LEGACY OF LIES: EL SALVADOR 1981-1984
AFGHANISTAN: A DISTANT WAR
AFGHANISTAN: RESTORING SPIRIT & STONE
UNITED STATES: GREENPOINT
UNITED STATES: SEX TRAFFICKING
- Vice in Los Angeles
- Survivors of Human Trafficking
VIETNAM: AFTER THE WAR
BRAZIL: GOLD RUSH
EL SALVADOR: STATE OF EXEMPTION
GUATEMALA: SCORCHED EARTH

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Robert Nickelsberg

LEGACY OF LIES: EL SALVADOR 1981-1984
AFGHANISTAN: A DISTANT WAR
AFGHANISTAN: RESTORING SPIRIT & STONE
UNITED STATES: GREENPOINT
UNITED STATES: SEX TRAFFICKING
- Vice in Los Angeles
- Survivors of Human Trafficking
VIETNAM: AFTER THE WAR
BRAZIL: GOLD RUSH
EL SALVADOR: STATE OF EXEMPTION
GUATEMALA: SCORCHED EARTH

About
Media
Contact

El Salvador in Black & White

The Atlacatl Battalion commander, Lieutenant Colonel Domingo Monterrosa, hands a new soccer ball to local children in Joateca, Morazán department, El Salvador, October 22, 1984. By 1983, United States military advisors in El Salvador had implemented

A United States Army advisor, left, leads Salvadoran army soldiers during an open air class in San Juan Opico, El Salvador, March 1, 1983. With the escalation of U.S. military aid in 1981, 55 military advisors, or the Mobile Training Team, MTT, arri

Laborers repair a road for a work-for-pay-and-food construction program sponsored by the United States Agency for International Development, USAID, in San Vicente, El Salvador, April 1, 1983. USAID efforts in El Salvador were dramatically shaped by

A group of laborers and their families gather to receive food allotments as part of a work-for-pay-and-food construction program, San Vicente, El Salvador, April 1, 1983. The program was sponsored by the United States Agency for International Develo

United States Army Staff Sergeant Courtney Gary from B/3/7 SFG Panama, attached to the U.S. Military Group in El Salvador, right, checks the targets of Salvadoran soldiers during rifle practice in San Vicente department, El Salvador, December 1, 198

Salvadoran army recruits hang from a crossbar during a training exercise overseen by United States Army Rangers and Special Forces at the Ilopango air base in San Salvador, El Salvador, January 1, 1982. The base was used by the U.S. military operati

An armored Cadillac car belonging to the United States Embassy pulls up to an arriving U.S. government jet plane in Ilopango, El Salvador, November 1, 1982.

United States Secretary of State George Shultz makes a statement to the media upon arrival at the military airport in Ilopango, El Salvador, January 31, 1984. Shultz was met by Salvadoran Foreign Minister Fidel Chavez Mena, center right. Considered

United Nations Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick arrives in El Salvador during a ten-day tour of Central America and is escorted by Salvadoran Foreign Minister Fidel Chavez Mena, left, and United States Ambassador to El Salvador Deane Hinton, right, for

President of the Junta Revolucionaria de Gobierno, Revolutionary Government Junta, JRG, José Napoleón Duarte addresses a press conference following the presidential election in San Salvador, El Salvador, March 28, 1982. National elections were calle

New cadets arrive for their first day at the Escuela Militar Capitán General Gerardo Barrios in Santa Tecla, El Salvador, January 1, 1983. Lack of opportunity for social and economic ascension led many young Salvadorans towards military inscript

A crew from ABC Television films a young fighter from the Ejército Revolucionario del Pueblo, ERP, as guerrillas stop commercial traffic along the Pan American Highway in Usulatán department, El Salvador, May 1, 1983. Every major paper and wire serv

Three leftist guerrillas from the Fuerzas Populares de Liberación, FPL, stand beside the corpses of Salvadoran army soldiers along a highway near Suchitoto, El Salvador, February 12, 1983. The soldiers were ambushed by the FPL guerrillas along the o

