Here is some specific historical information on the relationship between
latin american revolutionaries to Comintern and Sandino.
Mine
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Revolutionary Triangle:
Sandino, Martí and the Comintern.
I. Introduction
Augusto C. Sandino (1895-1934) fought against the
American troops occupying
Nicaragua in the late 1920s and early 1930s. He was
acclaimed in revolutionary
circles and volunteers from many countries rushed to
join him in his fight. One
such a man was Salvadorean-born Augustín Farabundo
Martí (1893-1932), a
persuasive law-school drop-out who became a trusted
advisors and Sandino’s
personal secretary. He joined Sandino’s armed peasant
band (The Defending
Army of the National Sovereignty of Nicaragua -EDSN)
in June of 1928,
shortly after becoming a Communist Party member in the
spring. Two diverging
sets of expectations were placed on Martí . In
Sandino’s eyes, he would help
recruit more foreign volunteers for his war; in the
Communist International’s
(Comintern) eyes, he would win the rebel chief over to
the Communist cause.
Martí’s biographer described him as an “unrelenting
agitator.” [1] He was very
successful in winning Sandino’s trust and in linking
him with the Mexican branch
of the Comintern organization but irreparably damaged
their relationship, which
they terminated in early 1930 in Mexico.
In light of previously unknown evidence, this paper
presents further arguments to
sustain the assertion, which has partly been advanced
elsewhere, that the
relationship between the two influential Central
American revolutionaries,
Sandino and Martí, was strained by their personal
ideological allegiances. [2]
Specifically, it examines Sandino’s understanding of
his association with Martí
and the Comintern. Though known, the unpublished
letters we use have been left
out of several editions of Sandino’s collected
documents edited by Sergio
Ramírez [3] but they do elicit challenging questions
about their seemingly
brotherly relationship , the subsequent break up, and
about Sandino’s
involvement with the Comintern, They also provide
insights into the last few
weeks of Sandino’s second sojourn in Mexico and into
the operations and
squabbles of the Mexican Communist Party of the time.
An account of the circumstances surrounding Sandino’s
trip to, and stay in,
Mexico between 1929 and 1930, and his confused
dealings with Martí and the
Comintern will follow the presentation of the new
documents and their authors.
A brief discussion of their impact will conclude the
paper.
1.The Documents
The first of the letters was written by Augusto
Sandino to Mexican national
Francisco Vera, Secretary of the Provincial Chapter of
the Magnetic-Spiritual
School of the Universal Commune (EMECU), a school of
theosophy Sandino
joined while in Mexico. [4] This letter was reproduced
in the Spanish cartoon
publication of Rius, El hermano Sandino but the full
implications of its content
are yet to be addressed. It was written shortly after
Sandino left Merida, in
Yucatan, bound for Mexico City to meet with
ex-president Portes Gil. Sandino
uses this letter to report of an incident on board the
on which he travelled with
his trusted friend Farabundo Marti.
The following two letters have never been made public
and they shed some light
into the relationship of the two revolutionaries and
their entanglement with the
Comintern branch in Mexico. The second letter was
written by Nicaraguan
physician exiled in Mexico Dr. Pedro José Zepeda, then
Sandino’s official
international representative and spokesman. It is
addressed to Mexican Colonel
Enrique Rivera Bertrán, who was at the time Sandino’s
representative in the
Mexican port city of Veracruz. The third and last
letter is Rivera Bertrán’s long
but unfortunately incomplete response to Zepeda. The
two men corresponded in
June, 1930, soon after Sandino’s departure for the
northern hills of Nicaragua.
Both wish to come to grips with some of the events
that led to Sandino’s
disgraceful return. Photocopies of the original
letters are in my possession.
Zepeda’s letter to Rivera Bertrán dated on 6 June 1930
is a response to an
earlier missive the Mexican Colonel had addressed to
him and likely dated 30
May 1930. It is neatly typed in one legal size sheet
of paper, whose only distinct
mark is Sandino’s personal seal at the bottom left
corner. The signature at the
bottom is easily legible and it reads: “P.J. Zepeda.”
It is apparent that Zepeda
was a careful man, divulging only what may have been
necessary for him to
divulge and promising to fill in the blanks in a
meeting with his corespondent at a
later date. He likely feared that the correspondence
could fall into the wrong
hands. The letter seems to be well preserved and in
good condition. Rivera
Bertrán’s response is dated 9 June 1930, only three
days later. Their
correspondence likely moved through private hands.
Rivera Bertrán’s writing is
not as restrained as Zepeda and the most interesting
details –at least those
regarding Sandino and the Comintern—are provided by
way of long digressions.
Rivera Bertrán’s is as long-winded as it is
convoluted. This letter is also typed
and bears Sandino’s seal at the top left corner of
each of the three pages with
which are acquainted. It is not possible to tell how
many pages actually followed.
