Duarte at an impasse THE ATTENTION of the world was suddenly drawn back to El Salvador by the spectacular guerrilla assault of March 31 on the key military base of El Paraiso, 60 kilometers north of the Salvadoran capital, in which for the first time a US military advisor was killed in battle. An estimated 800 FMLN guerrillas took part in the attack.
The operation at El Paraiso followed two other major assaults in January and February. On January 4, the FMLN attacked Osicala in the north-eastern province of Morazan.. On February 12, it hit the nearby town of Delicias de Concepcion. Both are in the defence system surrounding San Francisco Gotera, the capital of the department.
These events were clear indications that the regime of the highly touted "reformer" Jose Napoleon Duarte has been unable to contain, much less drive back, the guerrilla forces. At the same time. on the social and political fronts as well the regime is sinking rapidly amid growing difficulties. The following article describes the dilemma of US imperialism today in El Salvador, and the growth and organization of a vast movement against rulers and owners unable to reform, even with the considerable help of their anxious American big brother. ARNOLD BERTHU
EL SALVADOR
General Blandon, chief of staff of the armed forces, severely criticized this suspension: 'The possibilities for inquiries against presumed guerrillas will be affected. Those arrested will be able to call in lawyers during the investigation, and we will not be able to detain such terrorists for more than 72 hours."
Finally, a political crisis threatened the government as a whole on February 12. Duarte backtracked under the pressure of the employers. He substantially revised the measures taken in October 1986, lightening the property and income taxes that were supposed to finance a part of the war. To put icing on the cake, he announced at the same time a liberalization of the rules on trading in coffee, which has been controlled for seven years by a state body, the Coffee Institute (INCAFE). Offensive against the reforms
Not content with this success, the big coffee producers then demanded total elimination of the state monopoly on the export of coffee. A week later, on February 20, the parliamentary right and the National Association of Private Enterprise (ANEP) got total capitulation from Duarte, inasmuch as the Supreme Court handed down a favorable ruling in a case brought by an industrialist belonging to ARENA and declared the income and property taxes unconstitutional.
This decision put the Duarte government in a very difficult financial position, since the army had already spent 120 million colons [1 dollar = 5 colons] of the income that the war tax was supposed to bring in! The 1986 budget was estimated at 900 million colons, and the cost of the war, outside US aid (see box) represented 1,500 million colons.
Duarte's position could be further undermined by the fact that El Salvador, like all the other Central American countries, has been hit by a drastic fall in the price of coffee on the world market. The resulting shortfall of income has been estimated by the Central Bank at 250 million dollars for 1987. itselt to rectricting or annulling all righte Decree No. 50 does not confine or guarantees. jurisdiction over crimes against the existence or organization of the state or against the public peace" and makes it possible to detain for up to two weeks any persons that the armed forces con. sider suspect, without bringing them before the courts. What is more, the decree makes the constitutional rules against confessions extorted by force legally inoperative.
11
Duarte's inability to make real reforms, especially a radical agrarian reform, and assure a minimum of economic and social progress for the masses has created a fully-fledged crisis of confidence among the ranks of the Christian Democracy itself. This was: aggravated at the start of 1986, when the government imposed a series of austerity measures that hit the workers directly. Its objective was to cut the budget deficit. The financial problem was the result of the enormous drain represented by military spending, which amounted to 25 per cent of the budget in 1987.
In order to regain part of his base of popular support, in October 1986 Duarte took a series of new measures, some of which shifted part of the burden for the war onto the Salvadoran capitalist class. These included notably a "Tax for Defence of National Sovereignty," in other words a war tax on inheritances, profits, exports, property and so on.
