Essential Estrogen

Tomorrow (June 20) Congress will decide the fate of the former School of the Americas. There is an amendment to the Foreign Appropriations bill that would cut funding to the (now named) Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation being put forth by Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass. The amendment has been steadily gaining co-sponsors and currently has just over 100. Rep. David Loebsack is the only member of the Iowa delegation who has signed on to this amendment.

The SOA/WHINSEC, a military training facility for Latin American military and police, has graduated at least 11 military dictators and over 60,000 soldiers, many of which have been linked to some of the worst human rights abuses committed in Central and South America. On June 1 the school graduated another 45 soldiers from eight countries. The school made headlines in 1996 when the Pentagon released training manuals used at the institution that advocated torture, extortion and execution. Despite this admission and hundreds of documented human rights abuses committed by soldiers trained at the school, no independent investigation into the facility has ever been launched.

The 2003 costs for keeping the SOA/WHINSEC's doors open was $7.5 million. This is a steady increase since 1995 when the cost was $3.8 million.

Support for this institution has significantly declined. In May, the Costa Rican government vowed to stop sending police to train there. Costa Rica is the fourth country after Argentina, Uruguay and Venezuela to cut ties with the school, citing its history of military intervention and human rights abuses.

On June 9 of last year, Rep. McGovern introduced a similar amendment to the Foreign Operations Appropriations Bill that would have cut funding for the school. While the amendment failed by a 15 vote margin, 35 of the representatives who opposed it lost their seats in the 2006 mid-term elections.

Protests calling for the closure of the school have taken place at the gates of Fort Benning, Georgia every November since 1990. Many may remember the two Dubuque nuns who were arrested during the 2001 protests. The annual vigil and nonviolent direct action coincides with the Nov. 16 anniversary of the University of Central America massacre in which SOA graduates assassinated 14-year-old Celina Ramos, her mother Elba Ramos, and six Jesuit priests in San Salvador.

Help end the violence by contacting your representative and asking him or her to support the McGovern amendment to cut funding for the School of the Americas/Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation. You can call the Capitol Hill switchboard at (202) 224-3121 and ask to be connected with your representative's office. Once connected, ask to speak with the foreign affairs legislative assistant.