CENTRAL AMERICA'S ARMS BUILDUP: THE RISKS OF GUNS WITHOUT BUTTER

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000403790002-0
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 9, 2012
• Sequence Number: 2
• Publication Date: April 19, 1987
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
0 Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/02/09: CIA-RDP90-00965R000403790002-0
19 April 1987
Central America's Arms Buildup:
The Risks of Guns Without Butter
T
By JAMES LeMOYNE
Special to TM New York Tltnes
SAN SALVADOR, April 16 - As Cen-
tral America undergoes the most rapid
military buildup in its history, with
forceful American participation, civil-
ian government leaders and diplomats
are concerned about prospects for
weak governments that must deal with,
the vastly strengthened armies in their
countries.
Such worries are justified, they say,
in a region where the army has often
left the barracks to occupy the presi-
dential palace and where army officers
are essentially a separate elite, better
organized and more unified than most
civilian administrations.
"There is always the implicit threat'
here that the army will overthrow you
one day," said one of the most senior
and experienced officials in the Hondu-
ran Government.
"They don't overthrow us because
it's not in their interest right now and
because the United States has told
them not to," the Honduran official
added. "But what the United States is
basically doing heft is paying our
army not to have a coup. Who knows
what will happen when you are no
longer here to stop them?"
Strengtkjr Rrotesdonalbm
American officials say such fears
are exaggerated. They say that under
United states influence the incidence of
abuses by the military in El Salvador
and Honduras has fallen sharply and
that both the army and the police act
and fight more professionally.
United States influence has been
strong. American military assistance
to its clients in the region jumped from
$14.2 million in 1981 to $212 million in
1986, and the security forces of El Sal-
vador, Honduras and Guatemala more
than doubled from 1981 to 1988.
"You can't support these govern-
ments without supporting their
armies," said a Western diplomat in
Honduras.
But strong misgivings about the mili-
tary buildup were repeatedly ex-1
pressed in interviews in the last month
with Honduran, Salvadoran and Guate
malan political leaders, who said the
armies in their countries had never
been more politically sophisticated or
stronger than they are today.
"The army is essentially a separate
.political party - the institutional
,party," a Salvadoran political analyst.
said. "All other sectors - business-,
men, the Government, the opposition
,parties and the American Embassy -i
go to the army to bargain and work out:
deals."
A Guatemalan political leader said:'
"The army is not subordinate to civil,
authority, it is parallel to it. Civilians'
go to the army with their hats in their
hands."
In Guatemala, El Salvador, Hon-
duras and Panama, civilian political,
leaders all say that finding a way to'
.take power away from the army and
integrate it into a civilian-dominated
society is a major obstacle. Several,
American officials agreed with that as-,
sessment.
"I would say that the biggest long-
term threat to civilian government in
El Salvador is the army, not the guer-i
rillas," a senior Western diplomat ink
San Salvador said.
The Reagan Rationale:
Response to a Threat
The military buildup, along with the
election of civilian governments, has
been strongly supported by the Reagan.
Administration, which calls the buildup;
a necessary response to a potent leftist'i
rebel threat in El Salvador and the
Soviet-backed strengthening of the'
Nicaraguan Army, now easily the larg-1
est in the
"You cant ll it buying influence if
you like, but what it is is common;
sense," said a senior American mill-'
tary adviser when asked to explain the
rationale behind American military'
assistance.
you get down to it, we are
here to protect American national in-
terests and we have to rely on local
armies to help us do that," he added.
The Salvadoran security forces
police and armed forces combined
grew from 16,850 men in 1981 to more
than 57,000 in 1986. Similar but less
abrupt growth has occurred in Hon-
duras with American aid, and in Guate-
mala, where the army promoted its
own development largely without
American assistance after the Carter
Administration cut off military aid 10
years ago to protest gross human
rights violations by a succession of
military regimes there.
The Reagan Administration has
sharply increased United States mili-
tary spending in the area from a few
million dollars a year in 1979 to more
than $212 million a year today and has
spent tens of millions more to pay for
American maneuvers and installations
in Honduras and Panama.
In Hon tr s the Administration has
used constant military maneuvers to
create a sprawling, modern air base at
Palmerola that houses more than 1,000
American servicemen, as well as to
build or improve at least seven other
Central Intelligence Agency t u 1
the Nicaraguan re , ennirshe
- n addd Lion, the Administration has
sent hundreds of American advisers
and C.I.A. operatives to oversee the
training, arming and management of
Central American client states' armies
and police over the last six years.
companions of militaryoofj? ,rs. olav
host toga ~es or a commanders
and bring them it is suc aT stereo
equipment to reward friendship, ac-
conite States and Central
American o
W When a captain in the politi t-
ce unit o the Salvadoran ury
police me t
the
C.I.A deputy chief the
ca on a vacation to the United
was as acool-
MM to stop
=
bea people with a and threat-
enina them with Ig to
three Salvadoran. And diplomatic offi-
American Policy:
Competing Goals
Critics charge that the buildup of
local armies reflects the contradictory
goals of United States policy in the re-
gion - to create stable, democratic
governments while at the same time
strengthening armies that have histori-
cally been antidemocratic, brutal and
. corrupt.
It is a tension between ideals and se-
curity interests that has dogged Amer-
ican policy since the Kennedy Adminis-
tration, which backed economic and
Al-
liance for Progress and counterinsur-
gency measures under the tutelage of
the Green Berets and the C.I.A.
When American interest and spend-
ing waned. the American-trained
armies and police either took over or
strongly influenced their governments.
l anfinlxd
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/02/09: CIA-RDP90-00965R000403790002-0