This brought a sharp counter-attack from the bosses. On January 22, 1987, the employers staged a one-day strike against the government's policy, effective in 70 per cent of private enterprise. The National Union of Salvadoran Workers (UNTS), the class-struggle trade-union that was reformed in February 1986, refused to associate itself with the bosses' protests. And, on this occasion Guillermo Ungo, spokesperson ofs the Revolutionary Democratic Front (FDR) and the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN), declared that the protests of the right were distinct from, and opposed to, those of the popular and revolutionary interests of an oligarchy represent the
At the same time, the two main far-right parties, the Nationalist Republican Alliance (ARENA) of Major Roberto D'Aubuisson and the National Conciliation Party (PCN) went on a prolonged parliamentary strike. This boycott prevented Duarte from getting the two-thirds vote of the deputies necessary to renew the state of siege that has been in force since 1980. According to Decree No. 50, which was adopted in February 1984, it has to be reimposed every month. (1)
American aid for the Salvadoran people (DR)
Facing this offensive by the extreme right, Duarte is trying to rebuild a certain popular base. A few days before he made his concessions to the oligarchy and then gave in entirely, the Christian Democratic Party called a demonstration of popular support for his policy. All the civil authorities were enlisted to mobilize civil servants and the unemployed who had been given work on projects to clear the capital from the damage of the earthquake.
In these campaigns, to get a large participation, the Christian Democratic Party's "hustlers" offered 15 to 25 colons, far more than the daily wage of an agricultural worker.
At the same time, the right called on people not to take part in the demonstration, and the FMLN organized a transport strike on the day, while UNTS called on workers not to join in the demonstration.
Finally, on February 7, more than 50,000 came out in response to the Christian Democrat's call. This figure is far from negligible, even if it is less than the organizers counted on.
Duarte certainly seems to be caught in a blind alley, but it would be premature to predict that he is liable to fall, because for the moment the United States has no other political card to play.
In 1981, 1982 and 1983, the United States supported Duarte's Christian Democrats and the extreme right represented by ARENA and the PCN, calling on them to come to an understanding and rule the country together in close collaboration with the armed forces. In 1984, the Reagan administration revised its policy. 12
Washington put its money on the Christian Democrats, to the detriment of ARENA and the PCN. Duarte was therefore able to get aid from the powerful European Christian Democracy, in particular the Germans and the Italians. (2) Washington's plan
The US project, for which Duarte was indispensable, combined four elements - elections, reforms, selective repression and war against the FMLN. In that way, Washington thought it could stabilize the situation in El Salvador and undermine the social base of the revolutionists.
If you add up the results of this scheme today, they are hardly brilliant for the Reagan Administration:
Elections. They undoubtedly helped to give international legitimacy to the Salvadoran government, a legitimacy and an audience that open dictatorships could not claim. But internally, while the Duarte project gained a certain popular support at the time of the elections in 1984-85, the illusions of some sections of the masses were quickly dissipated.
Reforms. They have been blocked. The second phase of the agrarian reform has not really been implemented. The government is backtracking on the nationalization measures concerning trading in coffee that were carried out by the military junta at the end of 1979 and the beginning of 1980. Above all, the standard of living of the popular strata has deteriorated very sharply.
Duarte is caught in a vise between the populist concessions he needs to make and the intransigence of the owning classes, which have no intention of yielding an iota of their privileges.
* Selective repression. While the massive and bloody repression has been sharply reduced in the cities, there is still selective repression. In 1986, the (non-governmental) Human Rights Commission counted 1,821 murders, 213 disappearances and 1,100 political prisoners in the Mariona and Ilopango jails. But this selective repression has not been sufficient to keep the organized mass movement from gaining strength and radicalizing. (3)
* The war against the FMLN. A total fiasco. The Front has expanded its armed forces and increased its capacity for military action, extending it to the entire country. It has regained important strength in the cities. The FMLNChas managed to create a situation of geographical dual power -two armies and two authorities face each other in the country. And Duarte had to initiate dialogue with the revolutionists in La Palma in October 1984, without the latter giving up their arms and ceasing their operations.
