ABSTRACT
This chapter presents the overview of opposition by examining additional elements alluded to by Anastasio Somoza Debayle—other nations, religious institutions, and the FSLN, as well as the coalitions that eventually drew much of the disparate opposition together in 1979. Other nations played a significant role in the Nicaraguan insurrection— some with enthusiasm, others with reluctance. In no case was external intervention decisive, but the policies of foreign governments generally weakened the Somoza regime and strengthened the insurgents. In May 1979 Costa Rica permitted the FSLN and its coalition organizations to establish a revolutionary government in exile. The FSLN survived seventeen years of weakness, repeated setbacks, and eventually internal divisions to assume the political leadership of a popular rebellion of remarkable spontaneity. Of the opposition forces, the Sandinistas alone had the military capacity to challenge the National Guard and the flexibility to respond with sufficient speed to the rapidly changing circumstances of the unfolding insurrection.
