FARC never enjoyed quite the celebrity status of, say, the Sandinistas in Nicaragua, the communist militia that enjoyed the support of, among others, Bill de Blasio, who returned from a visit to the war-ravaged country in his late 20s with “a vision of the possibilities of an unfettered leftist government,” in the words of the New York Times. (And how are you enjoying it, New York?) The Sandinistas got a Clash triple-album named after them, whereas FARC was always more an enthusiasm of cloistered academic Marxists and left-wing activists with a commitment to worldwide revolutionary movements. They were trained by IRA bomb-makers, and their interests were advanced in the U.S. Congress by elected Democrats, with American activists acting as back-channel go-betweens. Left-wing activists have long agitated for the release of FARC terrorists held in U.S. prisons.
