Talk:Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation

message: The following was deleted from the page "Critics argue that the school trains attendees in practices such as genocide, massacres of civilians, and egregious human rights violations, "Who are these critics and what is their first hand information concerning what is being taught at the shool?  According to WHINSEC the school has never in its history taught any type of terrorigation techinques of any kind. To put this information in as fact simply because some organization makes an accusation is not proof. One of the main purposes of the creation of WHINSEC was to have a school which from its very beginnings was adament about properly reviewing any materials that were used by the school and removing any training that would raise questions of human rights abuse. (Just for everyone's information: One of the biggest drums being beat to attack the former School of the Americas is the "torture manuals". The SOA "torture manuals" often talked about were never used as instruction materials but were additional reading materials provided by a fromer instructor from another school. The school included them in their additional reading materials without reviewing them assuming they didn't not contain innapropriate materials. When it was brought to their attention that they did they recovered and destroyed them. That was an action taken by the school after the school realized the mistake.) I know these things because I traveled to the school for eight years and personally investigated most of the accusations.) If this defaming materials is to be returned to the page it should requre that somewhere there is found one person who will testify that they were taught any kind of interrorigation techniques at WHINSEC. If not what may or may not have been taughts at SOA has nothing to do with what is presently being taught at WHINSEC. This is an article about WHINSEC and not SOA. -- (talk) 03:40, 17 December 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Critics

message: This page is currently SERIOUSLY BIASED towards the school. There is almost no mention of the countless massacres and killings that the school's graduates have committed.  There is no mention of the anti-union activity that the students are trained in. And, most of all, there is no mention of teh annual march against the school in which thousands participate every year, and in which dozens commit acts of civil disobedience in protest of the school. I have tagged this articl for disputed neutrality, and it would be great if someone researched the topic a little bit more and changed the article so it represented the reality of the school instead of the official government opinion.
If no one else changes it, I'll have to. And soon.TrogdorPolitiks 20:11, 13 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: [Countless? How many do you consider countless. I have never heard of more than a small handful of accusations for which there was no direct correlation between what they did and what they learned at the school. With over 75000 students having attended the two schools, all military, police, or civil authority to have only a small handful being accused of misconduct is actually quite remarkable in that by pure chance the number would not be greater. I might even assume that is because the school and its training actually prevented such things from occuring. 72.69.90.213 (talk) 19:01, 29 November 2010 (UTC)

text: I fixed some stuff. Still needs a rewrite, not incredibly clear WHY there is so much dispute over the institution, but the facts are there.TrogdorPolitiks 20:51, 18 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Let's remain objective. While I agree the article is flawed, what I see above my post here is as slanted as the article it's complaining about.  If the facts are there, as you say, cite some references.  I challenge you to present them without rhetorical devices like ALL CAPS; without inflammatory exaggerations like "countless massacres"; and without non-sequiturs:  the fact that there are annual marches, in which people commit civil disobedience, does not demonstrate wrongdoing on the part of WHISC; it demonstrates that there are annual marches, in which people commit civil disobedience.  The fact that numerous murders and some massacres (while clearly horrific and tragic) have occurred, does not prove that WHISC ordered them, nor that the WHISC trained the killers to commit them, any more than the fact that Ted Kaczynski's attendance at Harvard (or the attendance of any number of future white-collar criminals, lawyers, and CEOs) casts ill repute on that institution. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Ancientgeekphilosopher (talk • contribs) 9 August 2006.
I would say it is POV in this manner: Most people who know about the School of the Americas/Western Hemispher INstitute for SEcurity Cooperation know about it because of the attrocities committed by graduates and the high number of future dictators it graduated and not what the institution says of itself. There is no reason to give the institution's POV of itself at 50% of all content. This type of thinking gives government a de facto veto on all such content. And that's just speaking of a US centric POV. Move beyond the US and the SOA/WHINSEC's POV of itself would be a much, much smaller minority.  Unless of course US POV are the only views that matter.  I don't think that is what wikipedia is about. LobotRobot 21 December 2006
The writing style of this article is a complete embarrassment. It is so thoroughly biased toward the school as to approach complete self-satire. EVERY point in the criticism section is followed by pro-SOA/WHINSEC replies. This is not seen in reverse in the other sections. A total rewrite of this article is needed, although it appears that the school and-or its supporters will not allow it based on a careful review of the changes. Mac.bh (talk) 06:51, 26 December 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  POV 

