1. Central America is composed of seven countries: Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama

2. Nicaragua, a Background Nicaragua, a small Central American country, was ruled by the Somoza family since 1934 Resentment among the masses grew, and in 1961 the left-leaning Frente Sandinista de Liberacion (FSLN, or Sandinista National Liberation Front) was created, a movement named for the murdered rebel leader, Augusto Cesar Sandino Jimmy Carter’s administration efforts in the country

3. A principle of anticommunist politics that Reagan had learned in the 1950s was the need to stop Communism while it was weak and far away rather than letting it spread and move closer to the U.S. (the Domino Theory)

4. Froze funding to Nicaragua after becoming president in 1981 saying that the Sandinistas were aiding left-wing anti-government forces in El Salvador In 1983-84 the Reagan administration imposed a boycott on trade with the country Counter-revolutionary group - the Contras Reagan’s case with Grenada, a Caribbean island To Reagan, the notion of a movement in Nicaragua using Marxist ideas to advance nationalist goals is a problem Reagan’s Administration Policy in Nicaragua

5. The diverse range of personalities celebrated on the Sandinistas’ stamps reflected a long-established current in Nicaraguan history. Their stamps celebrated American historical figures such as Washington, Jefferson, and Lincoln whom they considered represented nationalist outlook

6. President Daniel Ortega Saavedra’s 12 nation European trip (1985) “The policies and actions of the Government of Nicaragua constitute an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States” – President Reagan Nicaragua was in many ways a greater disrespect to U.S. conservatives than Cuba had been Nicaragua PR campaign vs. U.S. PR campaign regarding president Ortega President Reagan’s appeals failed to work, or worked only with the expenditure of enormous political capital

7. On April 29, 1985 Ortega met with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev. With Western sources of aid largely cut off, Nicaragua was in desperate need of petroleum supplies

8. The worst personal weakness that could be pinned on him was a visit to a New York optician to buy $3,000 worth of eyeglasses As the vices of dictators go, it was fairly trivial, but it accounted for hundreds of column inches, and gave the cartoonists something to work with at last and landed him the cover of Time Magazine

9. A cartoon from the Los Angeles Times, with its clever play on one of the president’s frequent mild outbreaks of skin cancer, was one of many suggesting that trust in the truthfulness of the presidency had not fully recovered from Watergate

10. Who were the Contras? To partisans, they were “freedom fighters” or, a shade more neutrally, “the democratic resistance.” To Sandinista supporters, they were “mercenaries.” The New York Times, striving for impartiality, settled on “rebels.” Perhaps no single statement damaged Reagan’s standing more than his assertion that the contras were “the moral equal to our Founding Fathers”

11. Peace Talks The Contadora group – composed of the countries of Panama, Mexico, Columbia, and Venezuela 21 Point Proposal - It covered elections, ceasefires, arms limitations, amnesty for armed dissidents, and a prohibition on interference into the internal affairs of the Central American countries President Reagan’s Kissinger Commission - supported Reagan’s policies of continued military and economic aid to El Salvador’s government and support for the contra forces against the Sandinistas

12. The Arias Plan – named after Costa Rica’s president Oscar Arias. It stated that each government was committed to an open political process for all parties, a free press, and periodic elections monitored by the UN and the Organization of American States It committed the five Central American nations to require that any country outside the region should stop providing military aid to revolutionaries Elections of 1990 - President George W.H. Bush, now president of the U.S., objected but eventually accepted the accord because all the countries of Central America supported it