Editorial - Honduras in the 1980s - Mike Goldwater & Blue Cube Productions

La Vertud camp for Salvadoran refugees just over the border from El Salvador's Chalatenango province, April 1981.

Following Salvadoran army sweeps through their areas and mass killings, several thousand Salvadorans took refuge at La Vertud.

A carpenter makes a coffin for a small child who did not survive the journey over the mountains to Honduras

Bringing home firewood in a favela in the capital, Tegucigalpa.

For many landless peasants, the only work was day labouring - when they could get it. According to the UN, 55% of the rural population lived below absolute poverty levels.

Rural poverty in Honduras at this time, in 1982, was extreme, as here for this child in Santa Barbara province. In the dry season, the nearest water supply was a two hour walk away.

Dr Roberto Suazo Cordoba, Liberal Party leader, greeting a newspaper boy during his Presidential campaign. He won the election and was president from 1982 -1986.

To facilitate America’s campaign of support for the Contras trying to destabilise the Sandinistas in Nicaragua, the US established an airbase at Palmerola near Comayagua with 5,000 US troops, December 1983.

The Americans named their Palmerola camp hospital after the new Honduran president.

The US army set up a number of PR exercises, one of which was MEDCAP. Before leaving on the mission, the Colonel explained the healthcare for his troops.

MEDCAP consisted of two Blackhawks carrying 20 US army doctors, dentists and nurses to a remote location.

A mother and daughter await attention.

The team provide some health education.

Each location was visited only once and there was no follow-up.

The team pull teeth and gather local intelligence.

In a stunt for US TV, on Thanksgiving 300 children from Comayagua town were bussed in to the Palmarola airbase for a turkey dinner.

US marines parachute into Morocon close to the Nicaraguan border in a simulated invasion of Nicaragua, June 1986.

This was a joint exercise with the Honduran army.

Soldiering started young in Honduras - this boy was 12 years old.

Honduran troops on a night patrol, part of the US army's Cabanas 86 exercise.

The US army continued with its MEDCAP ops, here giving away tooth brushes.

Families displaced from their home villages by the Contra presence along the Nicaragua border faced an uncertain future, deprived of their land with no compensation.

Some Mesquito Indians, who lived along the Nicaragua - Honduras border, and had longstanding issues with authorities in Managua had joined the Contra forces.

These Kisan Misquito Contras are about to launch an attack over the border from Rus Rus.

Like El Salvador and Guatemala, Honduras was ruled by a series of authoritarian governments during the early 1980s, with opposition suppressed. The country was heavily indebted, with widespread poverty and social inequality, and was significantly impacted by the conflicts in neighbouring countries. The US under President Regan was determined to undermine the left-wing Sandinista government in neighbouring Nicaragua. America created and supported Contra forces who launched attacks across the border from bases along the Honduran border. America disbanded the Contras in 1992 after the Sandinistas lost elections to an opposition coalition that the US had supported, led by Violetta Chamorro.