D'Aubuisson, R

==

endorsed RR

---
  =LAT obitRoberto D'Aubuisson, 48; Reputed Head of Salvadoran Death Squadshttp://articles.latimes.com/1992-02-21/news/mn-2740_1_death-squadsFebruary 21, 1992|MARJORIE MILLER | TIMES STAFF WRITER
SAN SALVADOR — Roberto D'Aubuisson, the reputed godfather of El Salvador's right-wing death squads and founder of the ruling Nationalist Republican Alliance party, died Thursday after a prolonged battle with throat cancer and bleeding ulcers. He was 48.D'Aubuisson's death was reported by Dr. Jose Luis Saca, one of the physicians who had been attending him here.In the course of his political career, the former army intelligence major was accused of fomenting a coup, plotting the assassination of a U.S ambassador and masterminding the murder of thousands of his countrymen, including the archbishop of San Salvador.D'Aubuisson vehemently denied the charges as he made his way into mainstream politics. He became a charismatic leader of the conservative poor and a hero to El Salvador's wealthy elite, who believed that he saved the country from communism.To many leftists, D'Aubuisson remained a driving force of this country's 12-year civil war, and they saw his death, coming soon after a negotiated peace, as poetic justice. Yet months earlier, the cold warrior had become an unlikely champion of peace, reining in right-wing extremists who were trying to stop President Alfredo Cristiani from signing a cease-fire agreement with the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front.Last September, at the 10th congress of his party, known as Arena, D'Aubuisson laid down the law: "We support our president because he is fulfilling the three objectives of Arena: peace, progress and liberty. . . . The government has extended a silver bridge to the terrorists so they can enter the political arena, where we will be waiting for them."D'Aubuisson was a small, wiry chain-smoker who spit out words like bits of tobacco on the tip of his tongue. He became known to the nation in early 1980 when he made frequent nighttime television appearances to denounce civilian opposition leaders as subversives, much as Sen. Joseph McCarthy once accused many Americans of being communists.Some of those whom D'Aubuisson targeted on television were later killed by unknown assailants.As a youth, D'Aubuisson excelled in mathematics at a high school run by Jesuit priests--an order he would later brand as subversive. He entered the country's military school as a teen-ager, beginning his anti-communist education in the aftermath of the Cuban revolution. After graduating near the bottom of his class in 1963, he joined the National Guard.During his military career, D'Aubuisson received counterinsurgency and psychological warfare training from the United States and Taiwan. In the 1970s, while radical students, peasants and union workers began to organize against the repressive government of Gen. Carlos Humberto Romero, D'Aubuisson became a political policeman. He was a military intelligence specialist spying on the growing numbers of dissidents taking to the streets to protest military rule, electoral fraud and the crushing poverty in which most Salvadorans lived.D'Aubuisson was a major in the National Guard's intelligence section when a group of young military officers overthrew Romero in October, 1979, and formed a civilian-military government with many of the leftists that D'Aubuisson had been tracking.When the new government established a commission to investigate hundreds of political killings and cases of "the disappeared," D'Aubuisson resigned rather than testify against his superiors.The junta collapsed, and reformers lost power to extreme rightists. In the aftermath, thousands of leftists took up arms. The United States eventually spent more than $4 billion to put down the rebels in the civil war that followed. The right, meanwhile, formed clandestine groups with names like Squadron of Death and Secret Anti-Communist Army that unleashed a campaign of terror. Their death squads killed an estimated 30,000 people between 1980 and 1983.According to a 1983 Times investigation, the killings were part of a deliberate counterinsurgency program designed by a group of rightist military officers and wealthy landowners for whom D'Aubuisson was the spokesman.Over the years, U.S. officials and former Salvadoran military officers implicated D'Aubuisson in some of the most high-profile assassinations, including the archbishop of San Salvador, Monsignor Oscar Arnulfo Romero and Atty. Gen. Mario Zamora in 1980, and two American agrarian advisers and the head of a Salvadoran land distribution institute in 1981.