In February 1986, the UNTS was formed. It sealed an alliance between the class-struggle current that developed in 1984 on the one hand and, on the other, the People's Democratic Union (UPD), the Confederation of Cooperative Associations of El Salvador (COACES) and the National Association of Salvadoran Natives (ANIS), which had constituted an essential part of the Christian Democratic Party's electoral base in 1984-85.
This unity testified to the growing organization of the masses - workers, civil servants, peasants, students and so on - and to their radicalization. The UNTS had 35,000 members. To meet its challenge, the Christian Democrats, aided by the American Institute for Free Labor Development (AIFLD, linked up to the CIA) formed the National Workers' and Peasants' Union
2. In 1986, aid from the German Christian Democracy amounted to million dollars. An agreement was signed in February bringing this up to 70 million dollars for 1987. Negotiations are underway to grant 30 million dollars more in aid to El Salvador. These funds are essentially used in the framework of the "United to Build" plan, and in assistance to small private enterprise, the objective being to rebuild a social base for Duarte. forced the release of 99 political prisoners, In February 1987, the FMLN including 52 guerrillas and 47 unionists, in exchange for Colonel Avalos, who was taken prisoner by the Front in October 1985. International Viewpoint 4 May 1987
(UNOC) and stepped up their pressure on the leadership of the UPD in an attempt to rebuild the Christian Democratic Party's social base.
In November 1986, the UPD leadership decided to withdraw from the UNTS, explaining that it was taking too radical positions. This defection was a victory for Duarte. Nonetheless, COACES and ANIS, which were initially linked to the UPD, have remained in UNTS. And it seems that a part of the ranks of the UPD have also decided to stay in UNTS.
To judge by the capacity for mobilization that UNTS managed to demonstrate in January 1987, despite the departure of the UPD, it seems that the movement has not been greatly affected by the split. More than 35,000 people demonstrated in San Salvador on January 17, in response to a call from UNTS, despite of the fact that UNOC called on its supporters not to demonstrate, and the army stopped about a hundred carloads from joining the demonstration.
Despite the repression, firings, seizures of trade unionists and murders, the number of strikes remains high - 150 as against 172 in 1985. Moreover, working-class solidarity made it possible to win the release of Febe Velasquez, international relations secretary of the National Federation of Salvadoran Workers (FENASTRAS) and member of the executive of UNTS. He was seized by the army and accused by the Ministry of the Interior of belonging to the National Resistance Armed Forces (FARL), one of the five components of the FMLN.
In August 1986, Duarte himself justified the seizure of trade unionists when the general secretary of one of the unions in FENASTRAS was arrested: "The guerrillas infiltrate everywhere . . . . That is why the security bodies are encharged with investigating this. That is why this unionist was taken in."
Finally, to deal with strikes, the Duarte government has frequently resorted to militarizing the workplaces.
The year 1986 was marked by the trying out of the "United to Build" plan, designed to overcome the army's isolation from the population. "The war is 90 per cent political, economic, social and ideological, and only 10 per cent military" (Proceso Number 269). That is what the Salvadoran military strategists say today. The "United to Build" plan is aimed at winning this war.
The plan was drawn up in Washington and consists in particular of reinstalling in the countryside populations that were displaced or who fled
International Viewpoint 4 May 1987
### US intervention
US aid to El Salvador (millions of dollars) 1979 9,590 1980 58,549 1981 149,258 1982 277,611 1983 329,045 1984 531,331 1985 452,048 1987 770,000
Between 1979 and 1987, US aid to El Salvador multiplied 80 times. It has reached more than 2,500 million dollars, more than El Salvador's total foreign debt of 2,120 million dollars.
According to a study done in 1985, the US congressional committee overseeing arms and foreign policy established that 75% of this aid was destined for the war. If you taken into consideration the fact that the "Unite to Build" plan launched in 1986 allows the army to use US funds earmarked for reforms, public infrastructure, health and schools, you can see the grounds for the FMLN's statement that the Salvadoran army is getting two million dollars a day.
