Wait a second!
More handpicked essays just for you.
More handpicked essays just for you.
Essay on nicaragua
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Recommended: Essay on nicaragua
The world in the 1940’s was not the ideal place for anyone to be living. Hitler’s Nazi movements being one of the catalysts for World War II, the citizens of the world were flung into an era of disarray and discontentment in the early 40’s. After Japan’s surprise attack on the U.S., forcing the Americans into war, it soon became a whole differnet ball game. In 1941, the United Nations was formed comprised of the inter-allies and its goal to "work together, with other free peoples, both in war and in peace". Now, all corners of the world were being affected. The history of Central American countries particularly, Nicaragua will be examined in this reading. This reading will focus specifically on the history of Nicaragua from 1945 to the early 2000’s. A critical analysis of how Nicaragua and its leaders handled certain situations and whether or not the situations were handled well. In addition, only Nicaragua’s more significant events will be regarded and analyzed chronologically and collectively, while trying to avoid going in depth as to why certain events occurred as that is for another time. This paper will represent the stance that Nicaragua’s leaders handled certain situations in a manner that was not very beneficial to Nicaragua and its citizens but beneficial to those in power up until the Sandistina government took over and began to make decisions beneficial to Nicaraguans however, hindered by opposing powers.
From 1937 to 1947, General Anastasio Somoza Garçia is in power and begins the start of a brutal family dictatorship funded by the U.S essentially making Nicaragua a more U.S. influenced nation, informally of course. In June of 1945, Nicaragua was recognized as a charter member of the United Nations and become the fir...
... middle of paper ...
...s, the United States also played a major role in the process. One can say that Nicaragua has had leaders that were not fit to be leaders and leaders faced with obstacles too great to overcome while the United States played a crucial role Nicaragua’s history.
Works Cited
"Timeline: Nicaragua." Timeline: Nicaragua. N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Nov. 2013. .
"Nicaragua Timeline." BBC News. BBC, 09 Sept. 2012. Web. 1 Dec. 2013. .
"History, UN, United Nations, Charter, Chronology." UN News Center. UN, n.d. Web. 28 Nov. 2013. .
"TIMELINE." Nicaragua Time Line Chronological Timetable of Events. N.p., n.d. Web. 02 Dec. 2013..
During the second half of the twentieth century, when the Cold War was on its midst, the United States played an important role in world affairs. The increasing military power that the United States had during the Cold War, allowed it to influence the political decisions that many countries had during this time. The United States directly opposed the idea of communism, which the Soviet Union promoted. This conflict between this two great powers, lasted for five decades, and it tremendously affected the political ideologies of the world. Both countries tried to push their political and economic interest to as many nations as they could, especially those close to their borders. During this time, Guatemala was undergoing a social revolution with communist ideas. The revolution happened as a response to the social injustice committed by the United Fruit Company. The United Fruit Company started to lose land, due to a land reform passed b...
Background. In 1979, a political coalition called the Sandinistas led a revolution in Nicaragua and took control of the government. After United States President Ronald Reagan took office in 1981, he claimed the Sandinistas had set up a Communist dictatorship. He directed the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to begin aiding the contras, Nicaraguan rebels who were fighting to overthrow the Sandinistas. In 1983, however, Congress voted to limit the CIA support. In October 1984, Congress voted to cut off all aid to the contras.
Latin America went through many years of colonial rule from Spain, but around the 1800’s they began to seek their independence. The years to follow were full of rebellion and war, trying to gain their independence from colonial Spain. The “Americanos”, now believed that they were able to rule themselves, and that it was no longer necessary for Spain to keep controlling the Americas. When Latin America finally defeated Spain, new issues began to arise that were caused by many years of war, which led to chaos and a sense of imbalance in the hands of Latin America. Many of these struggles impeded Latin America’s success to rule themselves, and create their own democracy. Some of the main challenges and struggles that were most predominant in the independence of Latin America, was the economic instability caused by many years of war, the burden of colonialism from Spain, and the strong hand of the caudillos.
During the next 20 years, although not always president, Somoza maintained control of Nicaragua. Nicaragua declared war on the Axis powers on December 9, 1941. In June 1945 it became a charter member of the United Nations. Nicaragua joined the Organization of American States in 1948 and the Organization of Central American States, created to solve common Central American problems, in 1951. In 1956 Anastasio Somoza, who had resumed the presidency, was assassinated.
“So I guess in a way they are counter revolutionary, and God bless them for being that way and I guess that makes them contras, and so it makes me a contra too.” In 1979, a bitter war broke out in Nicaragua between the Sandinista Junta of National Reconstruction, the Nicaraguan government, and the Contras, a vicious rebel group. The goal of this war was simple, overthrow the Nicaraguan government and restore freedom for all Nicaraguan citizens. It was this that caught the eye of the American government and it was not too long before the U.S began to fund the Contras. Although the United States government funded the contras, they viewed them with skepticism being that they were extremely controversial.
