Noam Chomsky - Turning the Tide U.S. intervention in

Free World Vignettes
5. The Reagan Administration and Human Rights
T
hroughout, the Administration has produced a steady stream of
apologetics for the murderers and torturers, while conceding that
in the past there had been abuses that have now been overcome.
Ríos Montt, who took over the slaughter in March 1982, was “totally
committed to democracy,” “a man of great personal integrity” who
“wants to improve the quality of life for all Guatemalans” and had
received a “bum rap”; so President Reagan commented in December
1982 at a time when human rights groups and the international press
estimated that some 3-8,000 had been killed with 200,000 driven from
their homes by the government of this saintly figure, who, speaking on
Guatemalan TV, had “declared a state of siege so that we could kill
legally.” A few months earlier, after four months of mounting atrocities
under Ríos Montt, Stephen Bosworth of the State Department had
informed Congress that “the record of the past four months, while not
perfect, demonstrates that the new government has a commitment to
positive change and new opportunity in Guatemala”: “I cannot
emphasize strongly enough the favorable contrast between the current
human rights situation in Guatemala and the situation last December”
under the Lucas Garcia regime. He added falsely that “Under the
previous government, we did not provide military assistance because of
the human rights record,” but now, given the dramatic improvements,
we may proceed. Melvin Levitsky of the State Department human rights
office told Congress that under the Lucas Garcia regime, the US could
not “easily sustain a relationship” because it engaged “in violence
against its own people.”
During the Lucas Garcia regime, the Administration had sung a
Classics in Politics: Turning the Tide Noam Chomsky
54