In recent years, El Salvador has become the top US aid recipient in Latin America, although the country only has a population of 5 million! On the world scale, El Salvador comes in fourth position in the hit parade of coun tries getting the most US support, after Israel, Egypt and Turkey.
The US military presence in El Salvador is small (there were 40 US soldiers in 1980 and 100 in 1985), but there is no doubt about the fact that the strategy and tactics of the Salvadoran armed forces are directly controlled by the United States. Moreover, you have to take account of the fact that thousands of Salvadoran military men have gone through US military schools and that they regularly train with US and Honduran soldiers in Honduras.
Joint US-Honduran maneuvers are particularly important (The United States keeps 1,800 soldiers in Honduras, whose numbers are swelled by contin. gents of special intervention forces during the many maneuvers). These maneuvers are conducted a few kilometres from the northern zone of El Salvador, near the FMLN bastions of Morazan and Chalatenango.
Moreover, the American magazine The Nation has just revealed in its March 1987 issue that AID alloted a part of its budget, amounting to 3.5 million dollars in 1986, to El Salvador to get the UPD to withdraw from UNTS.
The Nation said that the general secretary of the UPD, Ramon Mendoza, got an initial sum of 3,000 dollars in November 1986 in exchange for his breaking with UNTS.
The main intermediary in this affair is the American Institute for Free Labor Development set up by the AFL-CIO in 1962 in close collaboration with the CIA.
from the war and the bombing. The army is the means through which economic and logistical aid is channelled to civilians who set themselves up again in the countryside. In this way, the armed forces substitute for the local and national civilian authori. ties in areas that considerably exceed the latters' "normal" functions -housing, public facilities, health and so on.
The financial aid appropriated by the army comes in large part from the Alliance for Internatiomal Development (AID) a US body linked to the CIA. In the new villages, the army is trying to form civil defence units to serve as a human barrier between it and the FMLN. This operation is akin to the "development zones" that the Guatemalan army started establishing in 1982 and to the "strategic hamlets" set up in Vietnam at the beginning of the 1970s.
It is hard to get a clear idea of the effectiveness of the "United to Build"
plan's effectiveness, but it is clear that the military are incapable of genuine dialogue with the population, even if they are being put through courses in public relations (!). On the other hand, Christian base communities inspired by liberal theology have organized a signficant part of the rural population living in the war zones.
Finally, the FMLN has managed to create an impossible situation for the army and the legal civilian government in about a hundred localities.
The country's small size and its population density, along with the weight of the Salvadoran army and the means of repression available to it (bombing and so on), have prevented the formation of permanent liberated zones in which social relations could be reorganized in a stable way. The FMLN, which has about 10,000 guerrilla fighters, has to fight in a special way, different from the Chi-
13
nese, Vietnamese, Yugoslav, Cuban or even Nicaraguan models.
One of the FMLN commanders, Anna Guadalupe Martinez, has specified what is meant by an FMLN. controlled zone:
"What we have done is to keep the Christian Democratic Party or any other right-wing party from having mayors in the zones in which we operate. For a year and a half we have either been taking them prisoner, or they have fled to the main centers in the departments concerned. But we have not replaced them with new authorities, because they would be murdered if the army came in. The people, seeing that there are no longer any authorities, have tried to organize themselves and create elements of legal, legislative and other powers to deal with the problems of the population.
FMLN/FDR WE INFORM the Salvadoran people, international public opinion that on
"Obviously the individuals who take part in this 'power know that they cannot do anything against the interests of the people and of the FMLN. This is not because we would set up new authorities. No, it is the population itself that organizes in neighborhood committees and town councils demanding water, electricity, medical facilities. This is self-management by the population which asks to be respected by the army and the FMLN. What is more, the population raises the flag of neutrality. That means that the army cannot liquidate these authorities, and we have to respect the organization that comes from the people themselves. This is what has happened in nearly a hundred villages in the country, from which we have driven the mayors and the civilian authorities. This is dual power." (El Nuevo Diario, communique the peoples of Central America, and November 30 our respective fronts,
Elite Salvadoran troops (DR) November 12, 1986.)
