Workers World congratulates Nicaragua on 45th anniversary of the Sandinista Revolution

Long before the Sandinista National Liberation Front liberated Nicaragua from the Somoza dictatorship and Yankee rule in July 1979, the name Sandino had become a beacon of struggle for national liberation throughout the world, especially for small nations fighting for liberation from vast empires.

Augusto Cesar Sandino had led a six-year guerrilla campaign against the U.S. military occupation of his country, fighting the occupiers to a standstill, until he was betrayed and executed on the orders of the vile National Guard General Anastasia Somoza Garcia in 1934, opening the door to a long dictatorship of the Somoza family.

In 1979 the world’s people watched with joyful anticipation as, 18 years after its founding in 1961, the FSLN guerrilla fighters overturned that Somoza family dictatorship. On July 19 that year, the Sandinista movement seized power and took on running the country while facing economic sabotage and a vicious counterrevolutionary (Contra) war financed by U.S. imperialism.

Though the situation appeared bleak when a pro-Yankee puppet, taking advantage of war weariness, won the February 1990 election, the Sandinista revolutionaries never gave up. They kept their influence in the army and police, which were closely tied to the people.

The pro-Yankee regimes accomplished nothing worthwhile in 16 years, and the FSLN was able to win the 2006 vote and each major election since. Meanwhile, the revolutionary government developed the infrastructure of Nicaragua—​despite the continued hostility of the Yankee empire.

Part of the struggle to defend a revolution is building international solidarity. It’s a solidarity that always goes both ways, and the Sandinistas’ successes encourage our struggle in the United States. As we join the celebrations of the July 19 Revolution in Nicaragua, we pledge to mobilize support for and solidarity with the Sandinista Revolution and the ongoing struggle of the Nicaraguan people to remain free from U.S. imperialism.