A television news crew, lower left, inspects the damaged suspension bridge across the Lempa River that was recently bombed by guerrillas in Cuscatlán department, El Salvador, January 3, 1984. The 800-foot bridge is the largest in Central America. Th

Civilians look over the dead bodies of three civil defensemen killed during an overnight attack by guerrillas from the Frente Farabundo Martí para la Liberación Nacional, FMLN, in Santa Clara, El Salvador, July 1, 1982. Civil defense patrols were

The sister of a civil defenseman faints upon hearing of the death of her brother during an overnight attack on the civil defense post in Santa Clara, El Salvador, July 1, 1982. Guerrillas from the Frente Farabundo Martí para la Liberación Nacional,

A close-up of United States military advisor Colonel John D. Waghelstein as he smokes a cigar during a press conference at the U.S. Embassy in San Salvador, El Salvador, June 28, 1983. Waghelstein served as commander of the U.S. trainers stationed i

A member of the Salvadoran guerrilla group Ejército Revolucionario del Pueblo, ERP, stands in front of two burning commercial vehicles on the Pan American Highway in Usulután, El Salvador, March 1, 1983. Guerrillas tactics for disrupting the transpo

Members of the media gather in a funeral parlor to film the dead body of a Dutch journalist killed in guerrilla territory two days earlier, San Salvador, El Salvador, March 19, 1982. Jacobus (Koos) Koster, Hans Ter Laan, Jan Kuiper and Johannes (Joo

Salvadoran military commanders and the head of the Treasury Police Colonel Nicolás Carranza, 3rd left, sit during a military ceremony at the Escuela Militar Capitán General Gerardo Barrios in Santa Tecla, El Salvador, May 1, 1983. Carranza worked w

Armed guerrillas from the Fuerzas Populares de Liberación, FPL, disembark from a passenger bus in La Palma, El Salvador, February 6, 1983.

A woman and her children wait for bus transportation in the Mejicanos neighborhood in San Salvador, El Salvador, March 1, 1983.

Journalists from western news organizations listen to leftist guerrilla officials from the Fuerzas Populares de Liberación, FPL, as they respond to questions during a press conference in La Palma, El Salvador, February 6, 1983. FPL, as a member of t

At the central office of the Salvadoran Human Rights Commission, a staff member, left, listens to women relay their cases regarding disappeared family members in San Salvador, El Salvador, January 1, 1983. It is estimated that between 8,000 and 10,0

Two guerrillas from the Fuerzas Populares de Liberación, FPL, watch a low-flying Salvadoran military observation plane near the Guazapa volcano on the road to Suchitoto, El Salvador, August 1, 1983. The FPL, a leftist militant group within the Frent

A Salvadoran husband and wife couple stand on their deeded farmland in San Vicente department, El Salvador, June 26, 1983. Agrarian reform initiated in 1980 in El Salvador was designed by United States advisors, financed by the United States governm

Guerrillas from the Ejército Revolucionario del Pueblo, ERP, speak with local residents of San Agustín, Usulután department, El Salvador, July 5, 1983. The ERP merged with four other leftist organizations in 1980 to form the Frente Farabundo Martí p

Salvadoran laborers load bags of freshly picked coffee beans destined for export at a privately-owned coffee finca in Santa Tecla, El Salvador, October 1, 1983. The coffee industry has been the backbone of El Salvador’s export economy since its days

Three local residents play a traditional Salvadoran song on a recorder and two drums in central El Salvador, June 26, 1983.

Local residents move their belongings before an assault by the Atlacatl Battalion in pursuit of guerrillas from the Frente Farabundo Martí para la Liberación Nacional, FMLN, in Tenancingo, El Salvador, September 27, 1983. Residents would eventually

An altar with a statue of Jesus Christ is carried in a religious procession through the streets in Perquín, Morazán department, El Salvador, October 23, 1983.

United States Ambassador Deane Hinton, center, hands an American flag to Roberto D'Aubuisson, President of the Constituent Assembly, in San Salvador, El Salvador, April 1, 1983. In addition to founding the conservative political party Alianza Republ

Marching band majorettes line up before a military parade for graduating army soldiers in Santa Tecla, El Salvador, October 1, 1982.

