 The Silent War - Impressions of a War in Southern Nicaragua - The Nueva Guinea region in the South of Nicaragua is inhabited by farmers who settled there during the Somoza government. Here, on the edge of the tropical rain forest, using the simplest methods of cultivation, these people are barely able to subsist. They have no streets, no radio and hardly any contact with their neighbours. In this secluded area, the farmers formed cooperatives and, under pressure from the Sandinista movement, they share both the work load and the profits from the yield. With state support, they planted new products such as cocoa. These cooperatives became significant targets for attack by the Contras. Contra assaults on settlements and plantations have forced the farmers to defend themselves on a permanent basis. The deliberate and strategic assassination of agriculturalists, teachers and nurses have caused widespread fear and terror. These tactics of attrition and exhaustion destroy the farmers efforts again and again; this not only has catastrophic consequences on their agricultural production, but they can barely provide for their own families. In addition, there are the problems of those who are forced by the military clashes with the Contra to leave their farms and who now live together in cramped conditions in provisional camps. This is the everyday reality of an economic war which aims to prove to the population that an improvement in living conditions and progress is impossible under a Sandinista government. This is how the inhabitants of this remote area of Nicaragua are 1988 confronted with the USA s Central American policy of "Low Intensity Warfare". The film reflects the drama of this new, as yet unknown war.