message: :In 2000, mounting pressure upon the United States Congress to stop funding the SOA caused the Pentagon to rename the school the Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation, abbreviated as WHISC or WHINSEC.
The source for this is an unsourced blog which is not a WP:RS. It was in fact Congress who changed the organization and name by law, the 2001 Defense Authorization Act, 10 USC, Sec 2166. It may have been the Pentagon who was behind the proposal for the changes that the Congress voted on but this would require a RS. As such I will removed this statement unless there are sourced objections.Ultramarine (talk) 12:14, 21 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:   At present WHINSEC is the best source of human rights protection and training available. How do I know that? Because I served for four years as and advisor and four years as a Board Of Visitors member at which time I helped in its development and implimentation. The real problem with entries on the page is evidently most people who post neither know the actual work of the school, have never been to the school, nor had any contact with its administration, teachers, or even students for that matter. I am constantly bewildered by statements such as "All those graduated who massacured people are never mentioned in connection with the school." Or statments like that. While in its existance the School of the Americas had over 60000 students. WHINSEC has had well over ten thousand students in its existance. I get a little greived when I give out information about WHINSEC and people say "who are you" that we should accept your information at truth. Well I ask the same question as to those who post falsehoods about the school and delete easily verified information which could be obtained by a simple phone call the school administration. What is even more frustrating is that after over 75000 students attended the two schools when a hand full go out and commit human rights violations that it is automatically assumed that they learned how to do it at either SOA or WHINSEC. How does a class on running a supply depot or writing military orders or working in cooperation with anti-drug taskforces across boarders teach torture or human right abuse? The answer is simple it does not. As concerns WHINSEC in their entire history they have never taught interrorigation techniques of any kind. Period. What they have learned at WHINSEC to the requirement of protecting human rights and not using torture or abusive treatment of others. Period. The WHISEC of today, an organization which is sending out trained country of origin graduates back home to teach their entire country the importance of protecting human right and the elemination of torture and such techniques is what should be the lead article on the WHINSEC post. Instead what we see is false propaganda coming from political anarchists such as SOA Watch and other organizations which are parroting false accusations in order to obtain political gain. Rev. / Chaplain (Major USAR, Retired) Kent Svendsen  Advisor Board of Visitors 2000 - 2004  Member Board of Visitors 2004-2008 WHINSEC / Former member Board Of Church and Society United Methodist Church Northern Illinois Conference/  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.69.90.213 (talk) 18:53, 29 November 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pentagon changing the name 

message: Not found on the webpage of WHINSEC, in contrast to the seal, and it does not list from where it was taken, so unless a source is given it will be removed.Ultramarine (talk) 09:46, 29 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Image 

message: Not sure if this belongs under the Controversy section, but the Punk Rock band Anti-Flag has a song called "School of Assassins (SOA)" a clear reference to this topic I think is worth adding somewhere 76.190.164.114 (talk) 05:26, 4 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Trivia 

message: I added some information that were missing, by translating from Italian Wiki. I think that if on that version the information are not considered violation of POV, they arent as well on the English one.
I am still working on it anyway.--Desyman44 (talk) 17:52, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Adds from Italian Wiki 

message: I have a photo of what SOA looks like now (hotel) if that might add to the page?--Abarratt (talk) 17:31, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Why not? in my opinion it's all right, but specify that that is the OLD location, not the current! On italian wiki there's this pic from commons: 70px - is that one or a new one?--Desyman44 (talk) 17:47, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  New Photo 