Major Roberto D'Aubuisson Arrieta, (23 August 1944 - 20 February 1992) was the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salvadoran_Army" title="Salvadoran Army">Salvadoran Army</a> officer and political leader who founded the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nationalist_Republican_Alliance" title="Nationalist Republican Alliance">Nationalist Republican Alliance</a> (ARENA), which he led from 1980 to 1985. He was known as "Chele", or "light-skinned face", and was considered an organizer-leader of the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_squad" title="Death squad">death squads</a> who <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torture" title="Torture">tortured</a> and killed thousands of civilians before and during the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salvadoran_Civil_War" title="Salvadoran Civil War">Salvadoran Civil War</a>. To political prisoners, he was known as "Blowtorch Bob", due to his frequent use of a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blowtorch" title="Blowtorch" class="mw-redirect">blowtorch</a> in interrogation sessions.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_note-foster-0">[1]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_note-nohero-1">[2]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_note-armshaw-2">[3]</a>

<h2>Contents</h2>

</div>

<ul>

<li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-1"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#Early_life">1 Early life</a></li>

<li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-2"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#Death_squads">2 Death squads</a></li>

<li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-3"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#1982_legislative_election">3 1982 legislative election</a></li>

<li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-4"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#Presidential_campaign">4 Presidential campaign</a></li>

<li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-5"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#Reception_in_the_United_States">5 Reception in the United States</a></li>

<li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-6"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#His_death">6 His death</a></li>

<li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-7"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#Commission_reports">7 Commission reports</a></li>

<li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-8"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#Death_of_son">8 Death of son</a></li>

<li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-9"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#References">9 References</a></li>

<li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-10"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#External_links">10 External links</a></li>

</ul>

</td></tr></tbody></table>

<h2>Early life</h2>

D'Aubuisson was born in <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Tecla,El_Salvador" title="Santa Tecla, El Salvador">Santa Tecla</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Libertad_Department,El_Salvador" title="La Libertad Department, El Salvador" class="mw-redirect">La Libertad Department</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Salvador" title="El Salvador">El Salvador</a>, graduating from the national military academy in 1963. He was trained in communications at the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Hemisphere_Institute_for_Security_Cooperation" title="Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation">School of the Americas</a> in 1972, subsequently joining Salvadoran <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_espionage" title="Military espionage" class="mw-redirect">military intelligence</a>.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_note-partridge-3">[4]</a>

<h2>Death squads</h2>

From 1978 to 1992, before and during the civil war, he commanded what are widely considered to be death squads.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_note-nohero-1">[2]</a> Among his victims was <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Salvador" title="San Salvador">San Salvador</a> <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archbishop" title="Archbishop">Archbishop</a> <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%93scar_Romero" title="Óscar Romero">Óscar Romero</a>, a prominent <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Catholic_Church" title="Roman Catholic Church" class="mw-redirect">Catholic</a> clergyman and campaigner for human rights. On 7 May 1980, six weeks after Romero's assassination, D'Aubuisson and a group of civilians and soldiers were arrested on a farm; the raiders found weapons and documents identifying D'Aubuisson and the civilians as death squad organizers and financiers, and of planning a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coup_d%27%C3%A9tat" title="Coup d'état">coup d'état</a> to depose the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revolutionary_Government_Junta_of_El_Salvador" title="Revolutionary Government Junta of El Salvador">Revolutionary Government Junta</a> (1979–1982) (JRG) governing El Salvador. Their arrest provoked <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-wing_terrorist" title="Right-wing terrorist" class="mw-redirect">right-wing terrorist</a> threats and institutional pressures, leading to D'Aubuisson's return from <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guatemala" title="Guatemala">Guatemalan</a> exile. Thereafter, on right-wing television, he regularly denounced the JRG and specific enemies; these enemies in turn were often assassinated soon after the broadcasts.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_note-nordland-4">[5]</a>

His opposition to the JRG gave him international infamy; in August 1981, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Washington_Post" title="The Washington Post">The Washington Post</a> reported that D'Aubuisson "openly talked of the need to kill 200,000 to 300,000 people to restore peace to El Salvador". Shortly afterwards, on 30 September, he founded ARENA (National Republican Alliance), a right-wing political party. D'Aubuisson accumulated much political capital via his anti-<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leftist" title="Leftist" class="mw-redirect">leftist</a> and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counter-insurgency" title="Counter-insurgency">counter-insurgency</a> fighter reputation, often using this capital to claim that the JRG was a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marxism" title="Marxism">Marxist</a> threat to El Salvador.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_note-jenkins-5">[6]</a>

<h2>1982 legislative election</h2>

Despite alleged electoral fraud and political violence, the 28 March 1982 Salvadoran legislative election of a Constituent Assembly was an ARENA victory, gaining them 19 of 60 seats, and their allies 17 seats. D'Aubuisson's people were thus the majority, who then elected <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%81lvaro_Maga%C3%B1a" title="Álvaro Magaña">Álvaro Magaña</a> as interim-president of El Salvador. D'Aubuisson became President of the Constituent Assembly. The JRG's government elapsed in May.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_note-bbctimeline-6">[7]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_note-sshl81-7">[8]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_note-herman-8">[9]</a>

