Reply #20: I too would rather that School was shut down

[Tom Rinaldo]

There has been too much blood under that bridge, and the symbolism of shutting it down would be powerful, along with a public statement about the reasons. But I used the word symbolism intentionally. When those in power in America choose to interfere in the internal affairs of other nations for their own self interests against the interests of most of those living in those other nations, they always find the means for doing so. It is the intent not the tool that is the root of the evil. Dick Cheney set up his own intelligence agency when he wasn't getting the results he wanted out of the CIA. Bush circumvented the F.I.S.A. Court when he feared they would not cooperate with his plans. Nixon had his plumbers. Reagan set up Ollie North to run Contragate and directly fund South American drug runners and death squads, to get around Congressional efforts to reign him in.

Clark made a public pledge that he would allow investigations of the current incarnation of the SOA and that he would shut the institution down if any evidence was found that it was intentionally being used to teach or advocate human rights abuse methodology. He is never given any respect for that position. Clark argues that there is a legitimate function for the institution which is the function that is actually laid out for it in the legislation that established it and in all of the appropriations bills that have sustained funding both SOA and son of SOA for multiple decades under both Democratic and Republican Presidents and under both Democratic and Republican Congresses. It is the equivalent argument to acknowledging that the Rodney King beating was perpetrated by police officers who were trained at the Los Angeles Police Academy, while still defending the actual intent of the Los Angeles Police Academy. Actually it goes beyond that.

Clark under Clinton worked with the Clinton Administration to review the official curriculum used at the institution to purge anything that violated human rights or advocated means to achieve ends that were antithetical to the values professed by our Democracy, as well as strengthen instruction in those values. Did those efforts go far enough? The official curriculum was thoroughly purged, while new efforts to promote human rights are undoubtedly insufficient. Can someone still abuse the new SOA or an other institution for ends that contradict it's formal charter? Just look at the Bush Justice Department for an answer to that question. Would closing down the Justice Department solve that problem?

Clark's actual involvement with the SOA in any capacity was minimal and short lived. It fell under his overall Command for less than two years when he was based in Miami as the General assigned oversight of all Army installations in much of the Western Hemisphere. In that role Clark delivered one commencement address at that School. I've seen wild claims made about Clark's involvement in the SOA that simply aren't true. It's been claimed that he taught classes there. Wrong. Someone got it confused. Clark taught classes at West Point, never at the SOA.

But here again is a sticking point for me. Clark has actually "hands on" done more (though not much in the larger picture) to correct abuses at SOA than the people who sit in Congress. SOA is Congresses baby. Congress under our Constitution appropriates the money that establishes projects of the United States Government. Congress debates and votes on appropriations to continue projects of the United States Government. If Congress cuts all funding for the Peace Corp, the Peace Corp ceases to exist. If Congress cuts all funding for Son of SOA, it too ceases to exist. Would the Current Administration jury rig some work around of Congress to continue anything shady that they might be pursuing under the table at the current "SOA". I have no doubt that they would, do you?

I know many of the hard core activists who are concerned about American military abuses in South and Central America probably know the answer to the following question, but I bet most of those who profess a concern about Clark and the SOA don't. Where do leading Democratic members of Congress stand on the revised SOA? And where have they stood on it during their tenure in Congress? I know some Democrats have at one time or another voted to close the SOA, but many voted to reform it and continue it also. Have you asked your own Congressperson about their stand, if he or she is a Democrat? Have you made this an issue with other leading Democrats who might run for President in 2008? Would you consider a vote against the SOA as more important in your evaluation of a Democrat than a vote in favor of the Patriot Act, or the IWR?

And just for the hell of it I'll play Devil's Advocate for a moment, since I've already said that I would like to see that institution closed. Speaking roughly here, prior to the 1970's there was an entrenched pattern in Central and South America of frequent military coups in support of Right leaning or outright Rightist military governments. It doesn't take much digging around in history to establish the truth of that statement. The result of Democratic elections, if they were held at all, were frequently over ridden by tanks. South and Central America, with a few notable exceptions like Costa Rica, had a very weak tradition of civilian control over the military. The military in many of those nations was not viewed as a servant of the popular will, or protector of people's basic liberties, it was viewed as the surest route to direct power and control of the economic resources of those nations. It looked a great deal like much of current Africa in that regard.

The professed purpose of the SOA was to change the view held by young officers in South America's various militaries of what the role of the military in society is meant to be, away from being the controlling institution of each nations destiny toward the concept of the military as understood in the United States, where the military firmly adheres to the principle of civilian control, protection of the Constitution, and a strict prohibition against involvement in domestic political affairs. A case can be made that some good came out of the SOA to date along with some bad.