message: Please edit it, anyone who can speak Japanese :)--124.155.16.92 (talk) 06:36, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  adds on Japanese wiki 

message: I added a picture of Posada Carriles at the time of his education in Fort Benning.
at the time the school was in Panama, but Fort Benning is the actual location of the academy. That's why I chenged in the beginning my own edit from "in the school" to "here", of course referring to Fort Benning.
--Desyman44 (talk) 13:43, 21 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  I don't think Posada Carriles went there. In Joan Didion's book "Miami", she discusses that several Cuban exiles went to military training in the US prior to or concurrent with the formation of the exile action groups Alpha 66 and Omega 7. But it wasn't SOA, and actually (according to Didion) the exiles saw the training as a sort of run-around by JFK to keep them occupied without actually committing to a full-scale invasion (that is, a second attempt of the Bay of Pigs). After becoming disenchanted with JFK's plan to train them, they stopped their training and returned to Miami and apparently it was really touchy for JFK at the time and he pleaded with them to stay or something (he was desperate to keep them convinced that a second invasion attempt was underway, when in fact he didn't want to do that). 173.3.41.6 (talk) 19:26, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
replies: text:  I have removed the picture of Posada. Over 200 Brigade 2506 veterans attended a 1000-hour "Special Officer Training Program" specifically set up for them at the US Army Infantry School in 1963. The documentation was included in Posada's 2011 court files and can be found here: Documents on Posada Carriles' military record on the blog Along the Malecón on Cuban-US issues. No reference anywhere to the SOA. --Hvd69 (talk) 11:40, 1 May 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Posada Carriles 

message: "The School of the Americas has been criticized concerning the human rights violations performed by a number of its graduates"
I deleted WHINSEC from the sentence because the reference given while it does mention SOA it does not mention WHINSEC. Also the facts do not match this statement. Of the WHINSEC students who have been accused of wrong doing the list is not "numberous" but very small. And of the accused wrong doing of the former students most were for criminal acts other than human rights abuses. Finally if you look at the reference given to verify the information that reference while it does mention SOA it does not mention WHINSEC. ChaplainSvendsen (talk) 03:46, 17 December 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the motivations you gave are rather "technicalities" and do not seem so persuading to me: I mean the reason why the list is not "numerous" is because the name WHINSEC is relatively recent and there's no dirty war going on anymore in latin america (so it's a consequence of an exogenous factor = historical background). 2 of the sources do not mention WHINSEC because they are older than 2001 (how could they?) while the one from commondreams.org, which is from 2001, actually mentions WHINSEC. Finally, SOA Watch and other HR organizations are still there, still campaigning for WHINSEC closure, that's a proof enough I suppose. No NGO changed attitude the day after SOA turned into WHINSEC. It is therefore misleading to make the reader believe only SOA was criticized and WHINSEC is not, also because critics to WHINSEC as a mere "renaming" for SOA are reported later in the paragraph, so it would result as incoherent for the reader. I would reinstate the deleted part.--Desyman44 (talk) 00:34, 20 December 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Human Right Violations 

