I've decided to post this text here, in the latest thread on the SOA, in an attempt to foster a "clean" approach of this apparently recurring controversial issue that some detractors regard as a demerit to Wes Clark's presidential bid.
Obviously, my views are just that - my opinion. But I would appreciate it if you'd consider this text in its totality: before hitting the "reply" link, please award me the courtesy of at least reading the whole thing first. I honestly didn't write this because I had nothing better to do, but because I deeply care, as I'm sure other participants in this topic do, regardless of where we stand.
I'll tee off with my point of departure. More than twenty years ago I developed a profound interest in "the pointed end of U.S. foreign policy," with special attention to what was unfolding in Central and South America. During Reagan's reign of terror, I was often simultaneously disgusted and mystified. Disgusted by the Goebbelsian marketing of wholesale genocidal massacre under the brands of "freedom fighters" and "contra rebels." And mystified, by the apparent complacency with which Reagan's lies were consumed, and how the sparse and meekly framed news reports on atrocities committed by his command were swept aside by a willingly ignorant nation.
To this day, I haven't seen serious attempts to pursue the crimes he instigated, which weren't restricted to the Americas. Compassionate forgiveness for that level of debauchery, my ass. Instead, Reagan's fellow criminal
Oliver North gets away with paid appearances on the airwaves; even on CBS. That is arguably the largest certificate of cowardice and corruption that media carry around in this country. And now there's an airport
and a carrier to perpetuate Reagan's perverted infamy, seemingly taking a nauseating pride in thumbing the nose simultaneously at reality, the world's opinion, and national selfrespect to boot.
So yes, I'm still pissed after all these years. And yes, that's anger at a heartless geezer and the handlers behind him, for whom a large number of people voted twice - in landslide elections no less. There you go again...
And yes, among those voters was Wes Clark, whose voting record I learned to understand, and accept. Just as I learned to accept and embrace a much more nuanced and overall benign view over the past twenty years towards the great majority of people that live in the United States. I came to believe that Joe and Mary Average
deserve a reward for their high hopes and trust, with a decent, humane, hard working and utmost capable man in the White House, committed to improve their lives, and making their country a repository of hope for this world again, in short: proving that Kennedy's spirit is alive and kicking.
It's a few ferociously rotten appels that I have a big problem with.
In a sense, my journey of the past twenty years serves as a metaphore for the SOA/WHISC case and my support for Wesley Clark's presidential bid. But that argument is strictly based on personal opinion. Before I go further into the issue with more tangible arguments, I'd like to first offer a more documented premise for the subject of the SOA, for the sake of those unfamiliar with it.
There are a number of solid sources that look into the grim past of the SOA and the atrocities committed by its most unsavory graduates. Without prejudice towards other excellent resources around the Net, I recommend the two following introductory places: a
PBS Online NewsHour special, and a
CNN feature on the SOA that was aired as part of their Cold War series. I believe that these two places give a reasonably fair and accurate bird's eye overview of the problem with the SOA's history.
For an introduction to the critical view, there is an ample site maintained by the School of the Americas Watch (SOAW) a watchdog organization: it is available
here.
Then, there's the site of the "old" SOA itself, which was formally closed on December 15, 2000: it can be found
here. The "new" SOA, named the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation (WHISC) is
here. It opened its doors in the same
Fort Benning, GA, in the same main building: Ridgway Hall. (Anecdotally, the SOA is abbreviated into USARSA, and the WHISC is referred to as WHINSEC in
milspeak - go figure. But I'll continue to use SOA and WHISC anyway.)
There's a
very brief, factual dates-and-places-only overview of the SOA's history
here:
The School of the Americas originated at Fort Amador in 1946 <in Panama - ed. NV1962> as the Latin American Training Center - Ground Division. Four years later it was renamed the U.S. Army Caribbean School and transferred across the isthmus to Fort Gulick, where Spanish became the official academic language.
In July 1963, the school was redesignated the U.S. Army School of the Americas, to more accurately reflect its hemispheric orientation. Under the provisions of the 1977 Panama Canal Treaty, USARSA was relocated to Fort Benning, Georgia, in October 1984 and designated an official U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command school.
Annual student enrollment is around 1,000 students, and since its inception the school has graduated more than 57,000 officers, cadets, noncommissioned officers and government civilians from 22 Latin American countries and the United States.