Although there is no signature, it is only in
connection to Zepeda’s 6 June 1930
letter that we can ascertain that the third letter was
written by Rivera Bertrán.
The 9 June 1930 letter begins by acknowledging receipt
of the 6 June 1930
letter and crossed-content examination of both has led
us to conclude without a
doubt that the author of the second letter was Colonel
Rivera Bertrán. Judging
from the reproductions, the original letter has
deteriorated significantly. There
appear to be small portions of the original sheet
missing at the bottom of each
page, for example, though no text seems lost there,
and in and around the places
where it must have been folded. The quality of the
reproduction in our
possession leaves much to be desired and as a result
there are a few illegible
passages.
III. The Background
The importance of letters between two peripheral
characters in Mexico upon the
study of Sandino or Martí is best introduced by
examining their backdrop. Why
was Sandino in Mexico? Had he left Nicaragua to
abandon his struggle? How
close was he to the Communists? Who are the EMECU?
Answers to these
questions can be found in events that took place a
year before the
correspondence in question.
Feeling politically isolated Sandino traveled to
Mexico in June 1929. Late in the
previous year he lost his chief propagandist and
personal representaive abroad,
Honduran poet Froylán Turcios, to a disagreement over
the new plan to
continue the bitter civil war in Nicaragua in spite of
a reasonable peace offer.
Turcios worried that Sandino might be perceived as a
petty caudillo making a
grab for power and damage the image of libertador he
worked so hard to
promote. Bluntly, he confronted Sandino: “The Sandino
caudillo in a civil war, in
a miserable fratricidal quarrel, I don’t know him, and
I would have nothing to do
with this.” [5] Sandino accepted Turcios’ resignation
ensuing a bitter parting of
the way. Instigated by Farabundo Martí, reports
Gregorio Gilbert, a
Dominican-national member of the EDSN, Sandino broke
off with Turcios,
accused the poet of treason and launched slanderous
charges of
misappropriation of funds against him. [6] With
Turcios gone, the rebel
commander lost by his own admission the line of
“communication with the
world” but his thirst for international exposure
continued to grow. He then
assigned his official representation in Mexico to the
Comintern-controlled
Hands-Off Nicaragua Committee, in all likelihood with
Martí’s counsel. [7]
Martí was enjoying success in his mission. But the
Hands-Off Nicaragua
committee had neither the vigor nor the credibility
that Turcios did to promote
Sandino successfully and the guerrilla chief became
convinced of the necessity to
go to Mexico to enhance his image and to obtain money,
weapons and support
for his struggle. On 6 January 1929, he wrote to
Mexican president Emilio
Portes Gil to request entry and protection in that
country so that he could come
to announce his “far-reaching projects” for Latin
America in person. [8]
The Mexican president responded positively and his
“invitation” helped
enormously to boost Sandino’s opinion of himself; he
soon began to write to
heads of state as though he were now one among them.
In anticipation of his trip
he wrote to American President Herbert Hoover firmly
to confirm that he was
not willing to abandon the battle. He also wrote to
the presidents of all Central
American republics seeking support. “At this moment
Nicaragua has a lever like
the one Archimedes had, and is in need of a fulcrum
like the one he sought. [ ...]
Archimedes” he said mixing images, “could turn the
world upside down, we
together could stop being humiliated by the Yankees.”
[9] Even before asking or
receiving answer to the request made to Argentina’s
president Hipólito Irigoyen
to host a conference of Latin American countries in
Buenos Aires, Sandino
proceeded to invite all the region’s presidents to
attend. In his letter he revealed
his understanding that destiny had chosen Nicaragua to
lead the march toward a
new state based on race and language.
It was written in the destiny of our [Latin
American]
peoples that our humbled and disgraced
Nicaragua
was to be the one authorized to call us to
unity with a
brotherly embrace. She is the one who has
sacrificed
herself and would gladly allow her entrails
to be torn if
by this means she might achieve the freedom
and
absolute independence of our Latin American
continental and Antillean peoples. [10]
The letter show Sandino’s embryonic commitment to the
idea of uniting the Latin
American countries to oppose the advances of the
Anglo-Saxon race in the
region. No such grand ordinance making Nicaragua the
eviscerated sacrificial
lamb of Latin America, of course, exists anywhere but
Sandino’s words
illustrated clearly the extent to which he was
prepared go. This was the
announced far-reaching project.
Accompanied by trusted men, among whom Martí, Sandino
reached Mexican
territory on 28 June 1929, but there were no state
honors nor presidential visits
on his arrival. He was instead relegated to Mérida, in
Yucatán , far away from
the political center of the country. There, he waited,
month after long month.