message: I realize that it states that this is not the place to have a discussion about the article. That is not my purpose here. My purpose is to prevent ongoing battles of people adding things only to have them removed. The guidelines state that any materials which are posted need to be "verifiable" and that the writing be "neutral". So here's my contention. If I read the materials and they appear to be attacking rather than "neutral" then that is a reason to remove or change it. Also, who decides what source is a legitimate source. I do not consider SOA Watch a reliable or truthful source. So unless somebody from Wikipedia can give me a good reason otherwise if the source is SOA Watch I can take that material out because SOA Watch is not a legitimate source. My rationalization for that is simple. If Wikipedia articles are supposed to be "neutral" then I'm assuming that the sources should not be organizations who's only goal in life is to attack, defame, and eleminate the subject. i.e. SOA Watch. Surely there are other sources which can be found to verify the materials. 
Next I want to know why the introduction is off limits to editors. The introduction is not neutral and in my educated opinion contains misleading information. I can't edit it, however, because there isn't an option to do that. Also can anyone from Wikipedia explain why WHINSEC should not be allowed to write major portions of this article? If what they write can be proven wrong then of course it should be deleted. What I have a problem with is false and misleading accusations are aimed at the school and written into the article as if they were fact. But on the other hand represenatives from the school arn't allowed to put information about the school and its activities because its not verifiable? So accusations verifiable or not are OK but telling the story about the school is not. How is that fair let alone "neutral". I'm doing this now because I'm planning on posting information about the school and will be very vigilant as to who deletes any of it and challenging it to the editorial board. ChaplainSvendsen (talk) 19:13, 20 December 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Editorial Disputes 

message: The following was added to that section. There were also a few minor changes in phrasing.
With the establishment of WHINSEC a new and different school was created which in the years since its creation has created a number of programs in response to the criticisms aimed at the former School Of The Americas. The most obvious of which is their mandatory human rights training which is mandatory for all students. One new policy was a vetting system who's goal was to prevent anyone already accused of human rights abuses from gaining a seat at the school. Another specific attempt to prevent criticism was the complete omission from the classes of the teaching of any type of interrogation techniques and a careful review of all teaching and reference materials.
This material was included as relevant facts concerning the reasons for SOA being closed and the attempt by the military to establish a new and different school. If there is any complaint about references I would like to know exactly what would be a valid reference. I have this information because I spent eight years investigating the school and all of it was presented during the Board Of Visitor meetings over the years. My references include past board members as well as the public relations section of the school. If this is a problem then I would like to see references concering accusations against former graduates that can show a cause and effect between what classes they attended at the school and the accusations of human rights abuse. Additionally quite often all that has to happen is the announcement that an investigation is being started, regardless of whether it had anything to do with human rights abuses or not, and immediately its presented as proof within this article. If this material is deleted because of complaints of verifiability then I will most certianly go in and delete those other references for the very same reason. ChaplainSvendsen (talk) 16:33, 1 January 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Human Rights Violations 

message: The following was deleted from the article:
"U.S. Army Maj. Joe Blair, a former director of instruction at the school, said, "there are no substantive changes besides the name. [...] They teach the identical courses that I taught, and changed the course names and use the same manuals."
The reason for this deletion is that even though it is an accurate statemnt and even though there is reference documentation the posting is disingenuous and misleading and fails the requirement of being neutral. It leaves one with the assumption that nothing was added to the course work. My suggestion is that if this is to be included it needed to be in another section other than human rights violation. Just how is setting up a supply cage or teaching proper preventative maintenance of a vehicle relevant to the subject of human rights violations? The statement in and of itself is correct, but over all misleading. let's take Vehicle Preventative Maintenanc for instance. It's taught in English all over the US military. Its translated into Spanish and is taught at WHINSEC in exactly the same way it was taught in SOA. And? What's the point? The assumption this posting tends to lead people to is that SOA is the same school teaching the same things in the same way without any changes. And that is blatantly false. So if someone what's to restate is in an accurate and neutral way and post it somewhere other than the Human Rigts Violation section I have not objection of having it returned to the article. ChaplainSvendsen (talk) 14:30, 7 January 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Human Rights Violations 

