Published on Tuesday, November 18, 2003 by CommonDreams.org
Hidden In Plain Sight

by Leah C. Wells
 
Not long after the Al Qaeda terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, George
Monbiot wrote in the Guardian/UK that the United States Government itself
sponsors terrorist training - at the U.S. Army School of the Americas in Ft.
Benning, GA.

A documentary by director John Smihula says that these horrific stories have
been 'Hidden In Plain Sight', and culpability is strangely obscured despite a
trail of evidence linking U.S. foreign policy to the bloodstained history of
Latin America in the 20th Century. 'Hidden' gives interviews of both SOA
supporters and critics, and shows flinchworthy footage of soldiers and victims. This
film has debuted in more than 40 U.S. cities and has featured a national and
international film festivals - including the Istanbul and Amnesty
International film festivals. This month, 'Hidden' will screen at the International
Documentary Festival in Amsterdam.

Noam Chomsky, Michael Parenti and Eduardo Galeano all give equally damning
testimonies for ways in which U.S. imperialism and military intervention have
worked against the Latin American poor, the workers and the indigenous, and
benefited the large corporations who have taken advantage of cheap labor and
compliance from regional leadership.

Christopher Hitchens distributes the blame and much more widely: "I think
that the SOA reminds people in a very blunt way that Americans too can be
collectively responsible for torture, for murder for dictatorship and not just for
defending these things or for covering them up, or being complicit with them,
but actually teaching people how to do them, which is more than complicity, it
is direct responsibility."

Is it a stretch to say that U.S. taxpayers keep the school open? Is it
feasible that through our oil dependency and consumptive behavior we give an
implicit nod to U.S. foreign policy, consenting to whatever means are necessary to
keep gas prices low? Silence is acceptance, and ignorance is no excuse.

Moreover, the U.S. war on terror and oil imperialism connects the dots from
the Middle East through Ft. Benning to Central and South America.
Petroleum-rich countries like Ecuador and Venezuela take heed: if Plan Colombia is any
indication of how the U.S. intends to secure South American oil, the continent is
certainly in for more trouble. Plan Colombia has funneled millions of dollars
toward anti-narcotics efforts, attempting to quash the thriving coca industry,
and has been denounced by human rights groups as a war against the people of
Colombia. This funding is not used for social welfare but to protect oil
pipelines, train soldiers, fumigate civilian areas with toxic chemicals, and supply
weapons for "protection."

U.S. culpability in crimes against humanity is overt in the eyes of many
Latin Americans. In 'Hidden', El Salvadoran death squad member tells an American
reporter, "We learnt from you. We learnt from you the methods, like blowtorches
in the armpits, shots in the balls." Their victims died unspeakable deaths,
and those who lived carry the weight of remembrance, like Ana Chavez Fisher
whose husband was killed in El Salvador. And like Hector Aristizabal whose
brother was tortured and killed in Colombia. And like Sr. Dianna Ortiz who survived
torture in Guatemala

For them, the existence of the school at Ft. Benning, GA is indefensible.

Yet 'Hidden' takes another look at the situation, soliciting views from
proponents of the renamed-SOA.

One supporter, Congressman Mac Collins (R-GA) takes stabs at the largely
Catholic "School for the Americas Watch" movement, saying that of all
institutions, the church should be willing to see the good in people working for, as
fellow supporter Colonel Glenn Weidner says, "peace in the hemisphere." Led by
Father Roy Bourgeois, a Maryknoll priest and himself a victim of torture in South
America, SOA Watch has maintained a vigil outside the gates of Ft. Benning
every November since 1990 to commemorate the murders committed by graduates of
the SOA of six Jesuit priests, their housekeeper and her daughter, committed by
graduates of the SOA.

Card-carrying Amnesty International member and Ft. Benning Base Commander
Maj. Gen. John Lemoyne, who has been implicated in the "Highway of Death"
massacre in the 1991 Gulf War, claims that "Amnesty has reviewed this school and said
it was the best institution to help our Latin brothers." Paul Paz y Mino, an
Amnesty International representative, counters: "General LeMoyne's statements
are completely false. No one in Amnesty has ever or would ever make such a
statement endorsing any military training, even though we don't oppose it
officially."

LeMoyne's military career underscores the claim that even at the highest
levels, those associated with the SOA act with impunity, sending implicit messages
to the soldiers who train there that they are beyond reproach. With testimony
from critics and even supporters, 'Hidden' still paints a bad picture of the
school.

Latin Americans have suffered under two silences, one in the climate of fear
and repression under their own governments, and another in Americans' lack of
awareness or capacity to believe that the U.S. could be involved. Generations
of Americans grew up believing that citizenship meant supporting one's
country, right or wrong. Perhaps this is the only real explanation for the degree of
convincing required to help a country see the forest for the trees, that which
has truly been 'Hidden In Plain Sight.'