Paved with good intentions: a profile of the School of the Americas.

• Author: Perz, Nathan

The "War Against Terrorism" begins at home. For over 50 years, the United States has been training Latin American terrorists and turning a blind eye to their crimes. The most notorious training facility of these persons is the School of the Americas located at Ft. Benning, Georgia. This note will briefly discuss the SOA's history, the movement to shut it down, and the significance of the issue to the Left.

History

By 1948, anti-Communism had become not only the centerpiece of US foreign policy, but a national secular religion as well. It was acknowledged among upper-echelon foreign policy planners than American-style capitalism would never have the same mass appeal as did communist ideologies. Therefore, to ensure the dominance of American capitalism in the post-World War II era, extensive programs were needed to control the flow of money, political power and information.

Nowhere was this more true than in Latin America. Ever since the Monroe Doctrine of the early nineteenth century, the US government has considered Latin America to be within its "sphere of influence," America's private "backyard." After World War II, numerous policies were put into action to ensure that Latin America would remain pacified, obedient and available to exploitation by US capital.

One specific manifestation of this larger policy was an institution called the School of the Americas (SOA), later referred to by opponents as the "School of Assassins." Established in Panama in 1946, the SOA quickly evolved from a relatively benign technical training facility to an advanced school for what is called "counter-insurgency," perhaps better described as population control and domestic terrorism. Every year, military officers from across Latin America attend the SOA. In total, the SOA has produced over 60,000 "graduates."

Between 1961 and 1966, nine Latin American governments were overthrown by military coups, including those of Guatemala and Honduras. (1) SOA graduates were involved with all of these coups. Since 1968, ten SOA graduates have become heads of state in six different Latin American countries through non-democratic means. (2)

Unfortunately, overthrowing democratic governments is not the worst of the crimes attributable to the SOA. What is even worse is the methods employed by SOA graduates to achieve and maintain political power. When SOA graduates return to their home countries, they frequently become members of secret police or "death squad" units. Their tactics include kidnapping, torture, murder, infiltration and spying, using rape as a political weapon, psychological warfare, and the massacre of entire families or villages.

While most victims are simply "disappeared" and...