Since 1981, when the FMLN launched its general offensive, the army had not made the sort of military effort that it did in 1986. In five years, the Salvadorans army has tripled its numbers from 17,000 to 50,000. This is thanks to US military aid, which today amounts to more than two million dollars a day. In 1986, the army tried in vain to inflict a strategic defeat on the FMLN by conducting very large scale operations.
For example, Operations Phoenix directed against ones of the FMLN's bastions, the Guazapa region, lasted six months, from January to June 1986. During that time, the bombing was constant. A thousand people were displaced, 500 were imprisoned. The Salvadoran army combined aerial bombardment with massive assaults of elite troops, given great mobility by the simultaneous use of 60 transport helicopters. FMLN stands up against massive attacks
This operation led to the almost complete depopulation of the region, and seems to have forced the FMLN to retreat momentarily. Since then, it has regained control of the region. The Salvadoran army tried to repeat this scenario in another region, Chalatenango, but with much less success.
In September 1986, when the third meeting in the FMLN-Duarte talks was to take place in Sesori, the army mobilized 30,000 men.
Overall, the FMLN managed to meet the attack, and even succeeded in dealing the Salvadoran army some very severe blows. For example, on June 19, 1986, it attacked the country's main military base, San International Viewpoint 4 May 1987 represented by the Executive Committee of the FDR and the General Command of the FMLN, signed a political pact bringing up to date the terms of the revolutionary democratic alliance.
This political pact sums up the experience of our alliance over these last six years of revolutionary people's war, its advances and the points scored by our people in the struggle against the pro-imperialist dictatorship and for the triumph of the revolution.
We declare:
1. The FDR and the FMLN are pursuing the same objective - defeat of the counter-insurgency scheme of US imperialism and its allies in El Salvador and the triumph of an anti-imperialist, anti-oligarchical democratic revolution.
2. The FDR and FMLN are fighting for political power in El Salvador in order to be able to lead Salvadoran society to achieving their national, pluralist and nonaligned project, expressed today in the platform for a Revolutionary Democratic Government (GDR), which has given life to their alliance.
3. Our alliance is a strategic one because of the concrete conditions themselves in which people are fighting. Only through a joint effort by our fronts and the organizations that make them up will it be possible to win and maintain the objectives we have set.
4. We are a pluralist and democratic alliance, which involves mutual respect and the broadest possible debate, without sectarianism, dogmatism or hegemonism.
5. In view of the pluralist nature of our alliance, the FDR is not the political arm of the FMLN, nor the latter the military arm of the FDR. They are two different, separate organizations, that are closely linked and coordinated and have common objectives.
6. The FDR and the FMLN will discuss together the political and military line to be followed and together will work out common strategy and tactics and the plan of action. Decisions will be made by consensus.
7. The FDR and the FMLN will inform each other and consult in an ongoing way and agree to set up the mechanisms and instruments necessary for this task.
8. Differences that cannot be overcome through discussion will be left to be decided in accordance with the autonomy enjoyed by all components of the alliance, with the possibility for divergence and constructive public criticism being left open.
This pact is the expression of a new level of development reached by our organizations and of their commitment to the struggle. It represents a step forward for our people on the road to freedom.
Mexico, December 15, 1986 Press Bureau of the FMLN FDR 14
Migel, and occupied it for several hours, inflictings 200 casualties, dead and wounded, on the army.
At the end of the day, the overall military balance sheet for 1986 was not favorable to the army. The FMLN demonstrated its operational capacities in the country's various regions. It controls about 25 per cent of the territory. By stepping up its activities at the end of the year, it managed to inflict more than 6,000 casualties on the Salvadoran armed forces, while at the same time, according to the army itself, the FMLN's casualties were lower than in 1985 (863 dead in 1986, as against 1,147 in 1985).
