"Well, I’ll be dipped in snuff, I said. I slapped my forehead in amazement. The cause of my wonder was a Washington Post … report that the U.S. Department of Defense admitted training Latin American military leaders in the arts of torture, execution, blackmail and other forms of coercion. … Let me be more precise: The source of my amazement was not learning that my government has used my tax money to train Latin American thugs in torture, execution and blackmail. … What astonished me is that it was in the news. In the New York Times. On "Dateline". The subject of indignant editorials. … If you want a shining example of what’s wrong with American media, try this tale on for size. The open sewer called the School of the Americas at Fort Benning, Georgia, has been known to anyone who cared to find out about it for years. And years and years. … And your news media are shocked, shocked, to learn all this." — Molly Ivins, 10/6/96

"Americans can now read for themselves some of the noxious lessons the United States Army taught to thousands of Latin American military and police officers at the School of the Americas. … A training manual recently released by the Pentagon recommended interrogation techniques like torture, execution, blackmail and arresting the relatives of those being questioned. …The newly released manual recalls a training manual that the Central Intelligence Agency distributed to the Nicaraguan contras … that recommended kidnappings, assassinations, blackmail and the hiring of professional criminals. The Reagan Administration quickly disowned the booklet when its contents were disclosed. Yet the School of the Americas continued to advocate similar methods for another decade. An institution so clearly out of tune with American values [sic] and so stubbornly immune to reform should be shut down without further delay." — New York Times, 9/28/96

"[I]t is hard to think of a coup or human rights outrage that has occurred in [Latin America] in the past 40 years in which alumni of the School of the Americas were not involved." – Los Angeles Times, 4/3/95

"Murder, extortion, torture—those are some of the lessons the US Army taught Latin American officers at the notorious School of the Americas in Columbus, GA. Recent revelations that the Pentagon trained police and military leaders in committing blatant atrocities describe a program that is beyond redemption." — Boston Globe, 10/1/96

"Supporters claim the SOA played a role in bringing democracy to Latin America over the past decade. Hogwash. The evidence suggests a much greater role for the SOA in the decades of military decade that preceded democratization." — Syracuse Post-Standard, 5/2/94