(09-05-2011 04:23 PM)CoconutKid Wrote:  As just a reminder to the younger players, there was an actual situation where a leftist (if not entirely communist) revolt had come to power in Nicaragua. It was the Sandinista Junta of National Reconstruction government following the July 1979 overthrow of Anastasio Somoza Debayle's dictatorship. Various groups opposed it. The Contras is a label given to the various rebel groups opposing it. Although the Contra movement included a number of separate groups, with different aims and little ideological unity, the Nicaraguan Democratic Force (FDN) emerged as by far the largest. In 1987, virtually all Contra organizations were united, at least nominally, into the Nicaraguan Resistance. From an early stage, the rebels received both overt and covert financial and military support from the United States government through the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), initially supplemented by the Argentine dictatorship of the time. By 1981, the U.S. had already begun to support the armed opponents of the Sandinista regime. The U.S. Government agency in charge of this was the C.I.A., which commenced to arm, cloth, feed, and supervise the Contras. A key role in the development of the Contra alliance was played by the United States following Ronald Reagan's assumption of the presidency in January 1981. Reagan accused the Sandinistas of importing Cuban-style socialism and aiding leftist guerrillas in El Salvador. On January 4, 1982, Reagan signed the top secret National Security Decision Directive 17 (NSDD-17), giving the CIA the authority to recruit and support the Contras with $19 million in military aid. The effort to support the Contras was one component of the Reagan Doctrine, which called for providing military support to movements opposing Soviet-supported, communist governments. The CIA distributed to the civilians The Freedom Fighter's Manual, meant to teach them simple sabotage methods (not going to work, damaging light bulbs, putting nails on roads, and so on.) and more dangerous ones (how to make a molotov cocktail).

If you didn't live through the years of the Reagan Presidency, there's a lot of history to look at as fodder for game construction.

Boom! Any everyone loves to see the U.S. as the epitome of "freedom" and "democracy." Ha, that's a laugh! Know your history folks...and thanks for the lesson Coco.