Torture at Abu Ghraib linked to U.S. Army’s School of the America’s ?

The recent reports of the torture of Iraqi detainees at the Abu Ghraib military prison near Baghdad, while shocking, are part of a larger pattern of abuse and torture at the hands of US soldiers, mercenaries and intelligence agents around the world. In fact, U.S. Army intelligence manuals advocating torture techniques and how to circumvent laws on due process, arrest and detention were used for at least a decade to train Latin American soldiers at the U.S. Army’s School of the Americas, renamed in 2001 the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation or WHINSEC.

The SOA/WHINSEC, widely known as the School of Assassins, has trained over 64,000 Latin American soldiers in combat skills and psychological warfare. Graduates are consistently linked to human rights abuses and atrocities in Latin America.

In September of 1996, the Pentagon, under intense public pressure, released the classified training manuals. The Washington Post reported that the manuals promoted "executions, torture, blackmail and other forms of coercion against insurgents." They also recommended the imprisonment of family members of those who support "union organizing or recruiting," those who distribute "propaganda in favor of the interest of workers," those who "sympathize with demonstrations or strikes," and those who make "accusations that the government has failed to meet the basic needs of the people." The training manuals are available on the SOA Watch website.

As reports of abuse at the hands of U.S. and U.S.-trainied soldiers, from Latin America to Guantanamo Bay to Abu Gharib, continue to surface, the Army continues to distance itself from the abuses. Officials often claim the soldiers involved in torture are "just a few bad apples," but as instances of human rights violations continue to grow around the world, a much larger picture of systematic abuse becomes clear.

To learn more about the SOA/WHINSEC and efforts to close it, visit www.SOAW.org or call 202-234-3440.

U.S. Army School of Americas: Background and Congressional Concerns http://www.fas.org/irp/crs/RL30532.pdf