82. Intelligence Memorandum Prepared in the Central Intelligence Agency1
Nicaragua’s Sandinista National Liberation Front
Summary
[1 line not declassified] the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) currently has about 1,200 guerrilla activists. Roughly half of these are in Nicaragua at any one time, while most of the others are concentrated in Costa Rica, Honduras, Panama, and Venezuela. The number of active supporters and sympathizers is much larger and probably growing, but impossible to determine exactly.
The FSLN—Marxist, revolutionary, and pro-Castro—is now split into three primary factions, the strongest of which is increasingly willing to cooperate with non-communist groups in the struggle against Somoza.2
The FSLN’s Cuban connection dates back to its founding in the early 1960s. Confirmed Cuban support is presently more modest than in the past, but the Castro regime is continuing to provide training, [Page 225] sanctuary, documentation, and communications and propaganda support.
[Omitted here is the body of the report.]
- Source: Central Intelligence Agency, Office of Support Services (DI), Job 80T00634A: Production Case Files (1978), Box 3, Folder 79: Nicaragua’s Sandinista National Liberation Front. Secret; [handling restriction not declassified]. Prepared by the Latin America Division of the Office of Regional and Political Analysis at the request of the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State, Bureau of Inter-American Affairs.↩
- The three FSLN factions were: the Terciario, the Popular Prolonged War, and the Proletarian Tendency.↩