In the meantime, while keeping him under close
surveillance, the Mexican
government handed Sandino a monthly allowance of 2,000
Pesos for him and
his entourage. [11] The government assistance was not
enough, however, and
they were soon compelled to receive donations from
local sympathizers in order
to make ends meet. Five months later, worried and
impatient, Sandino wrote to
the president complaining that he had “ ...not seen
the smallest sign of fulfillment
of the expectations that motivated [he and his men] to
travel to Mexico.” He
strongly suspected that the president was “secretly
denying him an interview.”
[12] But he must have had some hope or indication to
the contrary because he
kept his pride in check and continued to wait although
he still believed that there
was a plot to lure him and keep him out of Nicaragua.
Indeed, Somoza García
claimed that there was a deal between the American and
Mexican governments
to keep Sandino in Mexico. [13]
Adding to the disappointing arrival, the economic
hardships and the suspicions of
deceit, the EDSN was plagued by internal conflict as
three factions competed to
gain control of Sandino’s attention and his movement.
In the moderate camp Dr.
Zepeda wished Sandino to adopt the strategy of a broad
Mexican-style
revolution by uniting all the anti-imperialist groups
but favoring none. In Zepeda’s
calculations, this approach would win Sandino the
coveted support of the
Mexican government. The two radical factions were the
Alianza Popular
Revolucionaria Americana (Popular Revolutionary
Alliance of the Americas
--APRA) and the Communist organizations. The
Communist, represented by
Farabundo Martí, incessantly tried to attract Sandino
to their cause, only with
partial success. Although Sandino shared in the
Bolshevik dream of world
revolution to liberate the workers, and although he
did not hesitate in availing
himself of any person or organization to enlist
support for his cause, Sandino’s
brand of communism was different from the Comintern’s,
more spiritual, and he
always preferred to maintain his personal and
political autonomy. APRA’s man
in Sandino’s camp was the Peruvian-national Esteban
Pavletich. APRA was
founded in May 1924 by Peruvian exile Victor Raul Haya
de la Torre
(1895-1979) in Mexico, where he worked as a personal
secretary to then
Minister of Education José Vasconcelos. Vasconcelos is
known for his theories
of impending mestizo supremacy over all the races of
the world. APRA’s
socialist objectives were similar to those of the
Comintern –and therefore to
Sandino’s, but their central concern was the
establishment of a homeland for the
mestizo race of what they called Indo-America. [14]
APRA’s modest
organization struggled to compete for Sandino’s favor
against the Comintern.
Sandino could not afford to alienate the smallest of
his supporters given the
precariousness of situation and although the tug of
war for his attention tired him
immensely, he tried to keep his camp from breaking up,
maneuvering his way
around a confrontation.
Sandino’s stay in Mexico for nearly a year transformed
his life. While anxiously
waiting for the expected aid from Mexican authorities,
he rekindled his
relationship with the Freemasons and quickly rose to
the degree of Master
Mason. He also became an active member of a
theosophical outfit called the
Magnetic-Spiritualist School of the Universal Commune,
which although founded
in Argentina by Basque electrician Joaquín Trincado,
had many followers in
Mexico. Sandino’s association with the EMECU had a
profound and lasting
impact on him. Trincado constructed an elaborate
speculative system of
“spiritual magnetism,” an omnipresent substance
governing the universe thought
to be consubstancial with the human spirit. He called
this doctrine the Spiritism
of Light and Truth. The school’s motto is “Siempre más
allá,” (Ever further
beyond), which Sandino later adopted.
Sandino read several of Trincado’s works. He studied
with close attention Los
cinco amores , in which Trincado argued the existence
of five realms of love,
each more perfect than the other. He thought men moved
toward and would
soon reach the most perfect of all loves, universal
love. At the final stage there
would be a universal commune where all things would be
held in common, the
hate caused by religions would disappear and there
would only exist one race
(the Hispanic race) speaking one single language
(Spanish) in universal
brotherhood. [15]
Trincado was violently opposed to organized religion
and Bolshevik
Communism. He argued that the solidarity of the
spirit, which he understood as
true communism, would soon replace religion. In his
first doctrinal treatise
Filosofia austera racional he declared: “We will save
humanity at the cost of
destroying all religions.” [16] He believed that all
the Kabbalistic mysteries
hidden through the ages had now been uncovered in view
of the imminence of
the Last Judgment and preached that every thing
mankind needed in order to
attain divine wisdom already been revealed.