Since the 1880’s there were tensions between the different classes of people. The poor people felt as if they did not matter as much as the wealthy. Then in 1932, a party was formed: The Central-American Socialist Party, formed by Augustin Farabudo Marti; who had led some peasants against the government. Due to the leading party, the United States decided that they had to help The El Salvadorian Military Death Squads. La Matanza also known as the Massacre, had killed over 30,000 people who might have been suspicious. In 1970, there was another brawl between the people and the government. This had made the government reinstate the death squads once again. Nine years later, there was another out burst because the people were promised a better living and that did not
Roosevelt made the decision to formalize a policy started by Herbert Hoover by which the United Sates rejected the right to intervene militarily in the internal affairs of Latin American countries (Foner 853). Moreover, this Good Neighbor Policy, had mixed results. The United States withdrew its troops from Haiti and Nicaragua during the 1930s (Foner 853). What is more, Roosevelt accepted Cuba’s repeal of the Platt Amendment, which permitted American military interventions on that island. These steps offered an overdue recognition of the sovereignty of American neighbors (Foner 853). On the other hand, while Roosevelt criticized wealthy businessmen at home, like previous presidents he was left feeling uncomfortable and dealing with undemocratic governments friendly to American business interests abroad (Foner 853). Equally important, the United States extended support to dictators with the likes of Anastasio Somoza in Nicaragua, Rafael Trujillo Molina in the Dominican Republic, and Fulgencio Batista in Cuba (Foner 853). However, in the 1930s the international crisis deepened, the Roosevelt administration had taken steps to counter German influence in Latin
Nicaragua is part of North America, though it is mainly associated with Central America and the Caribbean.
Within this strong respect for the norm of sovereignty, a security dilemma starts to emerge in the region. International recognition is vital for these countries, for it is within this construct that sovereignty is built upon—it gives individual countries a sense of independence. Since the region does share an Ibero/Luso patrimony of colonialism, their territorial disputes have not been immune to conflict. In essence, Latin American behavior is indifferent to how the rest of the international community behaves with each other. Drawing from Kenneth Waltz’ neorealism theory where he establishes the belief in a self-help system of international politics, states must rely on their own resources and capabilities defend itself from external forces. From this realist perspective we start to see a foundation to the region’s for...
During the 1950’s it was said that a young communist named Fidel Castro threated the revolutionary contagion in the hemi-sphere, he did not want any help while studying the way of Latin America. Which immediately set a spark that would dis-tant himself between the United States (Ford 1). But it seemed that Castro was looking more at Latin America’s revolutions since the Bogotaza riots of 1948-54. His example of the way of the Latin Americans began to leave remains strong. It was said that Fidel Castro went to a meeting in the Revolutionary time to cause trouble in 1959 (Skelly 1). After taking over Cuba, Castro immediately moved himself and other people who were on his side to communize the island’s nation and to turn Cuba in-to a base to
Dollar and moral diplomacy were both effective in that they reached their common aim, to extend the US’s influence internationally, whether this be through economic or military means. Both of these diplomacies were meant to greaten the US’s power abroad. Through these policies, the US effectively had control over foreign nations. For dollar diplomacy, this meant influencing the economies of foreign nations. For example, in 1909, the anti-American Nicaraguan president Jose Santos Zelaya had revoked the US’s economic privileges. To protect its investments in Nicaragua, the Secretary of State convinced wealthy American bankers to donate large sums of money to Nicaragua in exchange for control of the Nicaraguan National Bank and 51% ownership of
The birth of both the Cuban and Nicaraguan revolutions started from very similar significant factors, both international and domestic. The United States foreign policy, throughout the Cold War and much of the mid 20th Century, was aimed at stopping the spread of communism by any means. This intervention and support even extended to non-democratic military regimes such as in Cuba and Nicaragua, as the U.S. feared their unstable governments and dissatisfied people would turn to communism for change. Following the successful revolution in Cuba led by Fidel Castro and his implementation of marxist principles, as well as the loss of control in Nicaragua in 1979, U.S. fears were all but realized. U.S. interventionism,
The toppling of Anastasio Somoza Debayle marked the end of a four decades long dynasty defined by cruelty and cronyism. The Somocista government actively denied or failed to provide the majority of Nicaraguans with any meaningful access to education, health services, running drinking-water, and in many cases food. The frustrations of life under Somoza rule fueled the struggled to topple the old regime. From the groups small roots as an anti-Somoza student organization, the FSLN capitalized on Nicaragua’s increasing civil unrest of the 1970s and won the support of the country’s poor. Along with a coalition of other revolutionary fronts of varying political ideology, the FSLN rose in an armed struggle against in 1978. The insurrection culminated in the surrender of the Somoza
The Partido Guatemalteco del Trabajo (PGT) was a leftist workers party with communist members. However, it was not a strong party and "Arbenz did not appoint any Communists to the Cabinet" (SH, 21). Jose Manuel Fortuny, the leader of the PGT, did have a friendship with Arbenz and worked with Arbenz in the creation of Decree 900, which became suspicious to the United States. Communism in Latin America, however, was vastly different than Communism in the Soviet Union. Land reform was necessary to create a democracy in Guatemala, and although ideologically different, the two men recognized this. "The proposal aimed not to create Stalinist collectives..." but aimed to remove tyranny and allow the creation of capitalism to move forward in Guatemala (SH, 22). The lack of differentiating the PGT from the Soviet Union lead to anti-communism obsession without any real justification of communist threat. As PBSUCCESS ended, no evidence was found connecting Guatemala and the Soviet Union (SH, 108). The atmosphere of anti-communist obsession in the US was a motivator for the new Agency’s desire to succeed, but the lack of connection between Latin America revealed the CIA was quick to implement PBSUCCESS without much thought of the political situation in
The United Nations has made many achievements since the agreement made in 1945. The efforts of the UN helped end the apartheid in South Africa allowing the citizens of South Africa equal participation in the Elections of April 1994 followed by a consensus in choosing a form of government. 90 percent of children in developing countries attend school and 60 percent of adults in these countries can read and write thanks to the UN and the struggle to improve education in developing countries. Over 300 international treaties have been created through United Nations efforts to strengthen international law. These achievements and many others encourage people like myself to promote and praise the United Nations.