Ridgway Hall, the former Infantry School Headquarters, serves as the USARSA Headquarters. In December 1991, the USARSA Helicopter School Battalion was activated at Fort Rucker, Alabama.(The number of graduates shown clearly indicates that the site hasn't been updated in a
long time.)
With this factoid introduction, I hope the pointers and issues I'll address below will provide for a more substantiated, if not at least a more clearly defined discussion to sift through our differences, and hopefully reach a better mutual understanding.
I believe that a distinction should be made between the following three separate issues, which I often see lopped together in this context. They are:
- The SOA's legacy versus present-day accountability;
- Wes Clark's role and implication in the SOA;
- The present-day role for an institute such as the SOA.
I'll go point by point now:
- I believe that the references I provided earlier are crystal clear: the SOA carries a past which overshadows whatever positive things it may have accomplished during its fifty years of existance. Directly or indirectly, way too many graduates have left the SOA at Ft Benning in Georgia to proceed committing some of the worst atrocities. While it's true that well over 60,000 graduates passed through the SOA and its curriculum, and while the widely accepted number of approximately 500 "rotten apples" among those graduates amount to just below 1%, I believe that having five hundred war criminals among its ex alumni remains a staggering and indicting fact.
However...
Those cases pertain mostly to the 60s, 70s, and especially the 80s; as far as I know, there aren't documented cases of direct or indirect SOA involvement during the 90s.
One relatively "new" case, which emerged during the 90s but in fact refers to the late 80s through 1991, is often highlighted as the latest smoking gun: the infamous manuals. I believe it is fair to refer to an older article that is reproduced by the SOAW, taken from the September 1997 issue of Covert Action Quarterly magazine. That piece, titled "Textbook Repression: US Training Manuals Declassified" is a long text, available http://www.soaw.org/new/article.php?id=270">here. That article summarizes the manuals case as follows:
On September 20, 1996, the Pentagon released seven training manuals prepared by the US military and used between 1987 and 1991 for intelligence training courses in Latin America and at the US Army School of the Americas (SOA), where the US trains Latin American militaries.
This release/revelation of those manuals prompted an internal inquiry. That same article describes it thus:
On February 21, 1997, the Department of Defense's inspector general completed another investigation. It admitted that in creating and using the seven army manuals "from 1982 through early 1991, many mistakes were made and repeated by numerous and continuously changing personnel in several organizations from Panama to Georgia to Washington, D.C."
Neither the public acknowledgement and release of those manuals by the Department of Defense (DOD) itself, nor the DOD's admission that those manuals shouldn't have been used, nor even the corrective ("censoring") measures taken afterwards can make the suspicions go away completely; I don't presume to do so, either.
But I'd like to point out a significant statement in that same article, reproduced by the SOAW to document its charges against the SOA. And that is the following text, which immediately precedes the previous quote about the Inspector General's findings of 1997:
While none of the manuals was written or used on the Clinton administration's watch, the administration so far has failed to send a clear message repudiating such training methods and to take decisive action to ensure that such materials are never developed again.
I highlighted the bit about the Clinton administration’s passive stance, because it places the emphasis where I believe it should be: on the federal government, the heart of civilian oversight of the military. That's where the buck stops. I believe the principle of accountability warrants a publicly visible attitude in pursuit of exemplary behavior. Therefore, I think it's regrettable that towards the end of the SOA, the most "significant" change in its structure was introduced during the Presidency of George HW Bush. That's more than a decade ago.
The word "significant" is placed in quotes to signify my opinion of a rather cosmetic make-over conducted in the very early 90s. Being diplomatic, I call this is a sin of omission: a clear opportunity missed by the Clinton administration, to draw a sharp contrast with the criminal biddings of prior administrations - and most notably, Reagan's.
All in all, I think there's very little merit in attempts to deny the SOA's grim legacy. But that is a far cry from stating that the present-day WHISC is guilty of perpetuating that past. If, absent proof of present-day wrongdoing, the WHISC is considered "guilty" of past wrongdoing by its predecessor, the SOA, then I believe prosecution of the politically responsible parties should come first and foremost. Not doing so is tantamount to holding only the military accountable for crimes ordered by their political bosses - which negates the principle of civilian oversight.
