Kissinger Commission

The Reagan administration convened the U.S. National Bipartisan Commission on Central America in 1984 in hopes of reversing flagging congressional support for its Central American policy, particularly with respect to aid to the Nicaraguan Contras and military assistance for the government of El Salvador. Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger chaired the conservative, twelve-member commission, whose mandate was to study contemporary conflicts in Central America and make policy recommendations.

The report of the Kissinger Commission was released in January 1984. It contained an overview of Central American development and addressed what the commission believed to be the immediate causes of the military conflicts afflicting the region in the early 1980s. Members of the commission concurred with other observers that peace in Central America was dependent upon improvements in economic and social conditions and that those developments were not likely to occur until the civil wars came to an end.

Regarding the region's economic problems, the report recommended that the United States mount a large aid program for Central America; it envisioned much more external assistance than was actually forthcoming in the 1980s. The sections dealing with security issues, however, created the most public controversy, and only partially succeeded in gaining congressional support. Especially contentious aspects of the report were its insistence that Central American revolutionary movements relied heavily on support from Cuba and the Soviet Union, the commission's refusal to fully acknowledge United States' backing of the Contras, and arguments in favor of increasing U.S. military assistance to El Salvador.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Report of the National Bipartisan Commission on Central America (1984).

Richard E. Feinberg, "The Kissinger Commission Report: A Critique," in World Development 12, no. 8 (1984): 867-876.

William M. Leo Grande, "Through the Looking Glass: The Kissinger Commission Report on Central America," World Policy Journal 1, no. 2 (1984): 251-284.

Additional Bibliography

LaFeber, Walter. Inevitable Revolutions: The United States in Central America. Second Edition. New York: W.W. Norton, 1993.

LeoGrande, William M. Our Own Backyard: The United States in Central America, 1977–1992. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1998.

Rouquié, Alain. Guerras y paz en América Central. México, D.F.: Fondo de Cultura Económica, 1994.

                                             Mary A. Clark