<< Front page News December 5, 2003

Obies join protest against military school

About 100 protesters had drifted away from the parade ground and were lining the fence of the army base peering inside. The crowd displayed the myriad of visuals and slogans typical of identity politics at modern protests.

Black t-shirted anarchists rubbed shoulders with Jesuits who chatted idly with aging and emerging hippies who shot knowing smiles at the first-timers and the locals out for a glance at the show.

Some stuck their fingers through the chain link fence, grinning provocatively and shouting taunts at the military police who were standing in wait about thirty feet away.

The MPs seemed fairly unperturbed by the attention they were getting. They milled about, chatting with news photographers and periodically fidgeting with the plasticuffs dangling from their belts.

Over the loudspeaker from the stage back of the parade ground the names of the dead were still being read off.

“Presente! Presente!”

Suddenly there was a rustle of activity through the woods. Something had happened.

“Three Jesuits,” someone said. “They went over the fence back by the main entrance. Just put on leather gloves and went right over.”

A second amplified voiced boomed out from behind the fence.

“Partisan political protests are not permitted on the grounds of Fort Benning,” it said. “Please do not attempt to enter onto the base. Anyone attempting to do so will be arrested and prosecuted.”

The crowed erupted into a chorus of jeers and chanting. The fence shook back and forth from the impact of dozens of fists. The MPs were still unperturbed.

A middle-aged man with a thick white beard wearing a “Dennis Kucinich for President” t-shirt turned away from the crowd and started walking back towards the parade ground talking to no one in particular.

“I’ve been protesting for 25 years,” he said. “It’s just not fun seeing people get arrested anymore.”

Most of America had no idea that one of the largest yearly political demonstrations in the country occured two weeks ago. With the more violent FTAA protests just wrapping up in Miami and continuing violence in Iraq, the yearly protest against the School of the Americas, which drew roughly 10,000 particiapants this year, was almost universally ignored by national media outlets.

For those who made the journey south to this sprawling military outpost near the Alabama border, it was a chance to participate in a truly unique political event.

The school of the Americas was founded in 1946 with the purpose of training Latin American military officers in combat, counter-insurgency and counter-narcotics techniques. Since its inception however, graduates of the SOA have been charged with some of the worst human rights abuses in Latin American history.

Graduates of the academy include the former dictators Manuel Noriega of Panama, Guilermo Rodriquez of Ecuador and Robert Viola of Argentina. Graduates are also charged with the assasination of Archbishop Oscar Romero, with six Jesuit priests in El Salvador and with the El Mizote massacre which left 900 civillians dead.

The first annual protest against the SOA was held in 1990 and consisted of only a handful of activists. SOA Watch, the group that sposors this and other events like it, was founded by Father Roy Bourgeois, a Vietnam veteran and Catholic priest.

A continued spotlight on SOA prompted Congress to close down the school in 2001 only to reopen it a few weeks later with a new name, the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation. The new school operates on the grounds of the old SOA and features practically the same curriculum.

Oberlin’s participation in the SOA/WHISC vigil was sponsored by the Oberlin Peace Activists League and Oberlin Students for Guatemala. This year, 41 members of the Oberlin community, including students, alumni and town residents, made the 13 hour bus ride down to Georgia.

The event lasted two days. Saturday was devoted to an informal gathering for speeches followed by music sung by folk legend Pete Seeger and lesser known groups like The Musicians Collective and the political hip-hop trio the Chesnut Brothers. Speakers included Amy Goodman, host of Pacifica radio’s Democracy Now and death penalty activist Sister Helen Prejean, who was the subject of the film Dead Man Walking.
Around the protest grounds, the various booths only served to emphasize how the SOA has become a symbol for anti-oppresion movements of all kinds. Among the causes represented were anti-war, workers’ rights, fair trade, the Kucinich campaign, Zapatista solidarity and boycotts of Coca-Cola and Taco Bell.

The day’s festivities were marred by what was going on behind the fence. Giant speakers had been set up at the base entrance to blast military band music and patriotic tunes out into the crowd.

During Goodman’s speech about suppression of dissent in the media, a sudden warning from the base commanders over the PA system only served to emphasize her point.

The music was eventually stopped and in a press conference later that day, base commander General William Freakley inisisted that the music was intended only to “keep the troops’ spirits up,” though it is still unclear why the speakers were pointing away from the base.

“We’ve got a lot more wattage we could have used,” Freakley said.

SOA Watch and the ACLU are announcing plans to file suit against the army for disrupting the legally authorized protest.

A variety of programs were held later that night at the Heritage Inn ,including several film screenings and art demonstrations by the Beehive Design Collective and the Puppetistas, both of whom also showed their work during the rally.

The main event of the SOA protest is the Sunday vigil. The different tone following the day’s events was immediately established upon entering the parade grounds, where marchers picked up white wooden crosses, each with the name of a a person killed by graduates of the SOA.

The speeches were somber as well. Carlos Mauricio, from the Stop Impunity Project, spoke of his torture at the hands of the police in Guatemala.

“As I sat there in the cell, I knew I was not alone because the martyrs were all with me,” he said as the crowd raised their crosses in support.

Seeger came up for another performance Sunday night. Though a bit frail at 84, the veteran of four generations of protest seemed electrified once he picked up a guitar, leading the crowd in a slow and rousing rendition of ‘Amazing Grace’.

“Stop trying to preserve your academic objectivity,” he told the crowd. “Just start singing!”

After his performance the vigil began. As the names of the victims were read off, people carried their crosses past the stage to lay them by the fort’s fence.

Though this technically involved crossing onto base property, police and military officials chose not to take action against the marchers this year.

After the vigil Oberlin’s contingent began their long bus ride back to Ohio. Meanwhile, back at Benning there was more tension as 50 people chose to risk a 6 month jail term by crossing onto the the base to take their protest directly to the US military. All were arrested and are awaiting trial.

   

A note to our subscribers: Our subscription list was deleted.
Please help us reconstruct it. (Read on...)