ACCESSION NUMBER:00000
FILE ID:96100803.LAR
DATE:10/08/96
TITLE:08-10-96  PERRY SAYS CONTROVERSIAL MATERIAL REMOVED FROM MILITARY MANUALS

TEXT:
(Outlines steps to prevent recurrence)  (440)
By Dan Newland
USIA Special Correspondent


BARILOCHE, Argentina -- U.S. Defense Secretary William J. Perry said
Oct. 8 that the Pentagon has taken further steps to ensure that the
curriculum of the U.S. School of the Americas never again condones any
violation of human rights.

Perry told a briefing for U.S. correspondents covering the Second
Defense Ministerial of the Americas (DMA-II) here that the United
States is reviewing its military training policies at the school,
located at Ft. Benning, Georgia, following revelations that some past
instruction materials suggested the use of torture and other human
rights violations in counter-insurgency operations.

Perry called the recently revealed materials in the curriculum of the
school, where many Latin American military officers have received
training over the past two decades, "shocking," adding that while it
comprised "only a small percentage" of the entire program, "that is
not an excuse."

In recounting the incident, Perry said the "extremely offensive"
material was introduced into the school's curriculum at some time in
the early 1980s. "I want to emphasize that what was done was wrong and
totally unacceptable," he said, adding that the material was not
discovered by defense officials until 1991, when it was brought to the
attention of then-Defense Secretary Richard Cheney.

"Dick (Cheney) took entirely appropriate action," Perry said. "He
ordered the school to stop using that material. He ordered that all
the manuals with that material that could be found be destroyed, and
he adopted new procedures to make sure that it would not happen
again."

But the issue did not end there. Perry said the Clinton
administration's Oversight Intelligence Board also discovered
references to torture in a more recent review of School of the
Americas instruction manuals. The administration reported this fact to
Congress and also made it public, while taking immediate parallel
action to safeguard against continued use of these materials, the
secretary said.

New measures taken by the Defense Department, according to Perry,
include a broadening of human rights training in the military and the
addition of a Board of Visitors to review the course content and
teaching methods for the School of the Americas. More recently, Perry
said he has ordered his department's instructor general to carry out
still another review, specifically designed to validate all training
procedures.

The main goal of all of these measures, Perry said, "is to make
absolutely certain that nothing like this can ever happen again."
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