EL SALVADOR
The leftist offensive is not final, after all
In the tiny, crowded killing ground that is El Salvador, 10,000 people died by violence last year. That total seems certain to be surpassed in 1981. Last week leftist guerrillas of the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (F.M.L.N.) began their long-promised "final offensive" against the forces of the military-civilian junta: more than 800 people were killed.
The seemingly inexorable, escalating tide of violence was sucking other countries into the vortex. Even before the start of the leftist offensive, the Carter Administration had become alarmed by evidence that the guerrillas were obtaining large quantities of sophisticated weapons from a number of sources, including Middle Eastern and East European countries as well as nearby Cuba and Nicaragua. Nicaragua appeared to be serving as the transit point for these arms. In order to "help El Salvador interdict the supply of military equipment coming in from the outside," as U.S. Ambassador Robert White put it, Washington resumed the modest $5 million military aid program that had been suspended since the murders of three American nuns and a lay worker by right-wing death squads a month ago.
Nicaragua, whose leftist Sandinistas have made no secret of their support for the F.M.L.N. guerrillas, was helping in other ominous ways. El Cuco, a beachside resort in the eastern part of El Salvador, witnessed an invasion by 100 guerrillas in five 30-ft. wooden boats; they almost certainly came from Nicaragua. Government forces claimed to have captured one boat and bottled up the invaders in the beach area, killing 52 of them.
The "final offensive" began early last week in working-class districts of San Salvador, the capital. As guerrilla bands in the city staged hit-and-run attacks on police and military targets, they issued, over a captured classical music radio station, a tape-recorded appeal for a general strike and a popular insurrection against the junta.
But there appeared to be few classical music lovers in San Salvador's barrios. The guerrilla attacks were beaten off by withering rifle fire and grenade attacks by the army. The government declared martial law and a dusk-to-dawn curfew. Less than 24 hours after the start of the offensive, Junta President José Napoleón Duarte called a press conference to deride the leftist efforts as "an absolute failure." Stores and businesses opened as usual the next day, and workers generally stayed on their jobs.
Elsewhere, the guerrillas had some temporary successes. They fomented an insurrection in the garrison of Santa Ana, the country's second largest city; an army captain and 80 soldiers defected to the guerrillas. Heavy fighting continued for days, as leftist troops penetrated several provincial cities before being thrown back. They seized San Francisco Gotera, the capital of eastern Morazan department, and it took government troops three days to break the cordon around the city and recapture it.