Almost a pensioner now, he was in town for a brief visit to catch up with old buddies and maybe see some sights, just like any other tourist from the United States. Over breakfast at his hotel his hosts filled him in on their news, which was not especially good, and afterwards he strolled through the war monument at Plaza de la Paz.
More than once he said he was a private citizen on a private visit. But when your name is Oliver North and you are in Nicaragua on the eve of an election, there might, not for the first time, be a credibility problem.
The Cold War warrior and former White House aide returned to the country with which he is indelibly linked last Sunday to do what he does best: champion a “fight for freedom” and warn of a left-wing menace to the US.
“It’s good to be back,” said North (62), crinklier and greyer than his 1980s heyday, but still a fit former marine lieutenant-colonel. A round of media interviews ended the pretence that it was a private visit.
To supporters it was good to welcome a hero who risked his career to funnel dollars to Contra rebels during their war against the Sandinista government, a covert part of Ronald Reagan’s Cold War strategy that morphed into the Iran-Contra scandal. To critics, it was like witnessing a criminal return to the scene of the crime: a conflict that cost 30 000 Nicaraguan lives, destroyed the economy and left the country polarised.
Like one of the volcanoes that circle Managua, North has erupted back on to the scene out of fear that the small Central American nation will once again slide into the enemy camp.
Daniel Ortega, the Sandinista leader, now 60, has a strong chance of returning to power in next month’s presidential election. Opinion polls give him 33% support, which, in a splintered field of candidates, could be enough to win in the first round on November 5.
The prospect has horrified North, who is now a conservative political commentator and activist. He told Nicaraguan television it would be “the worst thing” and was cause for concern. “My hope is that the people of Nicaragua are not going to return to that. That’s not good for your country. That’s not good for my country.”
The Sandinista has renounced revolutionary Marxism and promised to rule as a centrist moderate and reconciler. His campaign uses pastel pink and John Lennon’s Give Peace a Chance anthem.
North does not buy it, saying the old Kremlin ally, ousted in a 1990 election, is still a wily authoritarian who could form a left-wing front with Vene-zuela’s Hugo Chávez, Cuba’s Fidel Castro and Bolivia’s Evo Morales.
“If he wins, Ortega will have key regional allies — men who, by themselves, present no immediate threat to our security, but who together could create problems aplenty for the US and its democratic Latin American allies,” North wrote in an article earlier this month. “Unfortunately, Ronald Reagan is gone, and today Nicaragua looks like a case of ‘back to the future’.”
Hence his two-day mission to promote the ruling Liberal party’s conservative candidate, Jose Rizo, as the best chance to stop Ortega. The pair posed for photographs and exchanged compliments. “Oliver North is a person who risked his political future for Nicaragua,” said Rizo.
North was fired by Reagan in 1987 after it was revealed that he sold weapons to Iran to fund the Contras, a scheme widely believed to have had the backing of the then president. North admitted he lied to Congress and was convicted of accepting an illegal gratuity, blocking an inquiry and destroying documents. The sentence was overturned on the grounds that his televised congressional testimony may have prejudiced his right to a fair trial.
North reinvented himself as a novelist and a pundit for Fox News, where he is something of a talisman for hawks. Just like in the old days, the “striped pants set” at the state department did not recognise the peril of an Ortega victory, said North. Latin America’s left-wingers were emulating Adolf Hitler by using elections rather than coups to gain power.
The US ambassador and senior US officials have warned the impoverished nation of dire consequences if they vote for Ortega. But to North’s chagrin they have backed another conservative candidate, Eduardo Montealegre, instead of Rizo. The US embassy was said to be furious about North’s arrival, obliging him to call it a private visit. — Â