The World - News from Feb. 21, 1988

Salvadoran rebels said U.S. military advisers stationed in El Salvador face reprisals as a result of their growing role in combat. “The participation of the advisers in combat is increasing every day. More will be killed, more wounded,” Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front Commander Roberto Roca warned over the rebels’ clandestine radio station. Roca said he was referring to the 55 advisers training Salvadoran government troops and to what he said was a contingent of “about 40 (American) civilians advising and directing the repression of the people’s movement.” Washington last year provided more than $600 million in aid to the centrist government fighting an 8-year-old war against the Marxist-led insurgents.