With the laws of electricity all the
mysteries of science
have been broken, with the Spiritism of
Light and
Truth all the secrets of wisdom and creation
have
been broken, We have come to know continued
and
eternal life. [17]
He hated Soviet Communism in its materialist and
atheist approach that blindly
rejected the spiritual dimension of man. These ideas
became the center of
Sandino’s spiritual beliefs and Sandino was later
appointed leader (Celador) of
the Forty-ninth Chapter in Nicaragua. [18]
The company of his Salvadorean mistress Teresa
Villatoro was of little comfort
in Sandino’s humiliating wait, poverty, uncertainty
and perhaps even deceit, as
he became increasingly depressed in Mérida. His
principal refuge became his
mystical-spiritualist sessions and books and the
visits of local female admirers.
At times he locked himself up to read for days giving
instructions not to be
disturbed. He continued to address Nicaraguans in
public manifestos announcing
a sweeping victorious return. “I will soon be with
you. ...the hour of liberation is
near; ...the hour to put an end to the slavery is
near.” He assured his countrymen
that his temporary absence meant that “the absolute
triumph of Nicaragua’s
liberty” was at hand. [19] His private correspondence,
however, betrayed his
frustration and depressed mood. He began to think of
the trip to Mexico as a
mistake and continued to doubt that he would get any
aid from the Mexican
government. [20] He thought of leaving but was ashamed
of returning
empty-handed, without “half a penny cut in half nor a
single bullet for the
liberating cause of Nicaragua.” [21]
III. The Triangle
Toward the end of 1929 Sandino faced even more
turbulent events as he
became enmeshed in overwhelming intrigue. The rebel
General was accused pf
taking $60,000 dollars from the United States in
exchange for a comfortable life
of exile, while also taking money from the Mexican
Communist Party to continue
in his struggle. He was accused of betraying the cause
of the oppressed.
Sandino, always concerned with his image, was
devastated by the defamations
and wrote long letters to Hernán Laborde, Secretary
General of the Mexican
Communist Party (PCM), to deny the accusations and to
maintain his innocence.
[22] We learn from Rivera Bertrán that a meeting was
called at Sandino’s
request in early February. It was attended by
representatives of the three
organizations under the Comintern umbrella, which
Sandino suspected of being
the source of the accusations launched against him.
They denied their implication
in this matter, quickly expressed their displeasure
with the rumors and offered
their sympathies to Sandino. As Rivera Bertrán
reports, this part of the meeting
did not last very long. “The General began to speak,
stating the objective of the
meeting. Everyone said that it was not true that they
had pronounced such
maligning calumnies and proceeded to condemn the
defamations.” The PCM
boss swiftly ordered an investigation into the matter
and the meeting then moved
to address other matters.
The second item on the agenda also involved Sandino,
money and improprieties.
Gustavo Machado, a Venezuelan national who once headed
the Hand-Off
Nicaragua committee in Mexico, had raised a large sum
of money for Sandino
before the latter’s arrival to Mexico. But Sandino
only claimed to have received
$250 Dollars. What was not clear was how much money
Machado had raised.
When the question arose in the meeting, though Sandino
knew that Turcios was
incapable of stealing, he hinted at Turcios’ guilt
rather than pointing the finger at
someone in the Comintern. Conveniently, the records of
the PCM had burned
and the acting treasurer could not provide details.
Rivera Bertrán described it as
follows:
The question of the funds of the Hands-Off
Nicaragua
Committee was brought up, General Sandino
said not
to have received [from Froylán] Turcios, his
representative during those days, but $250
Dollars.
Mr. Pedruza was present, acting as
treasurer, and he
informed [those assembled] that the files
had burned
and he could not therefore render account.
[23]
Once again, another controversial issue involving
Sandino was pushed through
the meeting rather quickly.
At the meeting, Rivera Bertrán writes, Sandino was
“invited” to go on a
European tour to campaign for the Comintern under the
guises of promoting the
cause of anti-imperialism. In his continuous quest for
notoriety and recognition, in
his balancing act between competing factions, and
hoping to obtain something to
bring home out of it, Sandino later accepted.
Sandino was later cleared of receiving money from the
United States. The
official version of the PCM, as it turned out, pointed
to one of theirs as the
source of the allegations against Sandino: Gustavo
Machado. It was alleged that
Machado, bitter for having been passed as Sandino’s
official representative
abroad, an honor that was bestowed on Dr. Zepeda after
the Turcios affair,
launched a smear campaign against Sandino. One can not
confirm the allegation
against Machado, but Machado stood to win by
discrediting Sandino if he had
taken some of the money destined for Sandino’s fight.
On the other hand, the
PCM may have been willing to sacrifice Machado to
appease Sandino.
Whatever the case may be, this controversial dispute
with the Communists
rattled Sandino significantly and the accusation of
treason always hung over him.
It was around this time that Farabundo Martí left
Sandino’s camp for good.
