SOA grads hired assassins for Gulf Cartel

[G_j]

www.agrnews.org/issues/265/worldnews.html

SOA grads hired assassins for Gulf Cartel

Feb. 9— The Mexican Secretary of Defense released documents revealing that Western Hemispheric Institute for Security Cooperation, formerly known as the School of the Americas , trained ex-soldiers now working as highly trained assassins for the Gulf Cartel, a Mexican drug cartel.

SOA graduates comprise over a third of the 31 Mexican Army deserters now working with the Zetas, a group of hired assassins -– notorious for their "extreme violence" -– employed by the Gulf Cartel. The 31 renegade soldiers were previously part of the Special Air Mobile Force Group, an elite division of the Mexican Army.

The Zetas have been implicated in numerous shoot-outs and are suspects for executions, kidnapping, and other crimes.

The discovery of SOA-trained soldiers working as assassins for the Gulf Cartel is particularly ironic considering that the SOA claims "counter-narcotics training" as one of the major purposes of the school.

The SOA has highlighted counter-narcotics training as part of its public relations blitz attempting to dispel popular opposition to the school since the late '90s. The counter-narcotics emphasis has served as a convenient smoke screen allowing the SOA to keep functioning as it always has, just as the so-called "war on drugs" serves to cast hegemonic US foreign policies in a benign light.
..more..

[kalian]

1. See what happens when you create little monsters....

the Russians are dealing with similar foul individuals. Former KGB and
special operation soldiers are now working for the Russian mafia...
Oh what a wonderful world.... :eyes:

[kiahzero]

2. The SOA

The following is a repost from when this came up about Clark:
Let us assume that Columbia is a representative sample of the set of graduates.

Out of 8,679 graduates, somewhere on the order of 150 graduates are "notorious", according to http://www.derechos.org/soa/. This is rounded up, because I possibly miscounted as I went down the list.

This is 1.7% of the graduates from Columbia.

Gee... I seem to recall something in the Senate about 98% being damn good.

When I get a chance, I'll crunch the numbers from Mexico and see if they fall in the same range... about to go to class.

I will say this, though: The problem is not that we give military training to Latin America, the problem is the way we encourage Latin American countries to use that training (drug war).

[Bozola]

3. I hope you're not defending the SOA

http://www.soaw.org/new/article.php?id=270

[kiahzero]

5. Not so much defending

Pointing out a large hole in the argument against it. If there's a problem with the actual content of what's being taught, that's the case that needs to be made. Most of the debate over the SOA seems to hinge on the number of assholes it turns out.

I don't think that it's the evil that some make it out to be, but that's just me.

Edit: misspelling

[G_j]

6. the problem with this

is that it doesn't explain why there have been signifigant numbers of SOA grads identified within ultra violent groups.

for example, "SOA graduates comprise over a third of the 31 Mexican Army deserters now working with the Zetas, a group of hired assassins -– notorious for their "extreme violence" -– employed by the Gulf Cartel."

[G_j]

4. kick

[tom_paine]

7. Very possible that SOA types murdered Wellstone