<h2>Presidential campaign</h2>

On 25 March 1984, D'Aubuisson campaigned for the Salvadoran presidency. On 2 May 1984, he lost the presidency to <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jos%C3%A9_Napole%C3%B3n_Duarte" title="José Napoleón Duarte">José Napoleón Duarte</a> of the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Democratic_Party_%28El_Salvador%29" title="Christian Democratic Party (El Salvador)" class="mw-redirect">Christian Democratic Party</a>, receiving 46.4 per cent to Duarte's 53.6 percent of the electorate. D'Aubuisson claimed fraud and U.S. interference on behalf of Duarte.

<h2>Reception in the United States</h2>

On 5 December 1984, at a closed-door dinner for 120 people at the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitol_Hill_Club" title="Capitol Hill Club">Capitol Hill Club</a> in <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington,_D.C." title="Washington, D.C.">Washington, D.C.</a>, US conservative <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lobbyist" title="Lobbyist" class="mw-redirect">lobbyists</a> awarded D'Aubuisson a plaque honoring his "continuing efforts for freedom in the face of Communist aggression, which is an inspiration to freedom-loving people everywhere". Former US ambassador <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faith_Ryan_Whittlesey" title="Faith Ryan Whittlesey" class="mw-redirect">Faith Ryan Whittlesey</a>, then an assistant to <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_President" title="US President" class="mw-redirect">US President</a> <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Reagan" title="Ronald Reagan">Ronald Reagan</a>, took part in the presentation but reportedly did not attend the dinner.[<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_needed" title="Wikipedia:Citation needed">citation needed</a>]

On 31 March 1985, ARENA lost its governing majority in the Salvadoran legislative election. D'Aubuisson resigned as ARENA's leader, and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfredo_Cristiani" title="Alfredo Cristiani">Alfredo Cristiani</a> became party leader. In May 1988, ARENA's presidential candidate was Cristiani, not D'Aubuisson; Cristiani was elected.

<h2>His death</h2>

In 1992, D'Aubuisson died at 47 of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esophageal_cancer" title="Esophageal cancer">esophageal cancer</a>. He was never tried for any of his crimes. In 1986, ex-US ambassador <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_White_%28ambassador%29" title="Robert White (ambassador)">Robert White</a> reported to the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Congress" title="United States Congress">United States Congress</a> that "there was sufficient evidence" to convict D'Aubuisson of planning and ordering Archbishop Romero's assassination, describing D'Aubuisson as a pathological killer, as early as his 1984 Salvadoran presidential run.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_note-nordland-4">[5]</a>

<h2>Commission reports</h2>

After the Salvadoran Civil War, the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Commission_on_the_Truth_for_El_Salvador" title="United Nations Commission on the Truth for El Salvador" class="mw-redirect">United Nations Commission on the Truth for El Salvador</a> and the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inter-American_Commission_on_Human_Rights" title="Inter-American Commission on Human Rights">Inter-American Commission on Human Rights</a> confirmed that D'Aubuisson "gave the order to assassinate the Archbishop" to military officers who also tried to kill Judge <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Atilio_Ram%C3%ADrez_Amaya&action=edit&redlink=1" class="new" title="Atilio Ramírez Amaya (page does not exist)">Atilio Ramírez Amaya</a> "to deter investigation of the case". <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_note-foster-0">[1]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_note-un-ivD1-9">[10]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_note-cidh-merits-10">[11]</a> Views of him amongst contemporary Salvadorans are mixed and often drawn across party lines; ARENA supporters revere him for his right-wing beliefs and steadfast opposition to Communism, while <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farabundo_Mart%C3%AD_National_Liberation_Front" title="Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front">FMLN</a> supporters vilify him for his alleged human rights atrocities and involvement in Archbishop Romero's assassination. On 20 January 2007, President <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonio_Saca" title="Antonio Saca">Antonio Saca</a> of the ARENA party celebrated the anniversary of D'Aubuisson's death, promising "to continue the ARENA party, based upon his ideologic legacy." Amid oppositional debate, ARENA tried to name D'Aubuisson a "meritorious son of El Salvador", a national honor, but failed against protesting Church leaders and human rights workers.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_note-lacey-11">[12]</a>

