From Publishers Weekly
Dillon, a reporter for the Miami Herald , offers the first comprehensive examination of the civil war in Nicaragua from the Contra side. He focuses largely on the work of Luis Fley, the Contras' chief legal investigator who, uncovering tortures, rapes and murders committed by the Contra commanders against their own peasant troops, brought the criminals before a tribunal. Dillon analyzes the rivalry among U.S. agencies for control of the Contras--the CIA, the State Department, the Pentagon, the Agency for International Development and the National Security Council all had a crack at it--and shows how Lt. Col. Oliver North secretly aided and advised the Contra army during the U.S. military-aid cutoff from 1984 to 1986. The book provides a fresh look at the occasion of the most controversial U.S. foreign policy since Vietnam, an immensely complicated struggle in which some 30,000 died.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
Basing his book on extensive interviews, veteran journalist Dillon (Miami Herald) chronicles the rise and fall of the Nicaraguan contra movement, the proxy agent for the U.S. war in Nicaragua in the last decade. Interspersed with the larger story are the personal stories of Luis Fley, contra commander and top legal investigator of human rights violations, and Luis Moreno Payan, ex-Guardian lieutenant and contra counter-intelligence chief who committed human rights abuses. Dillon depicts with dramatic force the internal dynamics of the contra movement and its relationships with its U.S. sponsors. Offering a broader scope than Christopher Dickey's With the Contras: A Reporter in the Wilds of Nicaragua ( LJ 3/1/86) and written in a more dramatic style than R. Pardo-Maurer's The Contras 1980-89 (Praeger, 1990), this volume brings to life the diversity and the resultant internal wranglings of the military wing of the contras. Highly recommended.
- James Rhodes, Luther Coll., Decorah, Ia.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.
- James Rhodes, Luther Coll., Decorah, Ia.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.
