Reagan, meanwhile, was undercutting his own diplomats. First, he vetoed a bill that would have kept in place the minimal human rights certification requirements in El Salvador. Then, a month later, he publicly defended the death squads. “I’m going to voice a suspicion I’ve never said aloud before,” he said. “I wonder if all this is rightwing, or if those guerrilla forces have not realized that…they can get away with these violent acts, helping to try to bring down the government, and the rightwing will be blamed for it.”