message: Team,
As a first time reader of this particular page, I have spent several days reading through the old instructions to become familiar with the history of this page's evolutions.  Reading through the comments, I see a wealth of information about WHINSEC and about USARSA-some clearly verifiable (government documents, legislation etc) other information appears to lack credible sources.  It is my intent to contribute my expertise to Wikipedia, including this page but before I do, I would like to get some answers to a few items that stand out immediately to me based on my own research.  I need to get a sense of the purpose of this page from Wikipedia's view and also the view from those who have contributed and continue to contribute.
My first intention is to submit a Lead Section paragraph to replace the current one
 "The Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation (WHISC or WHINSEC), formerly the United States Army School of the Americas (USARSA or SOA; Spanish: Escuela de las Américas) is a United States Department of Defense educational and training facility at Fort Benning near Columbus, Georgia in the United States. Established by the US government for teaching law enforcement and military techniques to US allies in the rest of the Americas, it has been criticized for training Latin American dictators and their militaries in various techniques to quell dissidence in their countries."
  I hope that I am correct in identifying this as the lead section.  Regardless if that is its title, I believe that, based on Wikipedia's policy-present a "neutral point of view" and "verifiable" this paragraph does not represent a neutral point of view and is missing the verifiable information about WHINSEC (taken from 10 USC 2166) which defines the Purpose of the institute.  I think this is what a reader would expect.  Specifically, my intended changes would address the following points:
Why is there a redirect from an old SOA website to WHINSEC?  IAW 10 USC 2166 clearly shows that Congress closed that Army school over a decade ago " (b) REPEAL OF AUTHORITY FOR UNITED STATES ARMY SCHOOL OF THE AMERICAS.-Section 4415 of title 10, United States Code, is repealed."  10 USC 2166 also authorizes the SECDEF to establish a DOD training institute for Western Hemisphere nations (says he "may") "(a) ESTABLISHMENT AND ADMINISTRATION.-(l) The Secretary of Defense may operate an education and training facility for the purpose set forth in subsection (b). The facility shall be known as the 'Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation'.  A reader does not have to analyze this legislation here to understand that it was Congress' intent to close USARSA and establish a new DOD training institute to provide the SECDEF the ability to organize a security cooperation training institute as well as to address the concerns of opponents to USARSA, both civilian, governmental and international.  If someone desires to read about USARSA, why would they be directed to a page dedicated to WHINSEC?  In my opinion, the redirect implies that the WHINSEC page is the new USARSA page but USARSA no longer exists, as verified by the reference I just shared.  Solution: Eliminate the redirect because it confuses readers; start a USARSA page so that readers can find USARSA research all in one place; create a section called "Controversy" on the WHINSEC page where information can be input that discusses other views, opinions etc about WHINSEC.  Being objective-a review of the current WHINSEC page contains only a paragraph or two of facts about WHINSEC itself.  The remainder of the entries are centered on the controversy surrounding USARSA.
It is not the lead section that fails to properly describe what is the content on the page, it is the content on the page which does not match its title and provides little information about WHINSEC.
2) Why is the word " formerly" used in the Lead Section: "The Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation (WHISC or WHINSEC), formerly the United States Army School of the Americas" The verifiable evidence (US Legislation) which I shared above clearly shows that these are two different institutes.  If there is credible evidence that it was Congressional intent to incorporate only a name change for USARSA, then that reference should be cited here, otherwise remove the reference to USARSA.
56CommonSense (talk) 21:43, 28 February 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lead Section 

