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PASTOR GENERAL'S REPORT, APRIL 20, 1984
PAGE 9
Netherlands also supported a U.N. resolution on Central America
so one-sided the U.S. was forced to veto it•••.
As a Times of London editorial says, the belief that the U.S. and
U.S.S.R. are equally menacing "has become pervasively fashionable
among the so-called enlightened classes of Europe." One danger
here is� split within�-
"If the opini ? n that the U.S. is a
lawless, reckless gunslinger spreads widely enough," Mrs.
Kirkpatrick warns, "the alliance will simply collapse
BY
mutual
consent of distrust on the European side and disgust .£!! the
American side."
The greatest puzzle of all is how political leaders who recognize
the Soviet threat to their own countries and who expect U
.s.
protection against that threat cannot see Soviet penetration into
the Western Hemisphere as something that should concern them too.
Max Singer, a founder and former president of the Hudson Institute "think
tank" wrote concerning the reality of Central America in a column in the
April 6 LOS ANGELES TIMES. His description of the problem and its "cure" is
one that the majority of the elected representatives of Congress, as well
as lead�rship circles in Europe, recoil from.
While the countries of Central America are still poor and suffer
unequal income distributions, the primary cause of the current
conflict is not economic, social or political injustice. The
current conflict results from an attempt by small groups of ideo
logical extremists to take power--and to take it from successful
pro-democratic revolutions. During the years between 1960 and
the revolutions of 1979, average incomes in Nicaragua and El Sal
vador grew at about 2% per year. (This is the same rate at which
U.S. incomes grew during our advance from poverty in the
1800s.) •••
The extremists against whom the United States is fighting are not
driven by the need to achieve social progress. They� fighting
for sectarian power•••. They have been effective not because of
their popularity or because of the justice of their cause, but
because they have massive and expert help from outside.
Cuba,
for example, has more than 10 times as many people in Nicaragua
as we have in El Salvador.••. So, while it is undoubtedly true
that poverty is a significant fact in Central America, it is not
what has produced, or what sustains, the current crisis and
war•...
Since the "hearts and minds" of the great majority of the people
have already rejected [via elections] the guerrillas, despite the
crimes of some government supporters and army officers, the only
way to end the war in El Salvador is to defeat the guerrillas.
The guerr'Tllas musti:)e"°aefeated because they arernurderous and
unpopular: they present ..n2 just claim and cannot be satisfied
except
.BY
total power.
The best way to prevent atrocities is to get the guerrillas to
stop the fighting. Those who care about human rights in El Sal
vador should be telling the guerrillas to stop their unjust war,
and undercutting their morale by telling them that they will