In April 2010, Alvaro Saravia, an ex-Captain who has admitted involvement in Romero's assassination, testified in an interview with the Salvadoran newspaper El Faro that D'Aubuisson had given the order to proceed with the killing of the Archbishop.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_note-12">[13]</a>

<h2>Death of son</h2>

In February 2007, D'Aubuisson's son Eduardo, along with two ARENA politicians and their driver, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/February_2007_Salvadoran_congressmen_killings" title="February 2007 Salvadoran congressmen killings">were killed in Guatemala</a>. Investigating authorities believe they were connected to <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colombia" title="Colombia">Colombian</a> and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexico" title="Mexico">Mexican</a> drug cartels.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_note-lacey-11">[12]</a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_note-rosenberg-13">[14]</a>

<h2>References</h2>

<li id="cite_note-foster-0">^ <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_ref-foster_0-0">a</a> <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_ref-foster_0-1">b</a> Shawn Foster. "Window to honor slain church workers: window will stand in memory of assassinations," The Salt Lake Tribune (UT), 22 April 1995, Religion section, D1.</li>

<li id="cite_note-nohero-1">^ <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_ref-nohero_1-0">a</a> <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_ref-nohero_1-1">b</a> Editorial. "No hero for El Salvador ...," The Salt Lake Tribune (UT), 24 February 1992, A10.</li>

<li id="cite_note-armshaw-2"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_ref-armshaw_2-0">^{</a></span}> Marianne Armshaw. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1141/is_1_37/ai_66893463">"Trial of Salvadoran generals opens in Florida,"</a> National Catholic Reporter, 20 October 2000. Retrieved 20 August 2008.</li>

<li id="cite_note-partridge-3"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_ref-partridge_3-0">^{</a></span}> Wayne Partridge. "The School of the Americas: leadership or terrorist training?: jailed Ky. nun to be among protesters at annual rally Sunday", Lexington Herald-Leader (KY), 20 November 1999, 1A: "But the school can hardly be blamed for the misdeeds of its graduates, supporters say. D'Aubuisson, for example, attended only a six-week radio maintenance and repair course at the school."</li>

<li id="cite_note-nordland-4">^ <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_ref-nordland_4-0">a</a> <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_ref-nordland_4-1">b</a> Rod Nordland. "How 2 rose to vie for El Salvador's presidency," Philadelphia Inquirer, 23 March 1984, A1.</li>

<li id="cite_note-jenkins-5"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_ref-jenkins_5-0">^{</a></span}> Loren Jenkins, "El Salvador," The Washington Post, 16 August 1981, Washington Post Magazine, p. 10.</li>

<li id="cite_note-bbctimeline-6"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_ref-bbctimeline_6-0">^{</a></span}> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/1220818.stm">Timeline: El Salvador: A chronology of key events</a>, BBC News, 15 February 2008. Retrieved 20 August 2008.</li>

<li id="cite_note-sshl81-7"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_ref-sshl81_7-0">^{</a></span}> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://dodgson.ucsd.edu/las/elsal/1981-1983.html">Latin American election statistics: El Salvador elections and events, 1981-83</a>, Social Sciences Humanities Library, University of California at San Diego. Retrieved 20 August 2008.</li>

<li id="cite_note-herman-8"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_ref-herman_8-0">^{</a></span}> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.isreview.org/issues/41/herman.shtml">An interview with Edward S. Herman: "Freedom is not on the march,"</a> International Socialist Review, 41, May-June 2005. Retrieved 20 August 2008.</li>

<li id="cite_note-un-ivD1-9"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_ref-un-ivD1_9-0">^{</a></span}> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.usip.org/library/tc/doc/reports">el_salvador/tc_es_03151993_casesD1_2.html "Chapter IV, Cases and patterns of violence: Part D., Death squad assassinations: Section 1, Illustrative case: Oscar Romero,"</a> From madness to hope: the 12-year war in El Salvador, Truth Commissions Digital Collection: Reports: El Salvador. Provided by United States Institute of Peace. Retrieved 20 August 2008.</li>

<li id="cite_note-cidh-merits-10"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_ref-cidh-merits_10-0">^{</a></span}> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.cidh.oas.org/annualrep/99eng/Merits/ElSalvador11.481a.htm">"El Salvador, 11.481a: Irregularities in the investigation,"</a> Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. Retrieved 20 August 2008.</li>

