In the spirit of Major Martel's call for "intelligent discourse" on the SOA I
feel compelled to counter some of the disinformation that he recently posted to
LASNET. My perspective is that of a former U.S. Army intelligence officer. As
there are a number of points I think are untrue in his statement, I will just
take them on point by point.
1) While he asserts that "(t)orture, brutality and subjugation" are not taught
or endorsed by the U.S. Army, it was my experience that while U.S. officials
shy away from participation in torture, it is endorsed on the operational level
for use by our "allies". Of course, it is not referred to as torture, but
rather as "stress debriefing" or some such term that obfuscates the reality.
As far as brutality and subjugation, I think the counterinsurgency record can
be evaluated individually by the members of LASNET.
2) Martel asserts that there is no "conspiracy" against "farmers, clergy, and
other civilians". Leaving aside farmers and the laity, there is a significant
animosity toward "liberation theology" elements of the Catholic Church amongst
the counterinsurgency and intelligence elements of the U.S. Army. They were
definitely viewed as the "enemy" during the Cold War. I'm not sure how that
has changed in the last few years, but anti-liberation theology training was
a particularly memorable and distasteful part of my experience.
3) Of course it is obviously false that the "U.S. Army has nothing at all to do
with National Security Strategy policy making". The upper echelons of the Army
are key advisers to the civilian leadership and the Joint Chiefs of Staff are
key policy makers in of themselves.
4) It is not "against the law for the Army to involve itself in covert
espionage," rather it is against the law for the Army (and other armed
services) to collect information on U.S. persons (i.e. citizens, permanent
residents, etc.). The army is quite involved in covert activities of all types
and hopes that the restrictions on its use will be loosened. The FBI is not
the only U.S. agency with a sad history of violating the civil liberties of
U.S. persons and we can only hope that any reforms will make restrictions on
the Army tighter, not looser. Covert activities of course form part of the
"relation with the CIA," that the Army maintains, as do overt intelligence
activities. The CIA is the lead agency for intelligence matters and the
director of Central Intelligence is not only the head of the CIA, but all
intelligence matters, and therefore oversees the NSA, DIA, etc. Major Martel
is either not informed on these matters, or is lying.
5) While Major Martel is correct that the SOA itself had nothing to do with
setting the Cold War policies that it helped implement, he is disingenuous to
claim that the schools role was merely to "train and professionalize democratic
forces friendly to the U.S." There of course was never any democratic litmus
test for participation and support, merely an opposition to "communism" was
required.
While I am obviously not convinced that "respect for human rights....goes right
to the heart of the U.S. Army," I agree with Major Martel that these matters
merit intelligent discourse. To begin with, we need to address how does the
SOA fit into the new security policy for the hemisphere. The end of the Cold
War has obviously changed its role, and while obfuscating this history is not
helpful, neither is being captive to a conception of reality that is no longer
valid.
Alan Moore
amoore@oregon.uoregon.edu