These three points were true of the Sandanistas:
They were led by Daniel Ortega.They received aid from the USSR.They supported revolutions in El Salvador.Further explanation
The Sandanista National Liberation Front was--and still is--a socialist group in Nicaragua. It is abbreviated FSLN based on the Spanish version of its name. We usually refer to them simply as the Sandanistas, which is a name referring to a previous resistance leader they admired: Augusto César Sandino. Sandino had opposed US occupation of Nicaragua back in the 1930s.
The Sandanistas took over the government in Nicaragua in 1979, and remained has remained dominant in Nicaraguan politics since then. Daniel Ortega, who was the group's leader from its early days, is serving again now as the President of Nicaragua. He was elected to that office again in 2007, after having served in the role from 1985 to 1990. He also had been the leader of the government that was enacted from 1979 to 1985, which was called the Junta of National Reconstruction of Nicaragua,
As a socialist movement in Latin America, the Sandanistas received support from the Soviet Union. During the 1980s, the USSR provided significant economic, political, diplomatic and military support to Ortega and the Sandanista regime. The Sandanistas in Nicaragua, in turn, provided support to other communist revolutionaries elsewhere in Latin America -- especially in El Salvador. Throughout the decade of the 1980s, the Sandanistas supplied weapons to the groups fighting revolutions in El Salvador.
While the USSR supported the Sandanistas, the United States supported their opponents in Nicaragua, known as the Contras. They were "contra" or opposed to the Sandanitstas. The Contras were given funds and military training by the US Central Intelligence Agency. They also were given weapons through a secret deal arranged by Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North of the US National Security Council. This became a scandal known as the "Iran-Contra Affair" (because sale of of weapons to Iran was use to fund the Contras).
Learn moreSandanistas: The Iran-Contra Affair: Answer details:Grade: Middle school, high school, collegeSubject: HistoryChapter: Cold War, Latin OrtegaCold -Contra Affair