<li id="cite_note-lacey-11">^ <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_ref-lacey_11-0">a</a> <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_ref-lacey_11-1">b</a> Marc Lacey. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/21/world/americas/21salvador.html">"4 Salvadorans killed in way that evokes ’80s conflict,"</a> The New York Times, 21 February 2007. Retrieved 20 August 2008.</li>

<li id="cite_note-12"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_ref-12">^{</a></span}> Anne-Marie O'Connor. "Participant in 1980 assassination of Romero in El Salvador provides new details" Washington Post, 6 April 2010. <a rel="nofollow" class="external autonumber" href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/05/AR2010040503234.html?wpisrc=nl_cuzhead">[1]</a></li>

<li id="cite_note-rosenberg-13"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson#cite_ref-rosenberg_13-0">^{</a></span}> Rosenberg, Mica. <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1595944,00.html">"A murder spree in Central America,"</a> Time, 5 March 2007.</li>

</ol>

</div>

<h2>External links</h2>

<ul>

<li><a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.derechos.org/nizkor/salvador/informes/truth.html">"Report of the UN Truth Commission on El Salvador"</a> (1993)</li>

<li><a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://jcgi.pathfinder.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,921635,00.html">Democracy Among the Ruins: Citizens struggle with a turbulent campaign</a> (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mario_Vargas_Llosa" title="Mario Vargas Llosa">Mario Vargas Llosa</a>'s report on the 1984 presidential campaign), TIME, 26 March 1984 (retrieved 6 November 2006).</li>

<li><a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9D0CE1DE1F3CF931A15754C0A967958260&sec=health&pagewanted=all">Salvadoran Far-Right Leader Ill With Cancer</a>, by Shirley Christian, The New York Times, 22 July 1991 (retrieved 6 November 2006).</li>

<li><a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/1891145.stm">"US role in Salvador's brutal war"</a>, BBC World Service, 24 March 2002.</li>

</ul>

<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson</a>

==

But Pratt and the GOA were involved in more than just state politics. In the early 1980s, Pratt and the Gun Owners of America were <a href="http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=Rs1jAAAAIBAJ&sjid=cAENAAAAIBAJ&pg=2888,3186554&dq=gun-owners-of-america+larry-pratt&hl=en%20outspoken%20supporters" title="reference on outspoken supporters" target="_blank">outspoken supporters</a> of the white rulers in South Africa during apartheid, calling a press conference in 1984 to present "evidence" that allegedly tied Bishop Desmond Tutu to an effort to violently overthrow the white minority regime in the country. "Bishop Tutu's idea of Christianity, rather than one of bringing reconciliation of the divisions within South Africa is one that would welcome the extension of the atheist slave state from Russia to his own country," Pratt said. Bishop Tutu was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize that same year.

At the time, Pratt was on the ALEC board.

Also in 1984, while he sat on the ALEC board, Pratt and GOA <a href="http://www.prwatch.org/files/d%27aubussion.doc" title="reference on presented a plaque" target="_blank">presented a plaque</a> to notorious El Salvador death squad leader Robert D'Aubuisson in 1984 for his "continuing efforts for freedom in the face of communist aggression which is an inspiration to freedom-loving people everywhere." D'Aubuisson, known as "Blowtorch Bob" for his use of a blowtorch to torture political opponents, also was involved in the assassination of Archbishop Oscar Romero.

In 1990 Pratt wrote a book titled "Armed People Victorious" based on his study of death squads in Guatemala and the Philippines, and advocated for similar "citizen defense patrols" in the United States. The idea reportedly caught on in 1992, when Pratt <a href="http://www.rickross.com/reference/militia/militia7.html" title="reference on addressed" target="_blank">addressed</a> a three-day meeting of neo-Nazis and Christian Adherents organized by white supremacist Pete Peters. He shared the stage with a former Ku Klux Klan leader and an Aryan Nation official.

The Washington Post

December 5, 1984, Wednesday, Final Edition

SECTION: First Section; World News; A25

LENGTH: 835 words

HEADLINE: D'Aubuisson Honored by Conservatives at Capitol Hill Dinner

BYLINE: By Joanne Omang, Washington Post Staff Writer

BODY:

More than a dozen conservative organizations last night honored Roberto D'Aubuisson, the leader of El Salvador's extreme right wing, with a plaque and a closed-door dinner for 120 people at the Capitol Hill Club.

The plaque expresses appreciation for D'Aubuisson's "continuing efforts for freedom in the face of communist aggression which is an inspiration to freedom-loving people everywhere."