Martí’s departure continues to be the object of much
speculation since the
circumstance that surrounded it have been unclear, but
it does seem that the
falling out was directly related to Sandino’s troubles
with the Comintern as the
evidence in the Rivera Bertrán-Zepeda correspondence
shows. One thing seems
certain. It was not one but a series of events that
precipitated the rift between the
two Central American revolutionaries. The final rift
between these two men
ultimately had serious repercussions in the
development of revolutionary
movements in Central America, specially in El
Salvador, Martí’s homeland.
Sandino’s interpretation of the events may be
important in shedding some light
on the separation. But he offered three different
interpretations, at times
seemingly contradictory. Commenting on the several
groups that tried to
influence his movement, Sandino said: “We have always
held with decisive
conviction that this was essentially a national
struggle. Martí, the propagandist of
Communism, saw that he could not impose his program
and withdrew.” [24] In
these 1933 declarations to Basque writer Ramón de
Belausteguigoitia, Sandino
leaves us with the impression that the rift with Martí
was the product of an
ideological struggle of some sort and that Martí
withdrew voluntarily.
Decisions made half a world away unwittingly conspired
against the friendship of
the two men. In the plan set out at the Second
Congress of the Comintern in
June 1920, whose policies were adopted at the Congress
of Latin American
Communist Parties held in Buenos Aires in June 1929,
Sandino’s struggle
appeared as a means to an end in the promotion of
world revolution. Sandino,
on the other hand, saw his own struggle as an end in
itself, consistent with his
belief in bringing about the fulfillment of God’s
Kingdom on earth. Accordingly,
Hodges has concluded: “It is in the context of the
Comintern’s mistaken
assessment of the world situation and its adoption of
an ultra-left strategy of
class confrontation that the break between Sandino and
Martí must be
understood.” [25] But it may not be as tidy as that.
Sandino admitted there were intrigues with the
Communist in which Martí may
have tried to entangle him but according to his
declarations to José Román, the
differences were more personal than political. “I
never really had any ideological
dispute with him. Because of his rebelliousness he did
not understand the
limitations of my mission in Mexico, nor his position
of subordinate.” [26]
Sandino thus contended that Martí was insubordinate
and lacking in discipline.
Was this simply a clash of personalities? Probably
not, Sandino appears to have
had more public relations sense than he is credited
with.
The above declarations to Belausteguigoitia and Román
were made around the
same time but they ought to be treated with care, with
a grain of salt, as it were,
because they were made three years after the events
occurred. Sandino was
notorious for manipulating information in hindsight,
especially when he was
concerned.
It seems likely, therefore, that letters of the actual
time of the events may shed
trustworthy light on the issue. In the letter sent at
the end of April to Francisco
Vera, secretary of the EMECU at El Progreso, Mexico,
Sandino reported on
the situation with Martí. “Everything took place as
that Cátedra instructed me in
advance. This must be taken into consideration so that
such an element who
tried to cause me maximum grief is put in his proper
place.” [27] From this letter
one can surmise, if one can trust Sandino’s report,
that Martí did not withdraw
voluntarily but was expelled by Sandino and that the
decision to do so was
shared with, indeed ordered by, the EMECU chapter in
Veracruz. This would
be consistent with the EMECU’s anti-bolshevik stand.
Sandino’s words in the
recollection of Rivera Bertrán are clear as to the
brand of communism he
embraced in opposition to the Comintern’s.
“I am a communist because I understand it will be, or
is, the highest there exists,
but I am not in agreement with a bunch opportunists,
who always engage in
nothing but intemperate schemes, which profane such a
high principle worthy of
better fortune.” [28] The EMECU’s opposition to Soviet
communism may
explain Sandino’s comments to Vera, but what was the
grief and what were the
limitations Sandino speaks about? Here is where the
dealings with the PCM
sheds some light into his fight with Martí.
In exchange for the European tour that would have
given him the highly desired
exposure and fund-raising opportunity, Sandino had
agreed with the PCM
openly to attack the Mexican government’s foreign
policy while still in Mexico.
This seemed like a suicidal agreement and Sandino was
desperate. But Sandino
willing to go ahead with it? His eagerness to embark
on the tour was apparent in
his Letter to the Secretary General of the
Anti-Imperialist League in Mexico.
Answering the official tour invitation (dated 31
January 1931), Sandino placed
himself “at the orders” of the League, “considering it
[his] duty to do so.” [29]
The Communists, it would seem, may have wanted to test
Sandino’s resolve and
commitment to them so they waited for the promised
declarations before giving
definitive word on the trip, but Sandino tactfully
held out, wishing to be out of
Mexico on his way to Europe before attacking the
Mexican government. Rivera
Bertrán recalls the rebels words:
But do you think that I an such an idiot as
to set fire
to the house while I am still in it? No,
Sir, I will make
declarations when I judge it to be
opportune, but if I
start to open the lid with insults, they
would expel me
and they would hand me over to my enemies,
and so
I would accomplish nothing more than to be
sacrificed
stupidly. [ ...] If I am to throw my life
away it must be
with a purpose, not stupidly. [30]
In the meantime, the Comintern insisted that the
awaited cable from Berlin had
not yet arrived.
