'DEATH SQUADS' CONTINUE DESPITE U.S. PRESSURES

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000100130132-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 21, 2011
• Sequence Number: 132
• Publication Date: January 26, 1984
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

S~,Declassified in Part -Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/12/21 :CIA-RDP90-009658000100130132-4
I
:TICLE APPEARED
;;,Y ?A~E~(~ WASHINGTON POST
26 January 1984
`Death Squads'
Continue Despite~~
U.S. Pressures
President Reagan would like to
stamp out the infamous right-wing
"death squada? that have cast .a long
shadow over the anti-communist
cause in Latin America.
It won't be easy. The reasons:
? Our CIA may ~yg helped -set
un the first d a aq~da_ jn Guate-
male. Thev evolved out Qf the Na_
tiongl Liberation Movement, a pars=~
military~olitical or?anization that
overthrew lef~st prey, dent Jacoho
Arbenz in 1954 with tag not-eo-co-
ver,Laid of CIA arents.
? The CIA has continued to main-
tain contacts inside the death
s uads. The Reagan administration.
therefore; knows more than it cares
to admit ~1Q~ut the composition and
o_ perations of the death s uada. In
fact-die a ministration 'van a
st o ea _ 9'Q~ua ea ers to the
inter~irr- civi ian president of El Sal-
yador, Alvaro Ma?ana.
? Some death. squads operate
through the World Anti-Communist
League. This was once a respectable
association of ultraconservative
groups, but it has come increasingly
under the influence of extremist,
even neo-Nazi organizations. Nev-
ertheless, some of Reagan's staunch
supporters continue to sympathize
with the league.
? The Dresident has solid intelli-
gence that hard-core revolutionaries,
trained and indoctrinated b the
eta an ubans have moved
Into y posrbona in the rebel mov~-
menta of Central America. The only
way to stop the spread of communist
influence in our back yard, White
House aides say, is to bolster anti-
communist governments in the -re-
gion. But the death squads are eo
deeply entrenched in these govern-
ments that it is almost impossible to
extricate them.
I have been investigating the
death squads, which operate
throughout Latin America under.the
name of La Mario Blanca {White
Hand). In .the cause of executing
communists they have slaughtered
.tens of thousands of suspected left-
ists (including four U.S. churchwo-
men) without a trial. A loose rumor
or accusation may bring a death sen-
tence upon an entire family.
La Marro Blanca's political assea-
sins are protected by a Mafia-like
code of .loyalty and silence. One of
the rare sources. who dared to talk
about.the death squads explained to
my associate Jon Lee Anderson: "La
Marro Blanca means that whoever is
involved. in the killing is protected
by powerful, invisible hands. These
hands whitewash all evidence lead-
ing ~to a member."
An admitted assassin, whom I call
El Lobo (The Wolf), boasted: "We
go by different names in each coun-
try and make up new ones to con-
fuse our enemies. But we are all La
Marro Blanca"
The front organization. for the ~
death squads,-he confirmed, is the
Latin American Anti-Communist' .
Confederation, an affiliate of the.
World Anti-Communist League. The:
affiliate, known by the initials CAL,
pretends to keep its skirts clean of
the clandestine murders. But some-;
times the truth slips out.
At a World Anti-Communist
League meeting in 1981, CAL Sec=
retary Rafael Rodriguez came close,.
to letting the black cat out of the
bag. He boasted that many members-
of the Latin American affiliate were-
involved in "active resistance' to the
communist threat, "whether with
weapons, with the pen or with the
spoken word ....Their mission is.
to back with action any authority
taking effective measures to oppose.
communism." -
Despite pressure from the White
House, no criminal charges have
been brought in EI Salvador or Gua-'
female for right-wing assassinations.
La Marro Blanca is simply too pow-,
erful.
Meanwhile, the butchery goes on.
Declassified in Part -Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2011/12/21 :CIA-RDP90-009658000100130132-4