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Inside the School of the Americas: Military pedagogy, drugs, money- laundering The reprieve granted last September by Congress to the U.S. Army School of the Americas (SOA) must be viewed as both symbolic and premonitory. Having survived its third and narrowest challenge yet -- seven votes short of seeing its funding slashed and its doors shut down for good -- the SOA, tainted by heredity and damned by history, may well be on its last leg, a limb further compromised by nagging rumors that students and faculty alike have allegedly used the base to launder the ill-gotten profits from narco-trafficking and other federal crimes. With information obtained by this writer, these rumors could well give fact new life. It could also ring the death knell for a 50-year old institution which, in a self-serving symbiosis with its maker, the CIA -- also celebrating its 50th anniversary this year -- has played a sinister role in Latin America. Full Article by W.E. Gutman Honduran voters have a choice of 10 as they head for the polls tomorrow Liberals and Nationalists prepare for primaries By BLANCA MORENO As Hondurans prepare to vote in tomorrow's primaries, the 10 presidential hopefuls of the National and Liberal parties spent the week in a mad rush to the campaign finish line, launching poll wars and verbal battles in the national press. |
The bloody legacy of the U.S Army School of the Americas Editor's Note: The following two-part article was originally published on March 4, 1995 and March 11, 1995, respectively. By W. E. GUTMAN Getting rid of someone easy. Destroying popular aspirations takes more effort but you can always count on a volunteer or two to the dirty work. For money; favors; influence; power -- mostly power; out of conviction or spite or malevolence -- mostly malevolence. When conventional methods -- elections, plebiscites, national referenda --fail, or when the results threaten the oligarchy, the U.S. Army's School of the Americas, a shadowy but formidable spook-nook billeted for Fort Benning, Georgia can help. There are no petty bureaucrats here, no dim-witted freeloaders who dot the "I"s and bar the "T"s day after day, no semi-literate dogfaces taking up space and stealing time till retirement. The SOA is a model institution. Its instructors and students are recruited from the cream of Latin America's military establishment. On the curriculum: counterinsurgency, military intelligence, interrogation techniques, sniper fire, infantry and commando tactics, "irregular" and psychological warfare, jungle operations, among the most bellicose specialties. Full Article by W.E. Gutman
Politics by Assassination, Part II: Costa Rica has no army but... By W. E. Gutman Breathtaking mountain vistas. An idyllic climate. Unspoiled rain forests. Golden beaches stretching along two coasts. A rich fauna and an exuberant flora, Costa Rica has it all, and then some. But what makes Costa Ricans proud of all, what they enjoy reminding the world, is that their small Central American nations has had no army since its abolition in 1948. Look again. Full article by W. E. Gutman |
All original articles and photographs published in Honduras This Week are protected by international copyright law. Reproduction, in whole or in part without prior written permission, is strictly prohibited. |
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