Contras Under Heavy Attack in Nicaragua

The Nicaraguan army launched a major offensive against U.S.-backed rebels Tuesday, overrunning the Contras’ main base in northern Nicaragua and pursuing the rebels across the border into neighboring Honduras, U.S. and Contra officials said.

“Based on what we now know, this would appear to be the largest offensive we have seen the Sandinistas undertake,” State Department spokesman Charles Redman said, referring to Nicaragua’s ruling leftist party. He said U.S. intelligence estimates that 6,000 Nicaraguan troops backed by Soviet-supplied helicopters have moved into the Bocay River valley, the Contras’ main foothold in northern Nicaragua.

“We are in a critical situation,” a Contra spokeswoman, Marta Sacasa, said in a telephone interview from the rebels’ political headquarters in Miami. “We have had to give up some of our positions and disperse our troops. We are having some difficulty evacuating our wounded.”

She said Contra officers reported that about 1,000 Sandinista troops crossed the border into Honduras in pursuit of rebel units. State Department officials, while noting that they have no independent confirmation of that report, said they consider it credible. “We have no reason to disbelieve what the Contras are saying,” one said.

In Managua, the Nicaraguan capital, President Daniel Ortega confirmed that an offensive is under way and told reporters that it is succeeding. “We are dealing serious blows to the mercenary forces,” Reuters news agency quoted him as saying.

Reuters also quoted military sources as saying that the army was conducting a big sweep in northern Jinotega province and in northern Zelaya province to the east. The sources reported daily combat since March 8 near the gold-mining town of Siuna, about 160 miles northeast of Managua.

The Sandinistas launched their attack at a moment when the Contras were particularly vulnerable.

Two weeks ago, the Reagan Administration and congressional Republicans turned down a Democratic proposal for $30 million in non-military aid for the rebels, leaving the Contras with a dwindling supply of food and ammunition. The Administration rejected the aid package because it did not include any funds for military supplies.

‘Specter of Starvation’

Faced with what one of their officers called “the specter of starvation,” the Contras then agreed to a new round of peace talks with the Sandinistas next week after initially rejecting the negotiations.

Rebel spokeswoman Sacasa said that the Sandinista offensive calls into question the Managua regime’s commitment to a negotiated peace. But she said that the Contras still intend to attend the talks.

“This operation has a specifically political aim,” charged another Contra official, Bosco Matamoros. “The Sandinistas may go to the talks to try to dictate a cease-fire on their terms.”

The attack also began as the Reagan Administration launched a new political offensive in Congress to seek military aid for the Contras.

Reports of the fighting, in a remote area along the Nicaraguan-Honduran border, were sketchy Tuesday evening. But all accounts agreed that the Sandinistas had moved an unusually large number of troops into the Bocay Valley and that the Contras were unable to hold them off.

A rebel official who asked not to be named said that Contra military commander Enrique Bermudez was in the valley when the Sandinistas attacked and quickly withdrew across the border into Honduras to direct his troops.

Matamoros said that as many as 4,000 Sandinista combat troops supported by another 3,500 in rear units attacked the rebels’ positions in the Bocay Valley from the east. He said a Pentagon estimate of 1,000 to 1,500 Contra troops in the area is “about correct.”

“The strategic objective of the operation is to cut off our forces in central Nicaragua from the north,” he said. “For over 10 days already, we have not been able to provide any food supplies in central Nicaragua because of extreme limitations on our aerial resupply capability. Our resupply problems have basically immobilized some of our units on the ground.”

He said that two major Contra headquarters were overrun: the strategic command and control center near the Honduran border and a field command base at El Cuartelon on the Bocay River.

The rebels were attempting to evacuate their wounded, but they have only one small helicopter that can carry out only two men at a time, he added.

The Sandinistas prepared for the offensive with a week of aerial bombing, used multiple rocket launchers and long-range artillery to aid their advance and ferried guerrilla battalions to the battlefield by helicopter, Matamoros said.

“It is not the largest number of troops that the Sandinistas have used at one time, but it is their largest operation in a concentrated area,” he said.

Contra officials said the Sandinista troops appeared to have crossed the Coco River into Honduras in an attempt to encircle some rebel units. Nicaraguan troops have pursued Contra units into Honduran territory several times during the 7-year-long guerrilla war, only to withdraw within a short time.

There was no immediate reaction from the Honduran government. The area around the Bocay River is virtually unpopulated in both Honduras and Nicaragua.

The defeat of any further aid in Congress appears to have damaged the rebels’ morale, a State Department official said. “Some Contra elements may have lost hope and feel abandoned by the U.S. government,” he said.

Times staff writer Robert L. Jackson contributed to this story.