El Salvador: A dirty war, a brilliant victory

By
Jorge Gómez Barata                                                        Read Spanish Version    

The
popular victory that catapulted Mauricio Funes to the presidency of
El Salvador transcends the borders of the smallest Latin American
country to become a landmark. Two hundred years after the native
oligarchies (dependent on foreign capital) took over the republic as
booty, following an independence that was never consummated, the
Salvadoran people trims its spaces to the minimum.

Another
novelty is that the Farabundo Martí Front for National Liberation
joins the armed movements in Latin America that evolved from
guerrilla warfare to political struggle, so that, using traditional
means, they could challenge the dependent and pro-imperialist
oligarchy, defeat it on its own grounds and with its own weapons and
rise to power. Thus, they prove that, at present, armed struggle is
more of a road than a destination and can be taken up as part of the
global political effort.

In
El Salvador, all this is even more significant because the struggle
and victory are part of the same process of popular resistance to the
most immoral and dirty of the interventionist wars waged by U.S.
imperialism in the hemisphere. In addition, because it happens in an
exceptional context, it offers the administration of Barack Obama the
first opportunity for going from words to deeds and proving that
Washington is beginning to change.

The
fact that the new U.S. president, the most popular president since
Franklin D. Roosevelt, did not let the opportunity pass by and
personally congratulated the new president, who rises to power from a
young, modern and moderate left, despite the efforts against by the
man who left the White House in the past quarter, is evidence of an
unprecedented will.

Never
before, at no time, did the Empire act so thoroughly, maneuvered with
more resources and compromised its political credibility so much to
change the course of history in Central America (especially in El
Salvador) as it did under Reagan. At the same time, never before did
the U.S. meet in the hemisphere with a resistance as bitter, genuine
and decisive as the resistance raised by the Salvadoran people.

In
no other country had a political vanguard, risen from the core of the
people, shown the ability to summon the people and the youth together
to a revolutionary armed struggle. No other country had shown such
inborn talent to wage a war of national liberation that, because of
its lethal nature and the size of its operations, was comparable to
Vietnam, except that occupied a space many times smaller.

Twelve
years of intense struggle, and casualty lists estimated at more than
70,000 dead, out of a population that didn’t even reach 6 million
inhabitants, illustrate the bitter resistance raised against the
might of the United States, which spent in its confrontation with the
revolutionary forces in that small republic as much as all the money
it had invested in counterinsurgency throughout Latin America.

That
feat demonstrates the enormous power of convocation of the
revolutionary program, which managed to bring together — in a bundle
that could be neither undone nor broken — Catholics, leftist men and
women, nationalist and anti-imperialist elements, and all the social
actors who were interested in the struggle against poverty and
exclusion, in whose flags we see the legitimate images of Farabundo
Martí and Arnulfo Romero.

Despite
their maturity, these forces need to remain alert, facing the
traditional enemies, dealing with their own timetables and the
impatience of those who, driven by a wave of enthusiasm, want to
advance much too fast and who demand, early in the process, results
that require time, resources and opportunities.

Maximalism
and friendly fire are factors that could become apparent and need to
be prevented, without disassembling or discouraging any factor, and
without forgetting that the road that led to victory, with tactics
that were flexible, plural and opening-oriented, also helps
consolidate the achievements.

Jorge
Gómez Barata is a Cuban journalist living in Havana.