In 1986, the FMLN reportedly succeeded in imposing seven roadtransport and railway strikes, which scored an important success, as in previous years. During the coffee and cotton harvests, the FMLN also managed to force the landowners to pay decent wages to the agricultural workers.
The year 1987 began with stepped up FMLN attacks in the course of the "Heroic January" operation. This action was so successful that it was prolonged for a month, during which assaults were staged against major bases in middle-sized towns. The FMLN's offensive obliged the armed forces to make counter-attacks in nearly all of the country's departments.
The counter-insurgency scheme relying on the Christian Democracy has thus definitely been stymied. But there is no other one that can be put in its place in the near future.
The personnel can be changed. Duarte can be replaced by another Christian Democrat. The candidate in the best position to step into his shoes seems to be Abraham Rodriquez, one of the most right-wing of the Christian Democratic Party leaders. There was a hint of this during the JanuaryFebruary political crisis.
International Viewpoint 4 May 1987
However, the 64 dollar question is whether the United States can afford to set up an open military dictatorship again or put parties to the right of the Christian Democrats in power, either by elections, or through a ministerial crisis combined with a right-wing split away from the Christian Democracy. (In fact, up until now, the United States, as well as the Salvadoran armed forces, have assured Duarte of their support.) Such an option seems quite impracticable, much more risky than prolonging the life of a Christian Democratic government, even if the latter is in an impasse.
Why does such a solution seem so improbable? Because the Salvadoran army cannot with its own forces alone, even they have tripled, fight on two fronts, against the guerrillas and against the mass movement. The US army would find itself compelled to intervene more and more massively, sending thousands of men into battle, with all the repercussions that may be imagined on the home front and in international politics, at a time when the USSR is playing the detente card to the fullest. From 1984-86, the FMLN managed, through its proposals for dialogue and negotiations, to regain the political initiative and cut the ground out from under Duarte's feet. While increasing the military pressure, it succeeded in creating a space for political struggle for the reviving mass movement.
After it was crushed and broken up in 1980-82, the mass movement could not be recomposed in the cities and in the countryside on the basis of support for the revolutionary armed struggle waged by the FMLN. To fight openly for such a perspective would have been a suicidal policy for the cadres of the people's movement and meant their isolation from the masses. The "dialogue" proposed
The dialogue proposal launched by the FMLN opened up a political perspective for the mass movement -pressure to throw Duarte on the defensive so that he would really engage in negotiations with the insurgents with a view to bringing about peace.
"We are the ones who have to wage the fight to show that there is a just political solution in El Salvador. If we reject dialogue, not only will we lose our credibility, but above all we will create frustration among the people who are suffering from the bombing and the repression," FMLN commander Ana Guadalupe Martinez pointed out. For a time, Duarte himself used the dialogue proposal in an offensive way in order to score points with the Salvadoran population and to backup his international propaganda operation.
However, the FMLN's military pressure and the more and more
Profile of the economy Population: 4,772,000 in 1985. Very high population density. Agriculture is the principal employer and produces most of the wealth. It is also the sector in which workers are most exploited. The three main products are coffee, cotton and sugar cane.
Industry accounts for 15% of the economically active population. Ownership is very concentrated. Sixty families control 84.5% of all capital stocks, both in agriculture and industry. These families are the core of the capitalist oligarchy in El Salvador.
The agrarian reform, nationalization of the banks and coffee trading carried out at the end of 1979 and the beginning of 1980 to contain the mass movement have not modified the concentration of capitalist economic power.
GNP in 1985 was 20% lower than in 1978, barely reaching the level of 1973. Per capita GNP has been plummeting in recent years. In 1986, it had fallen to the level of 1965.
