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| Soldier
On |
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| Vietnam
vet Father Roy Bourgeois has spent a decade
fighting Latin American military violence |
| Interview
by Debra Hannula |
Father Roy Bourgeois won the Purple Heart
for his service in Vietnam before he put himself
on the line for peace. For the last decade,
he's led the assault on the U.S. Army School
of the Americas (SOA), a combat training school
for Latin American soldiers in Fort Benning,
Georgia.
During its 54-year history, the SOA has readied
over 60,000 Latin American troops in commando
tactics, military intelligence, psychological
operations, and advanced combat skills. SOA
graduates have been responsible for massacres,
torture, and assassinations throughout Latin
America. According to the Pentagon, the SOA
costs U.S. taxpayers $20 million annually.
Though Congress closed down the SOA last year,
its training continues under a different name.
Father Bourgeois first came to this issue
after volunteering for shore duty in Vietnam.
He went to war believing in the need to stop
communism, but changed his mind after losing
friends in combat and coming close to death
himself. Assisting a Catholic priest running
an orphanage for Vietnamese children inspired
him to commit his life to alleviating the
suffering of others. He returned from Vietnam
and entered the Maryknoll order, becoming
a priest in 1972. He spent five years in Bolivia
under the dictatorship of SOA-trained Hugo
Banzer, where eventually he was arrested,
beaten, and forced to leave the country because
of his work with the poor. Real Change caught
up with Father Bourgeois before a talk in
Seattle later this month.
Real Change: When did you first become involved
in the effort to close the SOA?
Roy Bourgeois: November 16, 1989, when six
Jesuit priests, a young mother and her teenage
daughter were killed at the university in
San Salvador. House Representative Joe Moakley
responded with a task force to investigate.
They discovered that those responsible were
soldiers trained at the SOA located at Fort
Benning, Georgia. I read their report, published
in 1990. Having lived and worked in Latin
America, I knew firsthand the military's brutality.
I rented a tiny apartment just outside the
main gate to Fort Benning and began calling
friends to join me. Several priests and a
winner of the Congressional Medal of Honor,
Charlie Liteky, came. Charlie is currently
serving one year in prison for trespass at
Fort Benning.
Initially, this was a faith-based movement.
Our first effort, in 1990, consisted of a
water-only fast for 35 days outside the main
gate of Fort Benning. We wanted to place our
bodies on the line, and fasting goes back
to early faith traditions. We each lost 40
pounds.
On November 16, 1990, the first anniversary
of the Jesuits' slayings, three of us poured
vials of blood mixed with the soil of El Salvador
on photographs of SOA graduates. We were convicted
and sent to prison. Charlie and Patrick received
six mon-ths each. I was sentenced to 14 months.
These were the early days, when we did not
have a movement organized. We were just individuals.
RC: You have spent altogether four years in
prison for acts of civil disobedience directed
at the SOA. How do you view your time there?
RB: Prison is a very lonely place, a very
hard place to be. In the early days there
was not much support, but I knew early on
it was important. We learned from Gandhi and
Martin Luther King Jr. that acts of civil
disobedience are a way to stop the violence.
I knew like in any movement, some would have
to pay a price and go to jail to expose the
greater injustice. From my experiences in
El Salvador and Bolivia, I knew I had to do
more than just give a nice sermon or college
lecture. We learned early on that they could
send us to prison, but could not silence us.
We also found that sending us to prison only
energizes the movement.
RC: How have you seen Catholics responding
on the basis of faith? How have others joined
the movement, and how do you inspire others?
RB: We began as priests and nuns connecting
to the martyrdom of the priests and nuns in
El Salvador. We soon realized through our
research that not only were church leaders
being killed, but all those working in defense
of the poor, including labor leaders, health
care workers and those calling for land reform.
When I was released from prison, I took our
information to the churches, to colleges and
to the media.
Then in 1993 something significant happened.
The U.N. Truth Commission's report on El Salvador's
civil war was made public. This report gave
the names of those responsible for the high
profile cases: the Jesuits, the four churchwomen,
Archbishop Romero and the El Mozote massacre.
73 percent of those who did the killings first
trained and graduated at the SOA. Congress
then came on board through Representatives
Joseph Kennedy and Joe Moakley. Newsweek came
out with a two-page article entitled "Running
a School for Dictators" in August 1993, listing
such graduates as Manuel Noriega, Banzer,
and death squad leaders like Roberto D'Aubisson.
At that time I was traveling around the country
asking people to call for the closure of the
school. The Presbyterian Church U.S.A., seven
million members, passed a resolution to close
the SOA. This influenced others to do the
same. The Leadership Conference of Women Religious
representing over 70,000 Catholic nuns passed
the resolution. That poked the bee hive. Others
joined, including Veterans for Peace, the
NAACP, the AFL-CIO, and chapters of Amnesty
International.
This is not a church issue. It's an issue
of justice. It's an issue of violence. It's
about men with guns. This is what brings in
students by the thousands. It transcends any
particular faith or religion. Though it began
with priests and nuns, it has grown and diversified
and is made up of people from all walks of
life.
RC: The 1980's appeared to be the high point
for Americans against U.S. foreign policy
in Latin America. Has this been true for you?
RB: This idea that this ended in the '80s
is B.S. The people of El Salvador continue
to live in poverty. Life is the same. The
poverty is the same. There has been no accountability.
Most of the killings committed by the military
have gone unpunished. They have granted themselves
amnesty, though we are sent to prison for
peaceful protest. In 1998 Bishop Gerardi was
killed two days after he released his report
on the atrocities committed during the Guatemalan
Civil War.
The training at the SOA continues. Right now
the majority of the SOA students are Colombian.
We are on a very dangerous course here - the
$1.3 billion U.S. military aid package to
Colombia is setting the stage. Placing the
biggest chunk of that money in the hands of
the military, knowing that the military and
paramilitary are violators of human rights,
can only weaken the civilian government and
harm the people of Colombia. We have not learned
anything from Vietnam or El Salvador. We must
be a voice for the voiceless and continue
to stand with the poor of Latin America.
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