THE GOOD WILL GAMES
Kutz, Jack
The GOOD WILL games BY JACK KUTZ In Guatemala, the U.S. Navy is distributing toys and food to orphanages, and U.S. Army doctors are treating Indians. In Panama, U.S. military personnel provide...
...sailors paint schools...
...The programs are a vital part of our training and exercises...
...The activities of the Medretes "undermine the fragile progress made by Hondurans by encouraging the myth that the best medical care comes from high technology and North America," says Gloyd...
...military presence in Central America...
...Clowns provide entertainment, barbers cut hair, doctors give vaccinations, and dentists pull teeth...
...The strategy is to avoid the deployment of U.S...
...We treat them for parasites, but we can only treat them once and then they go back to eating the same stuff...
...security...
...In Costa Rica, U.S...
...medical teams provide pharmaceutical and veterinary services to rural villages around the U.S...
...intervention in the Third World...
...Children are a primary target of such programs, which distribute toys, soccer balls, and clothing...
...In the obtuse lexicon of the Pentagon, U.S...
...Salvadoran planes drop propaganda leaflets on a targeted area, and the commanding officer gives a speech about the evils of communism and the virtues of the current regime...
...military operates the civil-action programs, while in El Salvador, U.S...
...Jack Kutz is an associate of the Inter-Hemispheric Education Resource Center in Albuquerque, New Mexico...
...medical squads are called Medretes (Medical Readiness Training Exercise Units...
...Our programs are for advancing U.S...
...Civic-action programs, he writes in the military magazine Proceedings, allow the United States "to maintain a low-cost, active military presence in the region while ostensibly carrying out a humanitarian, nonmilitary mission...
...Military medicine is the least controversial, most cost-effective means of employing military forces in support of U.S...
...Army will be involved in for the remainder of this century," states the Army's 1985 Operational Concept for Low Intensity Conflict...
...What's worse, the medical treatments may be doing more harm than good...
...The Medretes teams, the doctors found, had no knowledge of the best treatment for infant diarrhea—one of the most common health problems in Honduras...
...military personnel provide funding and guidance to the Salvadoran armed forces, which carry out their own programs...
...But Medretes personnel concede that typically they dispense aspirin and pull teeth...
...It's mostly public relations," says Captain Carol Corn, supervisor of the Medretes at Palmerola...
...The medical programs also serve as cover for the U.S...
...Captain John Athanson, author of "Aiding Our Neighbors," puts it more bluntly...
...We really can't do much...
...It is hoped that health care gives the local population hope for the future, a stake in their government, and immunization against becoming revolutionaries," says Colonel Joan Zatchuk, medical-unit commander at Palmerola...
...There is no humanitarian thrust," says Captain Brian Mahoney, chief of civic action at Palmerola Air Base outside Comayagua...
...Such programs are a sophisticated aspect of the doctrine of "low-intensity conflict," increasingly popular with the Pentagon as a blueprint for U.S...
...As an officer at Palmerola Air Base puts it, the United States wants "to win the hearts and minds" of young people to "preempt support from some future guerrillas...
...Food, toys, medicine, and clothing are handed out to villagers gathered in the plaza...
...Instead of treating these cases with oral rehydration (a simple technique recommended by the World Health Organisation and the Honduran Ministry of Health), the Medretes personnel distributed Kao-pectate, which Gloyd and Epstein say has little effect on the disease and can be harmful in many cases...
...The Medretes teams also dispensed an antiparasitic drug popular in North America but useless against hookworm, the primary parasite affecting Honduran children...
...base at Comayagua, treat prostitutes servicing the base, and distribute C-rations to the civilian population...
...In Costa Rica, Honduras, and Panama, the U.S...
...The Salvadoran military also shows an anticommunist film from the United States...
...We just want people to have a higher opinion of us...
...When the Salvadoran army conducts one of these programs, it goes to great lengths to impress the populace...
...The Medretes team in Honduras boasts that its program is "our biggest card, showing them our best face...
...security...
...Military Group in El Salvador...
...0 there is no humanitarian thrust...
...But the Pentagon sees it differently...
...Low-intensity conflict represents the most likely form of conflict the U.S...
...Southern Command's office of political-military affairs...
...We're not doing this out of the goodness of our hearts, although that's part of it," says Lieutenant Colonel Linda Wright of the U.S...
...military personnel provide dental and medical assistance— along with coloring books—to mountain villagers...
...Pentagon strategists stress the importance of dispensing medicine to civilian populations...
...troops and rely instead on clandestine operations, coun-terinsurgency campaigns, and civic-action programs...
...Our programs are for advancing U.S...
...The Medretes were "insensitive to the particular needs of Hondurans," physicians Steven Gloyd and Paul Epstein note...
...Most of the treatment they gave out was inappropriate, and the good they did was probably offset by the side effects...
...offers in its foreign policy must occur," says Captain Craig L. Smith, "to meet the challenges in a world where low-intensity conflict is increasing at a higher rate than traditional military threats...
...national interest in low-intensity-conflict situations," writes William P. Winkler, commander of the Academy of Health Sciences in a recent report...
...A fundamental change in the components of the security assistance the U.S...
...And in Honduras, U.S...
...We just want people to have a higher opinion of us...
...Civic action shows the people that the army doesn't just go in and rape," says Colonel David Steele, head of the U.S...
Vol. 50 • September 1986 • No. 9