message: In the interest of accuracy and ensuring that searchers find the information that they are looking for, I have taken out/modified the search categories as shown below for the reasons annotated:
:Category:Terrorism in the United States-Removed-This page does not have information about any terrorist acts and/or terrorism in the United states unless your opinion/view is that this institute conducts/condones terrorism.  Information found on this page should be relevant and verifiable, not subject to opinions.
:Category:Human rights abusesRemoved-removal is debatable if we create a neutral section on this page entitled "Opponents of WHINSEC" (example) and the section discusses who the opponents are and why they are opposed to WHINSEC the category may be relevant.  I offer this as, in reading what is currently on this page, it looks as though the topic of "human rights abuses" is used quite often and I would have to assume that those who posted that information may repost under the new section.
The debate over this topic that appears throughout this talk section has inspired me to do some reading and make a conclusion about it in the spirit of a new point of view which may allow contributors to come to some agreement on what is relevant to be posted on a page entitled WHINSEC.  In analyzing this, I have tried to be as objective and neutral as possible and stick to verifiable facts and information.
The connection between human rights abuses appears to be from students who completed training at USARSA and later committed an act(s) of human rights abuse in their native countries.  It also appears that the connection made by those who posted is best described using the legal term "proximate cause." Proximate cause is defined as "a happening which results in an event, particularly injury due to negligence or an intentional wrongful act." In the case of the human rights abuses noted by contributors on this page, it appears from the postings that, in their view, the proximate cause of the human rights abuses was attendance at USARA.  I say "in their view" as I do not see any documentation that indisputably verifies that attendance to training courses at USARSA is the proximate cause of criminal acts of trainees.
Verbalizing or writing proximate cause statements that an accuser knows are not true can be considered slander or libel (the utterance of false charges or misrepresentations which defame and damage another's reputation; a false and defamatory oral statement or representation published without just cause and tending to expose another to public contempt).
Fortunately our Supreme Court has recognized that there is a constitutional aspect to slander or libel which is freedom of speech.  The Supreme Court has taken the opinion that statements made about a public person or a matter of public concern are not considered slander or libel if the person making the statement does not know whether or not their statement is true (they are protected under the 1st amendment).  Without their ruling, freedom of speech in American might be significanly hindered, no to mention freedom of the press.  This Supreme Court standard is referred to as “actual malice."  
Intervening causes come into play when trying to prove proximate cause.  An intervening cause is defined as "A separate act or omission that breaks the direct connection between the defendant's actions and an injury or loss to another person, and may relieve the defendant of liability for the injury or loss."  In this case the defendant's action would be his/her attendance to USARSA.  It appears as though most of the violations occurred after attending training courses at USARSA.  Considering what intervening causes are possible in this scenario, I have come up with a list including: Coercion by peers, or superiors; obligation to follow orders of superiors; threat of physical harm; provocation; misinformation; traumatic stress syndrom; mental illness; a skewed moral framework or set of values; personal experiences growing up etc.  When developing this list, I tried to think about "what causes people to harm or kill others."  I am certain there are many more possibilities.  My conclusion would be that any of these intervening causes as well as others i am not aware of could have caused these people to commit these acts.  My other conclusion is that we will likely never know exactly why they did it.  In other words "would these people have committed these acts of violence if they had not attended training at USARSA."  Considering the testimony presented on this page about the murders in El Salvador for example, it appears to me that it is very likely that these atrocities would have happened anyway, as the testimony and truth commission findings seem to show that these soldiers were ordered to do so.  The only connection to USARSA that appears there is there attendance to training course(s).
So, what is my point?  Without some verifiable proof of proximate cause in the human rights violations posted on this page, one would have to make an assumption about the proximate cause of the violations.  The assumption could not be neutral but would find USARSA responsible or not responsible.  Therefore, we, as contributors, should be critical of posting information that is not verifiable and requires a non-neutral assumption to be made.  This is not in accordance with Wikipedia policies or the spirit of presenting neutral information for readers.
:Category:Salvadoran Civil WarRemoved, occured before the establishment of WHINSEC; not connected 
:Category:Operation Condor Removed, occured before the establishment of WHINSEC; not connected ca:Escola de les Amèriques
:fr:École militaire des Amériques Removed, this page is about WHINSEC not another institution  
:pt:Escola das Américas Removed, this page is about WHINSEC not another institution  Human rights in latin america
:Category:Human rights training in the Western HemisphereModified-formerly "human rights violations".  New category is more consistent and representative of WHINSEC
56CommonSense (talk) 18:10, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Page Search Criteria 

message: I think its appropriate that we have a section "background" where we can put additional information about WHINSEC that is not part of the lead section but does not fit into the History section.  I will place the text here initially. 56CommonSense (talk) 21:01, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Background 