In March, Sandino wrote again to reassure Laborde that
he intended to keep his
end of the bargain. “We are preparing the declarations
we must make
concerning the present situation of Mexico’s foreign
policy,” he said. [31]
Sandino was trying to buy time and had no intention of
fulfilling his pledge while
standing in Mexican territory for fear of reprisals.
He was most likely bluffing
when he said he had “the documents to unmask with
irrefutable proof the
attitude of those who have sold out to imperialism.”
[32] Earlier that same
month, Sandino had written to the League’s new
secretary to point out that he
was “in the best disposition” to go through with the
trip and announced that the
“declarations would be made soon.” [33] And once
again, at the end of the
month he wrote to Laborde. “We continue to prepare the
declarations. You
shall have them at the opportune time.” [34] Sandino
was very eager to have the
Comintern Mexican representatives that he was willing
to make the statements
soon and yet no declarations had been made more than
two months later. The
situation rapidly developed into a game of chicken.
Tired of waiting, trying to force Sandino’s hand (or
perhaps to expose him) the
Mexican Comintern chiefs leaked information that
Sandino was very critical of
his host government’s policies. [35] Under the
circumstances, Martí may not
have had any other choice but to take sides. It seems
likely that he may have
alerted the Comintern, or confirm their suspicions,
about Sandino’s concealed
intentions and bluff. Rivera Bertrán’s letter to
Zepeda narrated Sandino’s
suspicions and conclusions about Martí, who while
“drunk had challenged the
General [by saying:] “What is Sandino?”, that [Martí]
“did not give a shit about
Nicaragua,” that he “was a spy of the Communist
Party,” that up to then he had
not betrayed Sandino even though he was there for that
purpose,” and he
“insulted the General’s mother.””
In addition to this confession, Sandino claimed to
have circumstantial evidence
that Martí was “spying for the Communists.” “The
General’s doubts were thus
partly confirmed, although he was not able to obtain
sufficient proof,” when
Martí was caught burning a pile of letters Sandino
wished to inspect.
Although there were overtones of personal and
ideological differences between
men, judging from Sandino’s letters to Vera and Rivera
Bertrán’s letter to
Zepeda, Martí’s dismissal seem also to have been
motivated by strategic
concerns. The deal between Sandino and the Comintern
soon became a stand
off and he became convinced that there was an
informant in his camp: the one
who “betrayed” him, “causing maximum grief” and did
not understand the
limitations of [Sandino’s] mission” –the eviction of
the US Marines from
Nicaraguan soil. After their break up in April 1930,
Martí left for El Salvador to
found the local Communist Party. He was arrested,
tried for treason and sedition
following a peasant uprising that resulted in the
massacre of 30,000 peasants. He
was executed in February 1932.
Sandino did not react well to crisis or adversity.
Confounded and having
difficulty distinguishing friend from foe, he also
broke up with the APRA.
Pavletich too left his ranks. Sandino had wondered
earlier if there was not a
treasonous plot to keep in Mexico. “What occurred? Why
so many
dissimulations? Are we in effect victims of
treachery?,” he asked. [36] After his
rift with Martí he felt betrayed once again and he
became more suspicious and
withdrawn then ever before.
It was in the middle of the crisis with the Communists
that Sandino was finally
allowed to go Mexico City to meet with Portes Gil at
the end of February 1930.
This meeting did not please the PCM, who waited for
Sandino to denounce the
Mexican government instead of meeting with the former
president. For his part,
Sandino anticipated getting money and a shipload of
weapons but the help he
obtained was as humiliating as it was disappointing.
It came in the form of a
couple of machine guns, a few bullets and some more
money for his expenses.
Adding insult to injury, Portes Gil invited Sandino to
remain in Mexico offering
him land for him and his men to work. The PCM likely
wondered what Sandino
planned to do about his pledge to them if he obtained
aid from the Mexican
government.
The trip to Mexico was therefore marked by both
inflated expectations and
harsh disappointments. Macauley referred to Sandino’s
second stay in Mexico
as a “stalemate,” and from the strategic point of view
this is true, but as Gregorio
Selser has pointed out, it was “a bitter period” in
his personal life. [37] He was
homesick and disoriented, overwhelmed by intrigue,
betrayal and
disappointment.
