‘Nicaragua: New Challenges’
“Congressional Quicksand on Nicaragua” by professors Kenneth E. Sharpe and Morris Blachman (Op-Ed, Dec. 18) is right on. The congressional Democrats need to go on the offense against more Contra aid, bringing up again and again such matters as President Reagan’s refusal of offers by the visiting Daniel Ortega and Mikhail Gorbachev to negotiate, respectively, regional security in Central America and an end of military aid to both sides in Nicaragua.
The professors perform a great service in emphasizing the purely defensive nature of the proposed Sandinista military buildup, which they, as a sovereign government, have every right to undertake until we remove our troops from Honduras, end Contra aid and actively support the Arias peace plan.
Contra aid is indeed a moral disaster equivalent to, say, Gov. Deukmejian arming the L.A. street gangs in order to harass Mayor Bradley to drive him out of office. But running a corporate colonial system never was pretty; attempting to regain a lost colony by force even less so.
JEROME S. HOPKINS
Oxnard
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