Women and children line up for medical care at a military clinic in Perquín, Morazán department, El Salvador, October 23, 1983. Perquín was one of several towns in the Morazán department that were controlled by guerrillas from the Frente Farabundo M

Salvadoran members of the Atlacatl Battalion cross a river during a military operation in San Miguel department, El Salvador, September 1, 1983. Rapid reaction battalions were trained in counterinsurgency tactics to combat guerrilla warfare and were

In territory held by the guerrilla faction Fuerzas Populares de Liberación, FPL, armed guerrillas cross a river near the Salvadoran-Honduran border in Chalatenango department, El Salvador, February 25, 1981.

A Salvadoran Air Force door gunner watches the terrain below while flying in a United States-made Bell UH-1 helicopter gunship over the Rio Lempa district in northern El Salvador, January 1, 1983. As early as 1950, the United States provided extensi

A United States-supplied Bell UH-1 Salvadoran army helicopter with two M-60 machine guns flies over rural terrain in Morazán department, El Salvador, October 23, 1984. The helicopter flight was part of a mission to deliver a Catholic priest to the m

The hand of a mortally injured soldier sticks out of a hospital gurney at the Salvadoran military hospital in San Salvador, El Salvador, September 26, 1984.

Peruvian author Mario Vargas Llosa, left, interviews Salvadoran President Álvaro Magaña, right, at the Presidential Palace in San Salvador, El Salvador, May 10, 1984. Vargas Llosa was reporting on the 1984 Salvadoran presidential elections for Time

Judge Bernardo Rauda Murcia sits during an interview a day after convicting five former members of El Salvador's National Guard for the murders in December of 1980 of four United States churchwomen, Zacatecoluca, El Salvador, May 26, 1984. The trial

United States Ambassador Thomas R. Pickering listens to a question during a media press conference at his official residence in San Salvador, El Salvador, November 1, 1983. Pickering arrived in El Salvador in August of 1983 and was charged with guid

At a press conference, a leader of the left-wing labor union coalition Movimiento de Unidad Sindical y Gremial de El Salvador, MUSYGES, displays a headline in the El Mundo daily newspaper reporting threats by the right-wing death squad Éjercito Secr

A woman lights a votive candle on the fourth anniversary of the death of Archbishop Óscar Romero in San Salvador, El Salvador, March 24, 1984. Archbishop Romero spoke out against the increasing violence and economic inequality sustained by the Salva

Colonel Sigifredo Ochoa Pérez, commander of the counterinsurgency unit Destacamiento Militar 2, points to a map describing FMLN guerrilla movement and infiltration routes at the military headquarters in Sensuntepeque, El Salvador, October 1, 1982. I

A member of the Salvadoran guerrilla group Ejército Revolucionario del Pueblo, ERP, moves through the ransacked office of the national telephone company in Jucuapa, El Salvador, February 1, 1983. The guerrilla's clothing is made up of captured piec

Salvadoran soldiers from the Atlacatl Battalion wake in the early morning in fog-enveloped hills before moving into position against armed guerrillas from the Ejército Revolucionario del Pueblo, ERP, in San Miguel department, El Salvador, August 1,

Families congregate on the Pacific coast beach in La Libertad, El Salvador, January 1, 1983. The country was engaged in a twelve-year civil war between successive authoritarian regimes, backed by the United States, and the guerrilla coalition Frente

A day laborer uses a long-bladed saw to cut wooden planks on the cooperative El Sunza in Sonsonate, El Salvador, October 7, 1983. El Salvador's primary-export economic structure of the 20th century concentrated land ownership and income in the hand

An old gnarled Guanacaste tree grows in a rural town in central El Salvador, June 26, 1983.

Unidentified men look at two corpses in the city morgue in La Libertad, El Salvador, August 10, 1984. Both victims were shot in the face and showed additional signs of bruising. The twelve-year armed conflict would claim over 75,000 lives before pea

A Salvadoran journalist uses a white flag to indicate to armed guerrillas from the Fuerzas Populares de Liberación, FPL, ahead on the road that he and his colleagues are traveling in peace along the Pan American Highway to San Vicente, El Salvador,