El Salvador war: postscripts

[Pol-Mil FSO]

Dr. Fishel:

The Jesuit massacre happened a few months after I left El Salvador but I followed it closely and discussed it with several persons who were involved in the investigation or had related knowledge of the event. As a result, I do not believe that COL Benavides ordered the killings as it would have been out of character. Benavides was known within the Tandona (Academy Class of 1966) as a follower rather than a leader. In addition, he was the Military Academy Director during the FMLN Offensive and was assigned responsibility for an ad hoc security sector that included the Military Academy, ESAF Heaquarters, and UCA; from what I have heard I understand his role to have been more in the deconfliction rather than planning of operations as he had TACON of units only when they were actually moving within his assigned sector.

Despite the assertion of the UN (so-called) Truth Commission Report, I have strong doubts that COL Ponce gave the order - he was too intelligent and not prone to panic. Nevertheless, I think the order did come from a Tandona member as those are the only persons from whom COL Benavides would take orders on such a serious matter - I think the most logical suspects would have been 1st Brigade Commander COL Zepeda or Vice MOD for Security COL Montano.

Re your list of officers - I would add two more officers whom I believe to deserve a great deal of credit for holding ESAF together from 1983 to 1988 - Generals Adolfo Blandon and Eugenio Vides Casanova, the Chief of Staff and Defense Minister, respectively. Vides Casanova played an unheralded but key balancing role in preventing right-wing coups from within the ranks while addressing the concerns of his civilian counterparts and the USG. I also believe that it was a great shame and stain on our honor that nobody in the USG did anything to support Vides Casanova when he was the target of civil suits from human rights groups in the 1990s.