Trapped waiting in Mexico, Sandino defined his
suffering in a letter to his most
trusted Lieutenant, interpreting his won suffering as
martyrdom and describing
himself as the most divine of all martyrs:
My Dear brother: Bear in mind, you and the
other
brothers who find themselves in this
struggle, that I am
simply nothing but an instrument of divine
justice to
redeem this nation and the if I need some of
the
miseries that exist in this earth, it is
because I had to
come before you, also born of a woman, and
offer
myself to you full of the same human
miseries as we
are all in this earthly world, because
otherwise you
would not have been able to believe me if I
had not
spoken and been the same as you. [38]
Sandino may have called Turcios his Judas but it was
the humiliations and the
multiple disappointments in Mexico that lead him to
think of himself as a divine
incarnation.
Sandino had waited long to hear from the Mexican
government and from the
Comintern about the European tour, but after the PCM’s
leak he made hasty
plans to leave Mexican territory. It seems that
Sandino’s troubles with the
Comintern eventually precipitated the fall of his
already deteriorating relationship
with Farabundo Martí.
The presentation of a portrait of Sandino and his
difficult circumstances in
Mexico should in way be interpreted as a suggestion
that the pressures on the
rebel leader were determinants for his decisions
regarding Martí. Sandino’s
choice to go to Mexico was his alone and many of the
difficulties in which he
found himself were of his own choosing. These
difficulties, however, became
influencing factors in a chain of decisions as he
plunged deeper and deeper in
despair and suspicion.
Sandino and the Comintern were locked in a foolish
game, one that Sandino
could not possibly win. The hardening of the
Comintern’s policies toward
nationalist rebellions made Martí’s task in Sandino’s
camp quite difficult, forcing
him to choose sides. But it would seem that their
relationship had already been
strained by Martí’s undisciplined behavior, specially
in light of the fact that in his
selective puritanism, Sandino prohibited his men to
drink. Martí did not buy into
Sandino’s self-image of the spiritual prophet-messiah,
deity-incarnate like most
others and opted for the more scientistic and
materialistic communism instead of
the spiritual one that Sandino promised.
That there was an ideological dispute between the two
revolutionaries can not be
denied but the essence of their ideological
differences needs to be revisited.
Hodges is correct to assert that the rift between the
two revolutionaries comes
from their understanding of communism, but Hodges
attributed the differences to
Sandino’s spiritual anarchism. If we believe Sandino
that Martí was thrown out
the EDSN under instructions from the EMECU, then the
influence of this group
on the rebel was far greater and more significant than
we suspected. Not
withstanding the pressing circumstances, it would seem
that Sandino’s
whole-heartedly adoption of Trincado’s theosophy is
largely responsible for
breaking the revolutionary triangle of Sandino, Martí
and the Comintern.
[1.] Jorge Arias Gómez, Farabundo Martí: Esbozo
biográfico (San José, Costa
Rica: Editorial Universitaria Centroamericana, 1972),
52.
[2.] See Donald Hodges, Intellectual Foundations of
the Nicaraguan Revolution
(Austin: University of Texas Press, 1986), 97-106.
[3.] See Augusto C. Sandino, El pensamiento vivo de
Sandino (Managua:
Editorial Nueva Nicaragua, 1984 [1981]), Volumes I and
II, herefater cited as
EPV I or II, respectively.
[4.] Rius, El hermano Sandino (Mexico: Grijalbo,
1986), 127.
[5.] Froylán Turcios, “Letter to General Augusto C.
Sandino,” 17 December
1928 in Anastasio Somoza García, El verdadero Sandino
o el calvario de las
Segovias (Managua: Tipografía Robelo, 1936), 112-113.
[6.] Gregorio Urbano Gilbert, Junto a Sandino (Santo
Domingo: Editora Alfa y
Omega, 1979), 145.
[7.] Augusto C. Sandino, “Proclamation Granting
Representation to the
Hands-Off Nicaragua Committee,” 18 January 1929, in
EPV, I: 310.
[8.] Augusto C. Sandino, “Letter to the Interim
President of Mexico, Licenciado
Emilio Portes Gil,” 6 January 1929, in Somoza García,
El verdadero Sandino ,
122.
[9.] Augusto C. Sandino, “Open Letter to Herbert Clark
Hoover, President of
the United States,” 6 March 1929 and “Letter to all
the Central American
Presidents,” 12 March 1929, in EPV, I: 324-328 and 332
, respectively.
[10.] Augusto C. Sandino, “Letter to all Heads of
States of the Americas:
Proposal for a Continental Conference,” 20 March 1929,
in EPV, I: 338-340.
[11.] Gilbert, Junto a Sandino , 282.
[12.] Augusto C. Sandino, “Letter Licenciado Emilio
Portes Gil, President of
Mexico,” 4 December 1929, in EPV I:404-407.
[13.] Somoza García, El verdadero Sandino , 244.
[14.] Victor Raúl Haya de la Torre, Por la
enmancipación de America Latina
(Buenos Aires: Gleizer, 1927).
