Nicaragua Remembers Julio Buitrago, the Urban Resistance Hero

Nicaragua’s Sandinista Youth Wednesday remembered Commander Julio Buitrago, the father of the urban resistance, who died 51 years ago in combat with the military forces controlled by the Anastasio Somoza dictatorship.

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Militants of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) gathered in Managua to remember a 24-year-old fighter who died after a three-hour confrontation with over 300 soldiers, who were assisted by a Sherman tank and an artillery plane.

"We paid our respects to someone who defended this Revolution, who we are living now, until his last breath," said one of the young leaders who came to the site where Buitagro died on July 15, 1969, a former safety house which is now a museum.

To pay tribute to a heroic act that Nicaraguans still remember in amazement, young students also planted ornamental plants on land next to the former FSLN's safe house.

Sandino City Mayor Reynaldo Raymundo Flores and other citizens deposit a wreath for the precursors of the urban resistance, Commander Julio Buitrago.

Historians recalled that the military deployed a disproportionate operation because they believed that the FSLN founder Carlos Fonseca hid in that house.

When the attack began, the young Buitagro ordered his comrades to leave and he barricaded himself with a 45-caliber M3 submachine gun.

As part of the psychological operations promoted by the dictatorship to intimidate the population, the attack on the Sandinista safety house was broadcast live on television.

This strategy, however, only endowed the Sandinista fighters with a halo of invincibility in the eyes of the Nicaraguan people.