Back in 1912 President Taft sent a young Iowa-born accountant to Nicaragua to help collect customs payments and make sure that some of the money went to service foreign debts. In the unabashed days of dollar diplomacy, that was one way the U.S. saw to it that a troubled Caribbean republic's obligations were met. At his rolltop desk in a musty corner of the wood-and-adobe Managua customhouse, Irving A. Lindberg did an honest and efficient job. More important, as the years passed, he made friends with a rising young National Guard officer...
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