D'Aubuisson also has scheduled a speech tonight at Georgetown University, and some students are organizing a protest.

A former Salvadoran army major who was cashiered for plotting coups, D'Aubuisson has been linked to death-squad murders in El Salvador by former U.S. ambassador Robert E. White and congressional testimony. But D'Aubuisson and the conservatives insist that the charges are false and spread by Marxists opposed to his democratic, free-enterprise views and to the conservative ARENA party whose unsuccessful presidential candidate he was.

Richard Mathias, a Georgetown student and official of the Young Americans for Freedom, said the YAF had arranged D'Aubuisson's campus appearance because D'Aubuisson "hasn't had a fair shake" in the U.S. media.

"Death squads have a very negative connotation. He's not been able to get across his message of free enterprise, anticommunism, freedom of exports and imports," Mathias said. "We can't think coherently about El Salvador if we think of the primary antithesis to the government as being a death-squad leader."

<h2><a id="titleHref" href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/09/25/389727/-80s-Flashback-Right-wing-wined-and-dined-Nazi-apologist">80s Flashback: Right-wing wined and dined Nazi apologist</a></h2>

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</div>

Before I start this diary, I'd like to thank the makers of Lexis-Nexis for making examples of right-wing hypocracy and double-standards much easier to find.

I wonder what all the wingnuts <a href="http://www.nysun.com/article/63232">threatening Columbia University with funding cuts</a> would have to say about this.

<a href="http://www.newslinx.org/articles/12-5-1984DAubuisson.htm">Washington Post, 5 December 1984:</a>

More than a dozen conservative organizations last night honored Roberto D'Aubuisson, the leader of El Salvador's extreme right wing, with a plaque and a closed-door dinner for 120 people at the Capitol Hill Club.

The plaque expresses appreciation for D'Aubuisson's "continuing efforts for freedom in the face of communist aggression which is an inspiration to freedom-loving people everywhere."

</blockquote>

<a href="http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/CIA%20Hits/ElSalvador_CIAHits.html">The CIAs Greatest Hits by Mark Zepezauer:</a>

A big admirer of Adolf Hitler, D'Aubuisson once said, "You Germans were very intelligent. You realized that the Jews were responsible for the spread of Communism and you began to kill them."

</blockquote>

</div>

More from the WaPo article:

A former Salvadoran army major who was cashiered for plotting coups, D'Aubuisson has been linked to death-squad murders in El Salvador by former U.S. ambassador Robert E. White and congressional testimony. But D'Aubuisson and the conservatives insist that the charges are false and spread by Marxists opposed to his democratic, free-enterprise views and to the conservative ARENA party whose unsuccessful presidential candidate he was.

Richard Mathias, a Georgetown student and official of the Young Americans for Freedom, said the YAF had arranged D'Aubuisson's campus appearance because D'Aubuisson "hasn't had a fair shake" in the U.S. media.

"Death squads have a very negative connotation. He's not been able to get across his message of free enterprise, anticommunism, freedom of exports and imports," Mathias said. "We can't think coherently about El Salvador if we think of the primary antithesis to the government as being a death-squad leader."

[...]

Groups that joined in presenting the plaque to D'Aubuisson included the Viguerie Co., Gun Owners of America, the Western Goals Endowment Fund, the Washington Legal Foundation [Mark Levin?], the United States Defense Committee, the American Foreign Policy Council, the Public Service Research Council, the Moral Majority, The Washington Times, the National Right-to-Work Committee, the National Pro-Life Political Action Committee, Intercessors for America, the Young Americans Foundation and the Young Americans for Freedom. Presidential assistant and former U.S. ambassador Faith Ryan Whittlesey also joined in the presentation, but reportedly did not attend the dinner.

Other hosts for the dinner included the Free Congress Foundation, the Conservative Caucus and the Conservative Alliance, according to Lynn Stoner of the National Council for Better Education, who helped organize the event.

</blockquote>

More info about Mr. D'Aubuisson and his activities can be found <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roberto_D%27Aubuisson">here</a>.

What's that thing they say about <a href="http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&um=1&ie=UTF-8&tab=wn&q=source%3Awashington_times+ahmadinejad">glass houses</a>?

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...<a href="http://www.prwatch.org/news/2012/04/11394/not-just-nra-former-alec-leader-head-gun-owners-america-sides-shooter-trayvon-mar">http://www.prwatch.org/news/2012/04/11394/not-just-nra-former-alec-leader-head-gun-owners-america-sides-shooter-trayvon-mar</a>