ABSTRACT
Several inter-related themes had shaped United States (US) policy toward popular movements in Latin America. US policy-makers had been blind to local realities that were to bring the Sandinistas to power in 1979. Despite cordial relations at the diplomatic level, US policy toward Nicaragua retained its interventionist element. Secretary of State Haig set the stage and the momentum for US policy in Central America and Nicaragua in the first months of Reagan's coming into office in January, 1981. Nicaragua answered every major US policy statement with an explanation of events or a detailed refutation of US claims and a call for talks. Nicaragua's primary interest vis-a-vis the US was in a discontinuation of historic patterns in US-Nicaraguan relations. If Jimmy Carter's policy toward Nicaragua reflected uncertainty and suspicion about the nature of the revolution, the intention of the Reagan ideologues was clear: the revolution had to be destroyed and the Sandinistas put out of power.
