpg)
One of the most
important and least understood
aspects of the rebellion is how Sandino & the
Sandinistas tried to
create a fully independent and autonomous
nation-state in the mountains of Las Segovias,
with its own sense of national identity and its
own lines of civil and military authority. Sandinista authorities were authorized to gather
and funnel material goods and information from
their zones to the central command; to gain
recruits; and to spread the word about Sandino's
nationalist vision. Cultural constructions
of authority were central to everything
happening here.
Here a Guardia
analyst finally 'gets it', at least in
a rudimentary way. Carefully reading a
captured Sandinista letter, he offers his
superiors a glimpse into something much bigger —
that the Sandinistas were basically working to
build a sovereign rebel republic across much of
northern and central Nicaragua. This was
something the US-dominated military should have
already known, and had a hard time learning (and
relearning) in the coming months and years.
The document thus speaks mainly to the deep
ignorance about the enemy that pervaded the US
intelligence apparatus at this time, a month
before the US-supervised elections that were the
official centerpiece of the whole intervention.
In
fact the 'civic guard' had been organized more
than a year before, in the founding of the Ejército
Defensor. From this item and others like
it, we learn that Marine-Guardia intelligence
had no idea that the Ejército
Defensor even existed. Crude,
oversimplified, but essentially accurate, this
snippet suggested what the EDSN was in fact most focused
on: acquiring material supplies,
dominating flows of information, and spreading the word about Sandino
& Sandinismo. Substitute "insurgent" for
"bandit" and these 66 words effectively
summarized the EDSN's most important quotidian
operations. There is no way to
know who wrote it. It has the feel of a
Nicaraguan member of the Guardia translating the
originating message to his English-only
superior, who wrote it up for the weekly intel
report. (left: high-res 6 MB JPEG
file of the founding Pauta of the EDSN, Sept.
1927, courtesy Walter C. Sandino).
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[October 8, 1928] Following is an extract from
B-2 Report of 11th Regiment, Ocotal:
... (b) The "Civic Guard" which has been
organized in at least one section (Nueva
Segovia) is an important agency in the bandit
supply. The members of this organization collect
food and other supplies for the bandits and have
them ready for use when called upon. The also
act as spies, and in addition, assist in
propaganda work by conveying messages throughout
the countryside by word of mouth.
IR28.10.08: 8,
RG127/43A/3l
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Ancillary Document
The
foregoing report was evidently based mainly on
the following letter from José Antonio Pérez to
Ciriaco Picado, 15 July 1928
(EDSN
28.07.15),
seized along with Ciriaco Picado on 18 September
1928:
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General Barracks of the Defenders of National
Rights for Nicaragua.
The undersigned, 2nd Chief of Military
Operations for this zone, lets it be known that
by authority of my superior, from this day on,
Captain Ciriaco Picado has been named Chief of
Civicos of Guallava, in the jurisdication of San
Lucas, and that he is hereby authorized to
develop the interests of the Party of proper
government of Nicaragua. Be watchful for the
well-being of those who belong to our Party and
do not leave them subject to the traitors, the
invaders and the pro-Yankees, keeping in mind to
let this Barracks know, once in a while, of all
operations that you make and keep in agreement
with the other Chiefs of the Civicos of that
place. When they seem to be in danger and you
need help promptly, send word quickly to this
command.
Patria y Libertad
/s/ J. Antonio Perez M., 2nd Chief of Military
Operations
José Antonio Pérez
Maldonado, 1st Chief under Ortez
Engl. only. IR28.10.08: 15. RG127/43A/3
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