- As to the role of Gen. Wesley K. Clark: he was only indirectly involved with the School of the Americas (SOA) in his capacity of Commander-in-Chief (CIC) of the U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM, headquartered in Miami, FL) from June, 1996 until September, 1997 (see this listing of all past SOUTHCOM commanders; scroll to the bottom of that page to see his name.)
Earlier, I provided a quote to highlight the Clinton administration's passive stance after the public revelation of those infamous manuals. But that same quote contains another, highly significant element, which at the very least denies Wes Clark's direct involvement:
none of the manuals was written or used on the Clinton administration's watch
Again, this article was published in September, 1997. That also happens to be the same month that Wes Clark's command over SOUTHCOM ended. Now, I don't think much of attempts to make a connection there, with that article. But I do make a connection between the news of manuals and the "open document" policy that characterized the Clinton administration, certainly when compared with its predecessor, and most certainly with the secretive cabal that occupies the White House since.
I was really amazed by the openness with which many certainly sensitive documents were made available during the Clinton years. I strongly suspect that -- were a similar case to arise today -- the very existance of the manuals would be denied, and reports of it suppressed. All under the guise of the oft-heard excuse of "national security." Clinton's openness implied a greater vulnerability / exposure to criticism; that's another finer point I would like to make.
There is also documental proof that Wes Clark visited the SOA on one occasion, in his capacity as CIC of SOUTHCOM. This was on December 16, 1996, when he delivered a graduation speech at the SOA. The text of that speech is available here but since it (unfortunately) is published entirely in all caps, I took the liberty of copying it and presenting a more legible version, here. I recommend reading it, as it gives a fair impression of Wes Clark's view on the SOA's role and mission.
That speech, delivered directly to its graduates at the SOA, is clearly at odds with the suggestion that he somehow, in any way "supports" institutionalized teaching of human rights abuses. I think it is germaine here to also briefly refer to his passionate efforts, roughly two years earlier, to intervene in the infamy of Rwanda, and also roughly two years later, then successfully convincing the Clinton administration to finally intervene in Kosovo.
My firm conviction is that Wes Clark and "teaching torture" don't belong in the same sentence. I believe it's reasonable to conclude that the SOA's grim past isn't connected to Wes Clark's actions or decisions, past or present. What remains is his campaign pledge to close the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation (WHISC) -- the institute that emerged after the closing of the SOA, on December 15, 2000 -- provided it can be established that human rights abuses still occur there:
"If you find anything in that curriculum material or anything that's taught there that looks in any way remotely connected with human rights abuse or torture, you let me know, and I promise you, we'll close the School of the Americas when I'm president," <Wes Clark> said.
In essence, the critics maintain that the WHISC should be closed now, without further discussion or evidence. This takes me to the third and last core issue: what's the point of the WHISC?
- As to the purpose of the WHISC: in spite of WHISC's self-advertised assurances that the WHISC's curriculum contains no reprehensible content from a human rights perspective, I believe that concern over the SOA's legacy is legitimate. But I see that rather as a basis for ongoing concern over which/how values and principles are taught to the US' military partners, such as in the Organization of American States (OAS) - a concern that is best served by proper and transparent oversight. I don't think it is served by closing down WHISC without evidence of current, ongoing misdeeds: doing that misses out on an important opportunity to engage and lead members of allied armed forces in the right direction: protecting and serving democracy.
In closing, and with all due respect to the intentions and integrity of the arguments used by opponents of the SOA/WHISC, I think there's some irony in the SOAW's criticism of Wes Clark's position. On their pertaining page
http://www.soaw.org/new/newswire_detail.php?id=407">here, they point to an article taken from the tabloid and clearly right-wing New York Post, which according to them "exposes" Wes Clark. That NYP article is
http://www.nypost.com/news/nationalnews/13799.htm">here. Perhaps unknown to the SOAW, the New York Post weighed in on the SOA issue just a few days after that news report, with an editorial article available
http://www.nypost.com/postopinion/editorial/44195.htm">here. I think it is fitting to reproduce the final part of that editorial:
We can think of any number of reasons why Wesley Clark shouldn't become president.
But his past association with the School of the Americas isn't one of them.Odd as that makes me feel, on that last point I agree with them.
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