The War on Democracy Page #7

the funeral of Archbishop Romero

who was murdered as he said Mass

on March 23rd, 1 980,

This man, Robert D'Aubuisson

gave the order to kill the archbishop

Major DAubuisson

was Washingtons dirty secret in El Salvador

He was trained

at the School of the Americas

According to the Truth Commission,,,

- Oh, please!

-,,and a whole swathe of,,,

Come on, John! If this is where we're going,

you're wasting my time,

That's all bullshit,

Those people all had agendas,

So, it was bullshit that the Salvadorian military

were murdering tens of thousands of people,,,

No, I bet you can't count more than 200

in the whole ten or twelve years,

We can count 200 in this one village alone

They were mostly women and children

systematically murdered

in just one day and night in December 1 981

in the village of El Mozote

The killers belonged to a special battalion

of the El Salvador army

trained by the United States

There were few survivors

(Woman) I saw the women

clinging to each other,

crying and screaming at them not to kill them.

I fought for my children,

I didn't want to let them go,

I said I would die with them,

but they wrenched them from my arms,

We heard them killing the children,

They killed them at night,

You could hear their screams

for their mothers and fathers,

You're taking the stuff from these

propaganda mills, and I'm not interested,,,

What are the propaganda mills?

All this Truth thing and all of that -

they're nothing but propaganda mills,

- Do you really think..,,

- I know so, You,,,

Are they all conning us, lying to us -

Amnesty international?

Amnesty internationals right in the middle of it,

During the 1 980s

the years of Ronald Reagan in the White House

a trail of carnage and grief

was blazed across Central America

I reported America's war against Nicaragua

which had the temerity to overthrow

a Washington-backed dictator, Somoza

The CIA attacked Nicaragua

with death squads known as the Contra

Why did Washington attack

such tiny countries?

Because the weaker they are

the greater the threat

People who can free themselves

against all the odds

are sure to inspire others

What right have you,

and I mean you, the CIA, the United States

government or any foreign power,

what right do you have

to do what you do in other countries?

National security interests,

But that's a divine right, isn't it?

Because the people that you do it to

have no say,

Well, that's just tough,

We're gonna protect ourselves

and we're gonna go on protecting ourselves,

cos we end up protecting all of you,

and let's not forget that,

Right, Right, no, I won't,

We'll intervene whenever we decide it's in

our national security interests to intervene,

and if you don't like it, lump it,

Get used to it, world -

we're not gonna put up with nonsense,

If our interests are threatened,

we're gonna do it,

In Guatemala the United Nations described

the Washington-backed campaign

against the Mayan people as genocide

An American Roman-Catholic nun

Sister Dianna Ortiz

experienced this at first hand

as a missionary

In 1 989, after speaking out about the

brutal treatment of the indigenous people

she was kidnapped

In,,,1 989, November 2nd,

I,,,

OK.

I was,,,

,,abducted and,,,

,,l was put in a police car,,,

,,blindfolded and taken to a military installation

in Guatemala City

known as the Politecnica,

which still exists today,

I was,,,

,,taken to a basement, and,,,

I still remember to this day,,,

,,upon entering the building,

the clandestine prison,,,

,,hearing the screams

of people being tortured,

Can we stop?

For 24 hours, she was tortured

and gang-raped

During her ordeal

she identified the leader of the gang

as a fellow citizen of the United States

I came out a totally, um.,,

,,different person,,,

,,but also with new eyes,,,

and,,,more attuned to the hurting,

the brokenness,

the oppression, the deceit

of my government,

I've heard people say that what happened

in Abu Ghraib is an isolated incident,

and I have to just shake my head and say,

"Are we on the same planet? "

You know, "Aren't you aware of our history? "

You know, "isnt history taught in the classroom,

"about the role of the US government

in human rights violations? "

By the late 1 980s

Washingtons policy changed

Dictators like Pinochet are seen as

an unnecessary embarrassment

A new and innovative way

of controlling nations was launched

Good morning and welcome,

It's good to have you all here to help celebrate

the launching of a programe

with a vision and a noble purpose,

The National Endowment For Democracy is,

just as we've been told, more than bipartisan,

The establishment of the national endowment

goes right to the heart of America's faith

in democratic ideals and institutions,

It offers hope to people everywhere,

Like any new brand, it had a snappy name -

democracy

It was largely fake

an illusion of marketing and spin

This brand of democracy meant

that whoever you voted for

the policies would be broadly the same

and your countrys economy would be in step

with the United States

Washington would be your closest friend.

or else

In the 1 990s these democracies in name

replaced dictatorships in Latin America

with Chile providing the model

This is the commercial centre

of Santiago, Chile

On the surface today

everything seems normal, modern prosperous

Too the Bush administration

Chile is the very model of economic success

"a laboratory experiment"

according to the magazine Business Week.

Much of life has been privatized

There are now billionaires

and the rich are getting richer

Pinochet fixed the country,

- Who says?

- He,,, Oh!

- The United States says?

- No!

The World Bank says,

The lnter-American bank says,

Everybody says it,

He brought about an economic miracle

in Chile,

I'm not saying he had the brains for it,

but he had the brains to hire all these people,

Chileans, who had studied

at the University of Chicago,

who knew something about real economics,

Real economics

were advocated by Milton Friedman

an extreme right-wing economist

at the University of Chicago

Friedman was invited too perform

his "laboratory experiment"

on the economic life of Chile

The families of the tortured and disappeared

were silent witnesses

Without irony, he called his experiment

"shock treatment"

Please be seated,

Thank you all very much, It's, uh,,,

an honor for me to be here to, um.,,

pay tribute to a hero of freedom -

Milton Friedman,

He has used a brilliant mind

to advance a moral vision,

We have seen Milton Friedman's ideas

at work in Chile,

where a group of economists called the

Chicago Boys brought inflation under control

and laid the groundwork

for economic success,

This is the other side

of the economic miracle

Chile today is a deeply unequal society

This shanty town

is just minutes from Santiagos smart hotels

There are so many unemployed,

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