MAHONING VALLEY Residents protest Ga. academy

Three local residents say they'll continue to attend protests until the academy is closed.
By IAN HILL
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
CANFIELD -- Juanita Sherba stood under an umbrella with her son, protected from the cold rains of Georgia in November. Nearby, people carrying white crosses solemnly marched toward the tan stone sign that said "Welcome to Fort Benning. U.S. Army."
The crosses bore the names of those believed to be victims of violence taught at the School of the Americas, an academy based at Fort Benning that trained Latin Americans in combat techniques. During the Cold War, the U.S. government tried to use the SOA as a tool to fight communism in Central and South America.
Some SOA alumni have been implicated in violent crimes, including the murder of six Jesuit priests in 1989 and the rape and murder of four missionaries in 1980. All of those murders occurred in El Salvador.
Two of the missionaries, including a nun, were from Cleveland.
Sherba had come from her Canfield home to protest the SOA; her son had come from his home in Montana. Sherba's son hadn't planned to do more than play music at the protest.
As the protesters neared the gate to Fort Benning, Sherba stepped away from the umbrella. Her son walked with her.
"And he said, "I'm coming with you, Mom," Sherba said.
Arrested
Both Sherba and her son walked into the base and were arrested on trespassing charges. They were later banned from stepping foot on a U.S. military base or major American monuments, such as the Statue of Liberty.
Sherba said military chaplains also spoke with those arrested and said they were wrong to protest.
"It was a little bizarre," she said.
That was three years ago.
Since then, Sherba and other local residents have traveled to Fort Benning in November each year to join the protest against the SOA, which has been renamed the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation. Human-rights classes also have been added to the academy's curriculum.
This year's protest took place Nov. 15-17.
About 10,000 people participated; 96 were arrested. None of those arrested were Mahoning Valley residents who had come to the protest with Sherba.
Canfield resident Sandy Marin said she felt rewarded by attending.
"It's good to do something to feel like you're working for a peaceful world," she said.
Regina Reynolds, a Struthers resident and school nurse in Canfield, who also participated, said she believes she has a responsibility as an American to speak out against the SOA.
"Anything that you don't speak up against, you give tacit consent for," said Reynolds. "I consider myself more of an American, not less."
Learned of protests
Reynolds was cited for entering the base four years ago and banned from entering U.S. military bases. She said she learned about the protests in the early 1990s when she attended a presentation at Youngstown State University by the Rev. Roy Bourgeois, the founder of SOA Watch.
SOA Watch works toward closing the SOA and changing U.S. foreign policy in Latin America. It also helps organize the annual protests at Fort Benning.
Reynolds discussed the protests with members of the social justice committee at St. Michael Church in Canfield. The committee helped set up a local trip to the protest five years ago.
The InterReligious Task Force on Central America's Cleveland office also has helped organize local trips to the protests.
Reynolds, Marin and Sherba each paid for their trips to Georgia. They were trained in nonviolent civil disobedience before the protest and were told about the consequences of being arrested.
This year's protest began with speeches by relatives of those believed to be victims of SOA alumni.
"They call them 'the disappeared' because they don't know and they'll never know [what happened]," Sherba said of the speakers.
What speakers said
Some of the speakers also said they had witnessed violence linked to the SOA. The speeches were given on a stage next to Fort Benning.
Police with metal detectors searched protesters as they came near the stage.
The next day, protesters held what Sherba described as a "very solemn funeral march" to place crosses in the black chain-link fence outside Fort Benning. Some protesters climbed, crawled under, and walked around the fence and were arrested.
After the four-hour march, protesters held a "puppet show" using three 14-foot tall puppets.
The first puppet was blue and represented the mothers of victims of violence by SOA alumni in Argentina. The next puppet was red and represented those who had resisted SOA alumni.
Reynolds, Marin and Sherba walked with the third puppet, which was yellow and had a head that looked like the sun. They wore yellow hats and carried a yellow sign that read, "Imagine, a better world is possible."
"Ours was the hope of the future," Sherba said.
The three women said they will continue to attend the protests until the academy is closed. They encouraged local residents to contact the IRTF if they are interested in attending next year's protests.
hill@vindy.com