Trend of real wages (base 100 = 1970) (minimum wage) 1980 1984 Agricultural workers 82.9 57.9 Factory workers 115.8 96.5 Commerce workers 105.8 88.2
Inflation and unemployment rates 1979 1982 1984 1985 1986 Inflation 15.9 11.7 11.7 22.1 30 Unemployment 6.7 30 30 30 35
15
EL SALVADOR massive support for the dialogue proposal made by them forced Duarte to sit down twice at a negogiating table with the revolutionists, and thereby recognize that they have an unchallengeable legitimacy and representativeness.
Martinez explained: "When we put forward the possibility of a political solution through dialogue, we oblige the Salvadoran government to take. a stand, to say whether it is favorable or not to dialogue and to reveal its policy, which is to crush the FMLN militarily. For a long time, Duarte did not want to engage in dialogue, and the world condemned him. When he realized that he was paying a political price for this, he decided to adjust his position, using dialogue in a tactical way, not to seek a political solution to the conflict, but to gain legitimacy." FMLN sows no illusions
The FMLN carefully avoided spreading the slightest illusions about the possibilities for real alliances with Duarte, the army or the oligarchy. It constantly used the weapon of dialogue to show that Duarte, like the army, like the oligarchy, were allies and transmission belts of US imperialism.
"For Duarte, the banner of dialogue is merely a political game that has a temporary usefulness as a cover for his project. Duarte and the Christian Democracy are not a power in themselves. Their role is limited to being mere instruments of the Reagan government's policy." (4)
The FMLN has put into practice a strategy combining armed struggle (in less than ten years it has built a fully-iledged revolutionary army); political struggle for winning hegemony over the masses and accelerating the crisis of bourgeois rule; international solidarity; diplomatic initiatives; and, finally, an overall vision of the Ameri. can revolution.
The FMLN has managed to bridge the gap that opened between it and the masses from 1980-82 as a result of the massive and bloody repression directed against the popular movement. It avoided the deviation of giving priority to the military factor to the detriment of mass organization.
"In a people's war, the military factor is not absolutely predominant. What is decisive for a revolutionary movement is whether it has achieved an accumulation of military forces that, combined with political forces, enables it to change the relationship of forces. In 1983, while the FMLN's military blows pushed the army to the 16 9L brink of collapse, the absence of a rising mass movement kept these military victories from leading to significant changes in the relationship of forces." (5)
Likewise, the FMLN has also drawn the lessons from the overestimation that it made at the time of its "final offensive" in 1981 of the masses' capacity for insurrection when they had already suffered very severe blows. In these last years, the FMILN has paid great attention to struggles for concrete demands and to strengthening the organization of the masses.
Finally, the FMLN has been able to advance different political proposals in accordance with the needs of the time. For example the proposal for a Government of Broad Participation (GAP) made in January 1984 was used essentially as a political weapon to gain mass support and to throw the Duarte government into a crisis at a time when the Christian Democracy still enjoyed a certain popular support. In this, no ambiguity was left about the FMLN's revolutionary perspective.
"In the present social.. struggle, what is involved is not the demand for a liberalization or reformism measured out by the Americans and accepted by the oligarchy. What is involved is challenging the system as such by demanding deepgoing changes •..In our country, we will be able to talk about elections after there has been a recomposition of the structure of military, economic and political power.
"The Salvadoran social, economic and political forces that are convinced of the need for introducing structural changes in our society to achieve peace constitute the majority ... A negotiated solution cannot be envisaged to avoid social changes but, on the contrary, it must make it possible to achieve them within the framework of a national consensus. (6)"
On December 15, 1986, the FDR and the FMLN included in the document renewing their alliance the perspective of a democratic revolutionary government as the fundamental axis of their fight on the political level. The platform of such a government was adopted by the Salvadoran revolutionary organizations in February 1980sand by the FDR in April 1980.
There is no point in harping on the fact that the democratic revolutionary government was reaffirmed and the GAP put aside. The overall coherence remains. While firmly maintaining a revolutionary perspective, the FMLN may be led, as it was not long ago with the GAP, to put forward tactical proposals linked to the concrete conditions of the struggle.