Background
Luis Anastasio Somoza Debayle was born on 18 November 1922 in Leon. He was the eldest son of Anastasio Somoza García, succeeded his father as president of Nicaragua.
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Luis Anastasio Somoza Debayle was born on 18 November 1922 in Leon. He was the eldest son of Anastasio Somoza García, succeeded his father as president of Nicaragua.
He received his earliest education at the Christian Brothers School in Managua and at the age of 14 was sent to LaSalle Military Academy in Oakdale, New York, and received a commission as captain in the National Guard. He subsequently studied at the University of California, Louisiana State, and the University ot Maryland. While at Maryland, he was Nicaraguan military attaché to the United States.
Upon his return to Nicaragua, Luis Somoza had a rapid rise to colonel in the National Guard by 1950. He then retired, ran for deputy of the Nationalist Liberal Party (PNL), was elected president of Congress in early 1956, and First Designate, to succeed to the presidency if his father should die.
Somoza filled the presidency on a temporary basis when his father was shot on September 21, 1956. and was named president by Congress on September 30, upon his father’s death, until new elections in January 1957. Not wishing to run unopposed, Luis Somoza persuaded several Conservative leaders to participate as a “loyal opposition,” and to form the Nicaraguan Conservative Party (PCN), nicknamed Zancudo (pest or mosquito) because of its small size and inability to be anything more than a nuisance.
Luis Somoza announced that he would serve only one term.
In August 1967 the PLN nominated Anastasio Somoza Debayle, Luis’s brother, despite reported opposition by Luis. The sudden death of Luis Somoza of a heart attack 17 days before his brother’s inauguration removed a restraining influence on the more military-minded Anastasio.
He restored constitutional articles prohibiting the immediate reelection or succession to the presidency by any relative of the incumbent. Somoza inaugurated some programs of economic modernization, low-cost housing, and land reform. He reduced the budget of the National Guard. Freedom of the press and new opposition publications appeared. However, for four of his five years suspension of constitutional guarantees was in effect, and the Guard announced on September 30, 1960, that it has repelled the twentieth armed invasion since Luis Somoza became president. The most serious threat occurred in 1959: a land attack from Costa Rica and the airlifting of two planeloads of men led by young Conservative Party editor of La Prensa, Pedro Joaquin Chamorro Cardenal, and Independent Liberal Enrique Lacayo Farfân.
Luis Somoza contributed to improved Central American relations by accepting the World Court’s decision on Nicargua’s border dispute with Honduras and by seeking to avoid conflict with Costa Rica. Nicaragua joined the new Central American Common Market in 1961. On the other hand, Somoza was an early opponent of Fidel Castro and allowed Nicaraguan territory to be used by Cuban exiles for the abortive April 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion.
Keeping his promise to step down, Luis Somoza imposed selection of Minister of Education René Schick. The principal opposition forces withdrew from the 1963 election when Somoza rejected their demand for Organization of American states supervision of the polling.
