Spate of Killings Jolts Victorious Salvador Right

The well-known businessman shifted a holstered gun from one stack of papers to another on top of his desk and skillfully dodged the question at hand: Why isn’t he working in the new right-wing government of President Alfredo Cristiani?

He toyed with a dagger-like letter opener and finally replied: “It’s very dangerous.” Although he used to speak publicly on behalf of business groups, now he refuses to be quoted by name. “Some things are just too delicate to discuss,” he said. “You understand.”

El Salvador’s economic elite has taken power after five years of hostile Christian Democratic rule, but the thrill of victory has been dampened by a series of civilian assassinations--including the murders of an attorney general and one of Cristiani’s closest advisers--and stepped-up guerrilla attacks in the capital.

The killings prompted several businessmen whom Cristiani had wooed to decline jobs in the government, according to diplomats and military sources. Others have sent their children out of the country or left for awhile themselves. Many of those who remain are keeping low profiles and have increased security, causing what is widely referred to as “a bodyguard shortage.”

Leftist guerrillas from the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front took responsibility for some of the killings but denied involvement in others. As a result, this capital is tense with speculation, a sense of confusion and a fear of retaliation against leftists by the right wing.

“Everybody is waiting for the other shoe to drop,” a political observer said.

The return of exiled leftist leaders and the opening of television to political debate--democratic changes brought about in late 1987 and 1988 by the Central American peace plan of Costa Rican President Oscar Arias Sanchez--have been overshadowed in 1989 by the thunder of bombs from the guerrillas’ daily sabotage and an apparent hardening of positions on all sides.

The changes also affect the average citizen. Most residents in the capital have made their way through the nine-year war by keeping their ears to the ground and avoiding political involvement. But now, with a right-wing government and guerrilla assaults, there is a sense that the possibilities for remaining neutral are shrinking.

Choice Means Taking Sides

Because the chances of witnessing a guerrilla action are far greater now, so are the chances for military pressure. A civilian who observes rebel activity in his neighborhood has two choices: to talk or not to talk. Either one implies taking sides.

Despite the resolution from last week’s summit of five Central American presidents urging a “constructive dialogue” to end the war that already has taken tens of thousands of lives, people, in conversations, show little faith that there will ever be a negotiated end to the fighting. Tension hangs over the capital like a reverberating echo of the explosions.

Cristiani’s Nationalist Republican Alliance (Arena party) administration, which took office June 1, has responded to rebel attacks by increasing its rhetoric against legal leftist groups and preparing tougher anti-terrorist laws to jail suspected guerrillas. Army troops are permanently stationed at the National University, which the government views as a guerrilla haven.

The moves seem aimed at eliminating what little freedom remains to voice opposition.

Money for Anti-Guerrilla Tips

The army, which understands that its only effective defense against urban warfare is counterintelligence, has launched “Operation Network” to gather information. Soldiers set up roadblocks throughout the capital, and officials are planning a publicity campaign to offer money for anti-guerrilla tips.

For those who wish to remain anonymous, the army established a hot line to report “terrorist acts or suspicious activities,” according to Col. Rene Emilio Ponce, army chief of staff.

“We are looking for a massive repudiation of violence by the civilian population,” Ponce said in a recent interview.

Information sometimes pays off: The army discovered a huge cache of rebel weapons in the capital recently, including hundreds of East Bloc AK-47 automatic weapons. But the weapons served as a warning about rebel plans for the capital. AK-47s are easily converted into smaller submachine guns--more discreet for urban use--and authorities concede there were other stashes they didn’t find.

Already, violence has become so routine that it is almost predictable. For example, when architect Ricardo Jimenez Castillo erected a 19-story aquamarine glass office building that he named Democracy Tower, the reaction of many people was that the modern structure looked like a lightening rod for guerrilla sabotage.

Retaliation by Rightists

When, as expected, leftist guerrillas set off a bomb in the nearly completed high-rise, blowing out the walls of the first nine floors, Jimenez railed against the attack on democracy. But most people looked ahead, forecasting that the extreme right would retaliate against the nearby University of Central America.

And so, days later, when a bomb destroyed the university’s expensive printing press, bringing the output of liberal publications to a halt, many people were outraged by the escalating violence and attack on freedom of expression, but few were surprised.

A month before, when someone tossed a hand grenade into a crowded marketplace, killing two and wounding dozens, the government immediately blamed the guerrillas, who blamed the army. The violence appeared to benefit neither side, leading political observers to shrug at the only sure conclusion--that too many people have grenades in El Salvador.

In San Salvador during the last year, the guerrillas have attacked the army chiefs of staff headquarters, the National Guard headquarters and the army’s 1st Brigade headquarters, as well as several police and civil defense outposts in residential neighborhoods. Not all of the attacks were militarily successful, but psychologically, they made the point that the war has come to stay in the capital.

Politicians, journalists and diplomats have spent much of their time lately trying to figure out who killed Jose Antonio Rodriguez Porth, Cristiani’s 73-year-old secretary of the presidency--a Cabinet-level post. Rodriguez Porth, his driver and a groundskeeper were slain by a gunman in front of Rodriguez Porth’s house on the morning of June 9.

There are four common theories about the killers: That it was the guerrillas who are taking responsibility for some assassinations and denying it in other cases to create confusion; rightist extremists who believed Rodriguez Porth was too much of a pragmatist; followers of the right-wing air force chief, Gen. Juan Rafael Bustillo, who believed Rodriguez Porth blocked his appointment as defense minister, and Christian Democratic “death squads,” in a preemptive strike and warning to the far right.

Again, the only thing sure is the abundance of suspects.

Advised to Leave the Country

After the killing, the ultra-rightist Crusade for Peace and Work placed a newspaper advertisement attacking several prominent leftists and academics. U.S. Embassy officials then warned Ruben Zamora, leader of the small National Revolutionary Movement, and several other leftists that they would be wise to spend a weekend out of the country. Zamora and several of his colleagues took the advice.

The guerrillas, meanwhile, continue their economic sabotage against power lines and substations, soft-drink trucks, buses and other targets, in many cases wounding civilian passers-by. The government has surrounded telephone exchange boxes with wire cages, but the rebels blow them up anyway.

Publicly or privately, the guerrillas have accepted responsibility for killing rebel defector Miguel Castellanos, rightist businessman Francisco L. Peccorini and Atty. Gen. Roberto Garcia Alvarado, a close Cristiani associate appointed last December by the National Assembly, which is controlled by Cristiani’s party.

The rebels unequivocally deny not only the slaying of Rodriguez Porth but the fatal shooting of Edgar Chacon, an outspoken extreme rightist. For some business leaders, Chacon’s killing last month was the last straw that prompted them to take cover.

Before Cristiani took office, it was widely assumed that business leaders would jump at the chance to serve in a government that served their interests. Cristiani is a wealthy coffee grower, and his Nationalist Republican Alliance is made up of the landed and industrial elite. On the other hand, the previous Christian Democratic government nationalized the nation’s banks and its coffee export sales and implemented agrarian reform.

A few business leaders who were candidates for government posts took themselves out of the running when they realized how little they could earn in public service, compared to private enterprise, according to diplomatic, military and business sources. But several others dropped out after the assassinations.

“Several people turned down Cabinet jobs,” a military source said. “They feared that by joining the government, they would leave anonymity and become military targets.”