Assassination
Somoza was assassinated near his exile home on September 17, 1980. He was 54 years old. Somoza Debayle was ambushed by a seven-person Sandinista commando team (four men and three women). This was known as "Operation Reptile".
The Sandinista team had two Soviet-made machine guns, two AK-47 assault rifles, two automatic pistols, and an RPG-7 rocket launcher with four anti-tank grenades and two rockets. The leader was Argentinian Marxist revolutionary Enrique Gorriarán Merlo (code named "Ramon"), an ex-Ejército Revolucionario del Pueblo member. One of the team members said: "We cannot tolerate the existence of millionaire playboys whilst thousands of Latin Americans are dying of hunger. We are perfectly willing to give up our lives for this cause."
For over six months the Sandinista assassins researched and planned their assault. The team meticulously studied Somoza's movements with a team member who was staked out at a newspaper kiosk near the estate. They waited in ambush for Somoza in Avenida España. Somoza was often driven about the city in a presumed unarmored Mercedes-Benz S-Class sedan. Team member Oswaldo, disguised as a paper boy, watched Somoza exit the estate and signaled when he was leaving at 10:10 A.M.
Once in position, Hugo Irarzun (Capitán Santiago) readied the RPG-7. He tried to fire an anti-tank rocket at the car, but the RPG-7 misfired. Ramon then gunned down the chauffeur while Irarzun quickly reloaded the RPG with a new rocket. The second rocket made a direct hit on the sedan. Accounts mentioned that the Mercedes' engine kept on running even after the rocket explosion. Previously the commando team had considered the possibility that Somoza's vehicle might indeed be equipped with forward-paneled armor. This would most likely deflect the rocket projectile upwards if hit from a frontal stance. The Sandinista team decided to engage with a lateral attack which would rule out any projectile deflection. Somoza was killed instantly and charred with the other two passengers in the car, his financial advisor Jou Baittiner and his new driver César Gallardo. Later media reports in Paraguay stated that Somoza's body was so unrecognizable that forensics had to identify him through his feet.
Of the seven assassins, six escaped. Irarzun was later captured because of his blond beard and was executed.
Somoza was buried in Miami at Woodlawn Park Cemetery and Mausoleum. A few months before Somoza's death, his memoirs, Nicaragua Betrayed, were published. In them he blamed the Carter Administration for his downfall. His son, Anastasio Somoza Portocarrero, went into exile in Guatemala.
Former National Intelligence Officer for Latin America and Cuba expert Professor Brian Latell argues in his book After Fidel, that the plan to assassinate Somoza was devised in Havana with direct input from Fidel Castro. According to him, the Sandinistas had won power in July 1979 with the assistance of massive, covert Cuban military aid. Along with his brother Raúl Castro, the two masterminded a complex multinational covert action to provide the Sandinistas with huge quantities of modern armaments. Cuban intelligence and paramilitary advisors poured into Nicaragua along with the equipment. Latell states that the evidence indicated that the assassination operation was similar to other assassination operations Cuban intelligence had been involved in, and that Somoza was a long-time nemesis of Castro after he provided critical support to the U.S. in preparing for the Bay of Pigs Invasion of Cuba in April 1961. Jorge Masetti, former Argentine guerrilla working with Cuban intelligence services, describes the Somoza assassination and Cuba´s direct role in the planning in his autobiographical book In the Pirate´s Den.
His funeral became an occasion for wealthy Nicaraguan and Cuban exiles in South Florida to gather and protest the left-wing governments of Nicaragua under the FSLN and Cuba under Castro. However, other accounts note that this group in Miami was also relieved at Somoza's death because the newly-founded Contra army, which consisted of many ex-members of Somoza's National Guard, would have to give the impression of having no relation to the old Somoza regime, for purposes of public relations and world opinion.
In 1979, the Brazilian newspaper Gazeta Mercantil estimated that the Somoza family's fortune amounted to between $2 billion and $4 billion with its head, Anastasio Somoza Debayle, owning $1 billion.
Read more about this topic: Anastasio Somoza Debayle