Conservative Coup in Nicaragua 1926

In 1925, a coalition government was formed in Nicaragua upon the election of President Carlos Solorzano (fl. 1920s), a conservative, and Vice President Juan Bautista Sacasa (1874-1946), a liberal; shortly the US Marines left the country after 13 years of occupation. On October 25, 1925, General Emiliano Chamorro Vargas (1871-1966) and Adolfo Diaz (1874-1964) seized power by a coup d'etat, driving Sacasa and other liberals out of the government; after Solorzano's resignation, Chamorro became president in January 1926, but he was not recognized by the United States, which sent gun-boats and troops to Nicaragua after a liberal revolt broke out under General Augusto Cesar Sandino (1893-1934), whose supporters seized US property. A truce was arranged; Chamorro resigned and left the country in October 1926; and the Nicaraguan congress elected the conservative Diaz president.

A moderate conservative, Carlos Solórzano, was elected president in open elections in 1924, with liberal Juan Bautista Sacasa as his vice president. After taking office on January 1, 1925, Solórzano requested that the United States delay the withdrawal of its troops from Nicaragua. Nicaragua and the United States agreed that United States troops would remain while United States military instructors helped build a national military force. In June, Solórzano's government contracted with retired United States Army Major Calvin B. Carter to establish and train the National Guard. The United States marines left Nicaragua in August 1925. However, President Solórzano, who had already purged the liberals from his coalition government, was subsequently forced out of power in November 1925 by a conservative group who proclaimed General Emiliano Chamorro (who had also served as president from 1917 to 1921), as president in January 1926.

Fearing a new round of conservative-liberal violence and worried that a revolution in Nicaragua might result in a leftist victory as happened a few years earlier in Mexico, the United States sent marines, who landed on the Caribbean coast in May 1926, ostensibly to protect United States citizens and property. United States authorities in Nicaragua mediated a peace agreement between the liberals and the conservatives in October 1926. Chamorro resigned, and the Nicaraguan Congress elected Adolfo Díaz as president (Díaz had previously served as president, 1911- 16).

References

Dictionary of Wars, 329; Nicaragua - A Country Study.

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