Spitfire List Web site and blog of anti-fascist researcher and radio personality Dave Emory.

For The Record  

FTR #142 The Genesis of Latin American Death Squads

Lis­ten:
MP3 Side 1 | Side 2

Excerpt­ed from AFA-15, this broad­cast high­lights the rela­tion­ship between fas­cist ele­ments of U.S. intel­li­gence, the Autonomous Uni­ver­si­ty of Guadala­jara (Mex­i­co), the Latin Amer­i­can Branch of the for­mer World Anti-Com­mu­nist League and the for­ma­tion and oper­a­tion of Latin Amer­i­can death squads.

Oper­at­ing under the ban­ner of the “White Hand,” Latin Amer­i­can death squads were coor­di­nat­ed by the CAL (WACL’s Latin Amer­i­can affil­i­ate) and had the Uni­ver­si­ty as its epi­cen­ter. The pro­gram ana­lyzes the gen­e­sis of this rela­tion­ship in Guatemala, aris­ing out of the 1954 CIA-backed coup that over­threw Jacobo Arbenz. Uti­liz­ing CAL, ele­ments of the CIA mid­wived the for­ma­tion of the ter­ror appa­ra­tus that sowed death and destruc­tion in Guatemala and oth­er Latin Amer­i­can coun­tries in suc­ceed­ing decades. (In March of 1999, Pres­i­dent Clin­ton apol­o­gized on behalf of the Unit­ed States for the blood­shed that the Unit­ed States had been respon­si­ble for in Guatemala.)

The pro­gram sets forth the pre-World War II back­ground of “Los Tecos,” the Mex­i­can branch of CAL (based in Guadala­jara). Allied with Adolf Hitler, tutored by a mem­ber who had stud­ied in Nazi Ger­many and espous­ing an anti-semit­ic and anti-catholic occultism, Los Tecos dom­i­nate the Autonomous Uni­ver­si­ty. Found­ed, in part, by the U.S. State Depart­ment and Agency for Inter­na­tion­al Devel­op­ment (the lat­ter a fre­quent cov­er for U.S. intel­li­gence oper­a­tions abroad), the Uni­ver­si­ty serves as an ide­o­log­i­cal train­ing ground and oper­a­tional coor­di­nat­ing cen­ter for the ter­ror units of the White Hand. (This infor­ma­tion was sup­plied by a mem­ber of the Hon­duran branch of the death squad appa­ra­tus.)

The broad­cast high­lights the milieu’s oper­a­tions in El Sal­vador and Nicaragua, both oper­a­tions coor­di­nat­ed with Ronald Rea­gan’s CIA and both assist­ed (par­tic­u­lar­ly in the begin­ning) by Argen­tine fas­cists. In addi­tion, the pro­gram delin­eates the on-going rela­tion­ship between the Autonomous Uni­ver­si­ty and thir­teen dif­fer­ent Amer­i­can uni­ver­si­ties. Vis­it­ing Amer­i­can stu­dents are oblig­ed to com­ply with ide­o­log­i­cal train­ing man­dat­ed by Los Tecos. (Record­ed on 3/14/99.)

Discussion

No comments for “FTR #142 The Genesis of Latin American Death Squads”

Post a comment