"Reagan Was the Butcher of My People:"

[Michel Collon <michel.collon at skynet.be>]

Tuesday, June 8th, 2004
"Reagan Was the Butcher of My People:"
Fr. Miguel D'Escoto Speaks From Nicaragua

<http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/06/08/1453219>http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/06/08/1453219
We go to Managua, Nicaragua to speak with Fr. Miguel D'Escoto, a Catholic
priest who was Nicaragua's Foreign Minister under the Sandinista government
in the 1980s.
The 8 years Reagan was in office represented one of the most bloody eras in
the history of the Western hemisphere, as Washington funneled money,
weapons and other supplies to right wing death squads. And the death toll
was staggering - more than 70,000 political killings in El Salvador, more
than 100,000 in Guatemala, 30,000 killed in the contra war in Nicaragua. In
Washington, the forces carrying out the violence were called "freedom
fighters." This is how Ronald Reagan described the Contras in Nicaragua:
"They are our brothers, these freedom fighters and we owe them our help.
They are the moral equal of our founding fathers."

RUSH TRANSCRIPT

FATHER MIGUEL D'ESCOTO: First of all, let me start out by saying that, of
course, Reagan is now dead. And I, for one, would like to say only nice
things about him. I'm not insensitive to the feelings of many U.S. people
mourning president Reagan, but as I pray that god in his infinite mercy and
goodness forgive him for having been the butcher of my people, for having
been responsible for the deaths of some 50,000 Nicaraguans, we cannot, we
should not ever forget the crimes he committed in the name of what he
falsely labeled freedom and democracy.

More perhaps than any other U.S. President, Reagan convinced many around
the world that the U.S. is a fraud, a big lie. Not only was it not
democratic, but in fact the greatest enemy of the right of
self-determination of peoples. Reagan, as you mentioned just a few minutes
ago, was known as the great communicator, and I believe that that is true
only if one believes that to be a great communicator means to be a good
liar. That he was for sure. He could proclaim the biggest lies without even
as much as blinking an eyelash. Hearing him talk about how we were
supposedly persecuting Jews and burning down non-existent synagogues, I was
led to believe really, that Reagan was possessed by demons. Frankly, I do
believe Reagan at that time as much as Bush today was indeed possessed by
the demons of manifest destiny.

Of course, as I say this, I'm quite aware that to the people of say for
example, Project for a New American Century, that is counted as a big plus.
Because of Reagan and his spiritual heir George W. Bush, the World today is
far less safe and secure as it has ever been. Reagan in fact was an
international outlaw. He came to the Presidency of the United States
shortly after Samosa, a Dictator that the U.S. has imposed over Nicaragua
for practically half a century; had been deposed by Nicaraguan Nationalists
under the leadership of the Sandinista Liberation Front. To Reagan
Nicaragua had to be re-conquered. He blamed Carter for having lost
Nicaragua, as if Nicaragua ever belonged to anyone else other than the
Nicaraguan people. That was then the beginning of this war that Reagan
invented, and mounted and financed and directed, the Contra War. About
which he continually lied to the People. Helping the United States people
to be the most ignorant people around the world. I said i! gnorant, I don't
say not intelligent. But the most ignorant people around the world about
what the United States does abroad. People don't even begin to see -- if
they did, they would rebel. And so, he lied to the people, as Bush lies to
the people today and as they push on, thinking that the United States is
above every law, human or divine. And we took the United States, Reagan's
United States, his government to court, the World Court. I was Foreign
Minister at that time here in Nicaragua. I was responsible for that. And
the United States government received the harshest sentence, the harshest
condemnation ever in the history of world justice. In spite of the fact
that the United States since the early 1920's has been proclaiming to the
world that one of the proofs of its moral superiority as compared to other
countries around the world is the fact that it abides by the international
law and was obedient to the world court when the United States was brought
to the world c! ourt in Nicaragua and received the condemnation that ! the
Unit ed Sta tes failed to heed the sentence and they till owe Nicaragua by
now must be between 20,000 and $30,000 million at the time when we left
government that the damages caused by that Reagan war was over $17 billion,
and this, according to very moderate estimators of damage, people from the
United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America, people from Harvard
University and from Oxford and from the University of Paris basically this
is the team that was pulled together to estimate the damage. The United
States was ordered to pay for the damage. Bush never even wanted to talk to
me about it. I said, "Well, let's have a meeting so that you comply with
your sentence of the court." He said to me in two different letters that
there was nothing to talk about.

So, Reagan did damage to Nicaragua beyond the imaginations of the people
who are hearing me now. The ripple effects of that; criminal murderous
interventions in my country will go on for what, 50 years or more.