20th Anniversary of November Vigil to Close the School of the Americas (renamed Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation)

Thousands Converge at the gates of Fort Benning for 20th Anniversary of November Vigil to Close the School of the Americas (renamed Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation), also known as SOA - "The School of Assassins".

Thousands of torture survivors, veterans, faith-based communities, union workers, students, musicians, human rights activists and others from across the Americas are gathered today at the gates of the U.S. military base Fort Benning to call for the closure of the School of the Americas .

During the protest, the names of the torture, rape and murder victims of graduates of the school are read by the participants.


Many of the notorious human rights violators responsible for rape, torture, kidnapping, assassination and disappearance of thousands of people in Latin America and elsewhere were/are graduates of the School of the Americas.

Among them are generals Leopoldo Galtieri, Efraín Ríos Montt and Manuel Noriega, dictators such as Bolivia's Hugo Banzer and many of Augusto Pinochet's officers.

Members of the infamous Atlacatl Battalion of El Salvador who carried out the El Mozote massacre in El Salvador were also trained at SOA.

A database with graduates of both the SOA and WHINSEC who have been accused of human rights violations and other criminal activity is kept by The School of the Americas Watch, an advocacy organization founded by Father Roy Bourgeois and a small group of supporters in 1990 to protest the training of mainly Latin American military officers, by the United States Department of Defense at the School of the Americas (SOA).

SOA Watch conducts a vigil each November at the site of the academy, in protest over the murders, rapes and torture and contraventions of the Geneva Accord committed the graduates of the academy or under their leadership.

Today, November 20, 2010, is the 20th Anniversary of this November Vigil and regardless the well known abuses committed by some of the graduates of the School, it is kept open by the United States and in 2000 the United States Congress renamed the School of the Americas the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation (WHINSEC).

From El Salvador to Kandahar - Death Squads

Death Squads are armed military, police,insurgent, or terrorist squads that conducts extra-judicial killings, assassinations, and forced disappearances of persons as part of a terror campaign, war or insurgency. The killings are conducted in ways meant to ensure the secrecy of the killers' identities, so as to avoid accountability.

March 2010 - News on Óscar Romero - Archbishop of San Salvador - 30 Years after his Assassination on March 24, 1980.



Kandahar Death Squads - DOCUMENTARY BY Stephen Gray - May 2010

Getting Used to it ?

"Romero" is a documentary film (1989) depicting the life of Catholic Archbishop Óscar Romero, directed by John Duigan, starring Raul Julia.

On March 24, 1980, Romero was shot by an M-16 assault rifle while celebrating Mass at a small chapel located in a hospital called "La Divina Providencia", in El Salvador.

In 1993, an official U.N. report, identified the man who ordered the killing as former School of the Americas graduate Roberto D'Aubuisson, a member of the United States backed death squads that systematically carried out politically-motivated assassinations and other human rights abuses in El Salvador.

March 24, 2010 marks the thirtieth anniversary of the killing of Catholic Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero.
Comments in 2005, with extract of the 1989 film "ROMERO", directed by John Duigan, starring Raul Julia.

"ROMERO" , directed by John Duigan:
Part XI /11

Part I/11

Part II/11

Part III /11

Part IV /11

Part V /11

Part VI /11

Part VII /11

Part VIII/11

Part IX /11

Part X /11


Other Priests assassinated by USA backed death squads in El Salvador during Óscar Romero's time as archbishop (1977–1980):
-Rutilio Grande, S.J.: assassinated March 12, 1977
-Alfonso Navarro: assassinated May 11, 1977
-Ernesto Barrera: assassinated November 28, 1978
-Octavio Ortiz: assassinated January 20, 1979
-Rafael Palacios: assassinated June 20, 1979
-Napoleón Macías: assassinated August 4, 1979
-Ignacio Martín-Baró, S.J.: assassinated November 16, 1989
-Joaquín López y López, S.J.: assassinated November 16, 1989
-Juan Ramón Moreno, S.J.: assassinated November 16, 1989
-Segundo Montes, S.J.: assassinated November 16, 1989
-Ignacio Ellacuría, S.J.: assassinated November 16, 1989
-Amando López, S.J.: assassinated November 16, 1989

Bill Moyers - 1987 documentary - (the real "American way")

This piece aired on PBS in 1987. Bill Moyers is a well known respected journalist who also worked for Lyndon B. Johnson. He interviews many different people involved with the CIA and other government agencies. His documentary gives an overview of what the CIA has actually been doing since the 50's, from Iran, Guatemala, Cuba, Viet Nam, Chile and all over the world. He features former CIA agents, Rear Admiral Gene La Rocque (Ret. U.S.N.), Theodore Bissell (active in the CIA at the time), Sen. Frank Church and many others. The full video "The Secret Government" is 90 minutes. This is a 20 min edited segment but a good piece about USA "OPERATION SUCCESS" and more ...


Full video at:

The Secret Government: The Constitution in Crisis
by Bill Moyers -duration: 1:26:29
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3505348655137118430#

TORTURE MADE IN THE United States of America

CIA INTELLIGENCE: Former UK ambassador: CIA sent people to be ‘raped with broken bottles’

Published on November 4, 2009 - The Raw Story

"I'm talking of people having their children tortured in front of them until they sign a confession. I'm talking of people being boiled alive. And the intelligence from these torture sessions was being received by the CIA, and was being passed on."

Full text at: http://rawstory.com/2009/11/ambassador-cia-people-tortured/

Watch UK British Diplomat - October 21, 2009:

Making a killing: War Profiteers join at the "International Peace Operations Association"

Aired October 27, 2009

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

MORE AT: 
BLACKWATER: The Rise of the Most Powerful Mercenaries - By Jeremy Scahill



and at:Not Blackwater but Xe
http://www.thespywhobilledme.com/the_spy_who_billed_me/2009/02/not-blackwater-but-xe-as-in-xena-warrior-princess.html

Rape and torture -by the graduates of american "School of the Americas" Led by also graduate Romeo Vasquez -The american taught way of doing business

Despite US government claims that they've cut all military ties with the Honduran golpistas, the SOA continues to train Honduran soldiers. article HERE.

Take action: HERE http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/727/t/3823/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=27691