Angry Rant

I'm fast approaching the end of a book that Loteria Chicana recommended on her blog... The Tattooed Soldier... Anyway, it's a fast read and like she has already explained it has a non-fiction feel even though it's fiction.

It's about a man who fled to LA after his wife and child were murdered in Guatemala during the civil war.

Antonio, the main character, ends up accidentally crossing paths with the soldier who was in part responsible for the atrocities that left him a broken man... Hence the name "The Tattooed Soldier."

I won't go any further than that but the story reminds me of the many stories of the El Salvadoran Civil War I've heard from my wife's family... Antonio's story isn't that different from my brother in-law's story, which isn't that different form the stories from Honduras, Nicaragua, or Columbia.

In The Tattooed Soldier, Antonio knows his wife's killer, but in real life the people who "disappeared" thousands of innocent civilians continue to go un punished.

For the most part, we don't even have any names of the people who committed the unspeakable atrocities in the mid to late 80s... There is one name however, that stands out to me... It's John Necroponte. He was the ambassador to Honduras during the time Central America was being raped... The Reagan Administration had an ally in Honduran General/Dictator Gustavo Alvarez and they used Honduras as the headquarters for their clandestine terrorist activities. Necroponte was put in place specifically because of his willingness to turn a blind eye to the paramilitary Death Squads.
Necroponte has always denied his involvement in these war crimes, but the facts tell a different story.

The Baltimore Sun investigated the Honduran situation and found declassified documents that clearly show that "U.S. officials knew what was happening in Honduras and engaged in a willful deception to avoid confronting Congress with the truth."

Not only did he turn a blind eye to the situation, he had his assistants fudge the Human Rights record of Honduras on annual reports to Congress. He knew that Congress couldn't legally authorize the insane amounts of money being allotted to the Honduran Military if they knew of their blatant violations... He did that becasue he knew that no money to Honduras meant no money for the secret war...

Where is John Necroponte now? That's the worst part... George W. Bush named him the ambassador to Iraq... He served 9 months there before being sworn in as the National Director of Intelligence!?!?
The mainstream press hardly even noticed that a war criminal and co-conspirator of mass genocide was rewarded for his work with two of the highest and most coveted positions in the US Government. Some reports made a vague reference to his controversial past, but that's it. Aside from the Independent Press, there was nothing.

I don't really know why I'm writing all of this... There isn't a whole lot that can be done from a blog... I guess my hope is that some people will click on the Baltimore Sun articles I've linked to and forever associate the name John Negroponte with the Central American massacres of the 80's... We can't go back in time and stop the terror that was inflicted, but maybe if we keep it fresh in our minds and not let the perpetrators be forgotten there won't be a next time. Maybe then the students, professors, campesinos, and los pobres of Latin America will be able to speak their voices without fear of retribution... Maybe...

Baltimore Sun Article with related articles listed on page.

John Negroponte's official US Gov Pic... or as I like to call it: The Face of Satan.