Congressional Record: August 3, 1999 (Extensions)
Page E1736
HON. BERNARD SANDERS
of vermont
in the house of representatives
Tuesday, August 3, 1999
Mr. SANDERS. Mr. Speaker, I submit for printing in the Record
statements by high school students from my home State of Vermont, who
were speaking at my recent town meeting on issues facing young people
today. I believe that the views of these young persons will benefit my
colleagues.
[...]
U.S. Intelligence Issues
(On behalf of Bethany Heywood and Laura Freeman)
Bethany Heywood: How would you feel if a total stranger
demanded your money and wouldn't tell you what it was being
used for, but assured you it wouldn't be misused? Would you
trust this person? Of course not. But this is essentially
what the CIA does to the American taxpayer, and with their
track record, we certainly shouldn't trust them to use our
money properly.
Taxpayers don't even know how much money the CIA receives,
although a rough estimate is $3.1 billion per year. In the
past, the CIA has used a substantial part of its budget to
finance covert operations, many of which we are just finding
out about. Details of covert operations aren't declassified
until decades after the actual event. Conveniently, by the
time a covert operation is disclosed, any public outrage that
might have erupted will have been squelched by the time
lapse.
Whether they're in the past or not, some of the CIA's
actions have been inexcusable: Assassinations, attempted
assassinations, massive propaganda efforts to prevent
undesirable people from winning foreign elections, operations
to topple democratically elected foreign leaders from power,
internal spying on American citizens, extensive mind control
experiments conducted at universities, prisons and hospitals.
The list goes on and on. Are these activities the government
should be spending money on?
Although the CIA is prohibited from engaging in
assassinations, attempts have been made to assassinate quite
a few foreign leaders. Some of the targets have been Castro,
DeGaulle, Khadafy, Khomeini and Hussein, just to name a few.
One of the CIA's supposed restrictions is that its limited to
intelligence operations on foreign soil only. Apparently, the
CIA has trouble discerning foreign soil from American soil,
because, in the 1970s, 300,000 Americans considered
potentially dangerous to national security were indexed in
the CIA computer. Citizens considered particularly dangerous
were place under surveillance, with bugs in their phones,
microphones in their bedrooms, or warrantless break-ins into
their homes.
One way to stop the CIA's activities would be to cut CIA
funding so there isn't enough for covert operations. Right
now, the president can direct the CIA to undertake a covert
operation, and is advised to do so by the National Security
Counsel, or NSC. Members of the NSC are appointed by the
president. This does not represent a diversity of people and
ideas, because the president is going to pick people who will
agree with him. If the members of the NSC were democratically
elected, the abuse of power by a small group of like-minded
individuals could be stopped.
Another way to make the decision of whether or not to go
ahead with the covert operation more democratically decided
would be to have congressional oversight. This might be seen
by some as too great a threat to CIA authority, but would
prevent unethical abuse of power.
The problems with CIA covert operations and abuse of power
won't go away overnight, but steps can and should be taken to
limit and hopefully eliminate covert operations.
Laura Freeman: I am speaking on the School of the Americas.
Would you willingly arm a murderer? Would you support the
education of some of the worst human rights violators in this
hemisphere? Would you finance a school which trained its
graduates in the most effective ways to interrogate,
including torture, blackmail and execution?
Whatever the answer of American citizens, every year, $20
million go from the taxpayers to a school that does exactly
these things. The School of the Americas, or SOA, was started
in Panama in 1946. Its original purpose was to train Latin
Americans in military techniques, which would allow them to
create stable democratic governments in Latin America, as
well as repress communist activities and revolutions.
SOA students learn combat skills, military intelligence,
commando tactics, sniper training, torture techniques, and
psychological warfare. Most of the courses resolve around
what they call counterinsurgency, states Father Roy
Bourgeois, a priest who has dedicated his time to protesting
the SOA.
Who are the insurgents? They are the poor. They are the
people in Latin America who call for reform. They are the
landless peasants who are hungry. They are healthcare
workers, human rights activists, labor organizers. They
become the insurgents. How do the graduates of the School of
the Americas use their skills? They murder priests and
archbishops, missionaries, and, perhaps worst of all,
civilians, their own people.
With the advent of the SOA's move to Fort Benning, Georgia,
the school has become something we are less and less able to
disassociate from. As Father Bourgeois said: "We are talking
about a school of assassins right here in our backyard, being
supported by our tax money. It's being done in our name."
What can we do to clear our name of this stain? The answer
is simple: Close the School of the Americas. We must act to
save the lives of people all over Latin America. To quote
Salvadorian Archbishop Oscar Romero, "We who have a voice,
we have to speak for the voiceless."