[15.] Joaquín Trincado, Los cinco amores: ética y
sociología (Buenos Aires:
Talleres Gráficos Preusche & Eggelin, [1922] 1955).
The first four forms of love
were the love of family, civic love (friendship), love
for one’s region and national
love.
[16.] Joaquín Trincado, Filosofía austera racional ,
764. Cited by Hodges ,
Intellectual Foundations , 41
[17.] Joaquín Trincado, Los cinco amores , 181.
[18.] The EMECU group in Nicaragua did not exceed a
dozen followers and
although they meet regularly (twice a week) in a
private home, their small
numbers prevented them from obtaining an official
chapter status from Buenos
Aires.
[19.] Augusto C. Sandino, “Manifesto to Nicaraguans,”
6 September 1929 in
Gustavo Alemán Bolaños, Sandino el libertador: la
epopeya, la paz, el invasor,
la muerte (Mexico: Ediciones del Caribe, 1952), 77-80.
[20.] See Augusto C. Sandino, “Letter to Gustavo
Alemán Bolaños, 4 August
1929, in Alemán Bolaños, Sandino el libertador ,
71-73.
[21.] Augusto C. Sandino, “Letter to Gustavo Alemán
Bolaños, August 1929, in
Alemán Bolaños, Sandino el libertador , 77.
[22.] Augusto C. Sandino, “Letter to Hernán Laborde,”
2 January 1930 and
“Letter to Hernán Laborde,” 8 January 1930 in EPV,
II:25-39 and 41-42,
respectively.
[23.] Enrique Rivera Bertrán, “Letter to Dr. Pedro
José Zepeda,” 9 June 1930.
Letter Two in this paper.
[24.] Augusto C. Sandino in Belausteguigoitia, Con
Sandino en Nicaragua
(Madrid: Espasa-Calpe, 1934), 181.
[25.] Donald Hodges, Intellectual Foundations , 100.
[26.] Augusto C. Sandino in José Roman, Maldito pais
(Managua: Ediciones de
el Pez y la Serpiente, 1979), 132.
[27.] Augusto C. Sandino, “Letter to Francisco Vera,”
23 April 1933 in Rius, El
hermano Sandino , 127.
[28.] Augusto C. Sandino cited by Enrique Rivera
Bertrán in his “Letter to Dr,
Pedro José Zepeda,” 9 June 1930. Among one of the few
interesting documents
that came across my hands in Nicaragua but which I was
unable to photocopy
or take notes from, one stands out in my mind although
many of the details have
since escaped me. In one portion (of three) of the
original manuscript of
Anastasio Somoza García’s El verdadero Sandino o el
calvario de las segovias ,
there is an unpublished letter at the end addressed to
Augusto C. Sandino signed
by Farabundo Martí. This letter was omitted from the
final publication for
unknown reasons. I saw the letter almost in a flash
but the closing sentence is still
vivid in my mind. It read: “Your brother in Lenin.”
This was in stark contrast to
the EMECU’s practice of calling each other brother,
brothers in the spirit.
Martí’s closing line is therefore suggestive of the
tension that existed between
Sandino and Martí as a result of their differences in
world views.
[29.] August o C. Sandino, Letter to Gaston Lafargo,
Secretary of the
Continental Committee of the Anti-Imperialist League
of the Americas,” 4
February 1930. Photocopy in my possession.
[30.] Augusto C. Sandino cited by Enrique Rivera
Bertrán in “Letter to Dr.
Pedro José Zepeda,” 9 June 1930.
[31.] Augusto C. Sandino, “Letter to Hernán Laborde,”
12 March 1930 in
EPV, II:99-100.
[32.] Augusto C. Sandino, “Letter to Hernán Laborde,”
12 March 1930 in
EPV, Volume II:99-100.
[33.] Augusto C. Sandino, “Letter to Juan Segovia
Escudero, Secretario
General del Comite Internacional de la Liga
Anti-Imperialista de las Americas,”
9 March 1930. Copy in my possession.
[34.] Augusto C. Sandino, “Letter to Hernán Laborde,”
29 March 1930 in
EPV, II:108-109.
[35.] Carlos Villanueva, Sandino en Yucatán , 275
[36.] Selser, Sandino, II:68.
Augusto C. Sandino. “Letter to Pedro José Zepeda.” 25
January 1930 in El
pensamiento vivo , Volume II, 68.
[37.] Selser, Sandino, II:68.
[38.] Augusto C. Sandino, “Letter to General Pedro
Altamirano,” 2 January
1930, in Somoza García, El verdadero Sandino ,
147-148.
--
Mine Aysen Doyran
PhD Student
Department of Political Science
SUNY at Albany
Nelson A. Rockefeller College
135 Western Ave.; Milne 102
Albany, NY 12222