message: "In 1946, in the early days of the Cold War, the Latin American Training Center – U.S. Ground Forces[5] was established in the Atlantic sector of the Panama Canal Zone, in the US army base of Fort Amador.[6] During 1949 it was expanded and became the U.S. Army Caribbean Training Center, seated into a former hospital building on the grounds of Fort Gulick[7] (now housing the Melia Hotel).[8]
It was once again expanded and renamed the U.S. Army School of the Americas in 1963. It relocated to Fort Benning in 1984, following the signing of the Panama Canal Treaty.[9] More than 61,000 military personnel attended these United States Army schools.[5]
According to WHINSEC's web page, "the School of the Americas taught military education courses as they were taught in U.S. Armed Forces institutions—the School translated the courses, lessons plans and all, into Spanish. Beginning in 1963, and evolving as the region changed, SOA taught, at various times, professional military education and training courses to officers and non-commissioned officers in the areas of:
professional leadership (Command and General Staff course, Military Police courses, Infantry Officers Basic course, Artillery Officers course and a Cadet Orientation course);
infantry weapons (Mortar Officer course);
technical support (Engineer Basic and Officer courses, Radio Operators course, Small Caliber Repair course, Wheeled Vehicle Maintenance course and Medical Assistance courses);
counter-insurgency (Internal Defense and Development course, Military Intelligence course, Military Police course), introduced during 1963; and
specialized leadership and skills (Ranger course, Air Mobile course, Jungle Operations course, Patrolling course, Parachute Rigging course, Basic Airborne course, Pathfinder and Jumpmaster courses)."[5"
Since this section is on the WHINSEC page, we should provide information on the history of WHINSEC.  The institute has been around for a decade, there has to be some good information about it during that time.   The information above doesn't talk about WHINSEC at all and I find myself increasingly frustrated with the lack of WHINSEC information on this page.  I am working on updating the history section to tell the readers something about WHINSEC's history, not USARSA history, which apparently ended in 2000.56CommonSense (talk) 22:18, 3 March 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  History 

message: Was updated to 2012 to add recent announcement by Correa of Ecuador that he would be pulling all troops from WHINSEC citing reasons of human rights violations.  The link used came from SOA Watch, sorry Reverend, but their reporting was the most complete I found on the topic.  My statement was confirmed by actual statement by Correa which SOA Watch provided, albeit in Spanish.  (Not fluent but knowledge of French is enough to get the gist.)  Whether the school taught violations or not, it's indisputable Correa is making the correlation, which is what I wrote. Lulu de St. Etienne (talk) 18:51, 26 August 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Participation 

message: It seems to have escaped notice that the history of WHISC as School of the Americas has been whitewashed out of this article: the lead doesn't even mention the old name! This despite the fact that it is widely agreed that it was little more than a cosmetic change, and that School of the Americas redirects here. This needs to be fixed. Rd232 talk 15:55, 22 October 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Whitewash 

message: My effort to make an addition to Further Readings failed. This Wikipedia topic is incomplete without a link to the following poem: "Memorial for Antonio Maria Barrera" - which is posted upon the Internet at the following url: "http://jacksonday.home.comcast.net/~jacksonday/barerra.htm". United Methodist Church clergyman, Rev. Jack Day, joined others in the annual School of the Americas protest march in November 1998. When he got home he began the creation of a poem. Composed in English, this writer suggested the stanzas be translated into Spanish, and the poem published in both languages. Jack credits two translators for their help. Please go read this remarkable American poem. -- signed Edward Chilton.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.133.62.232 (talk) 14:46, 22 January 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Facing guns with poetry

message: I've read every article posted in the past, and it seems to me that they are
all generally unfounded and bias in support of closing the Institute.  Not
once did I see an official article, newsletter or even mentioned the folks
at that place.  As if this was the platform to carry on with the promotional
material in the benefit of a particular cause - may I say, close the school?
Well, the school is closed. 
I don't deny the fact that IF you want to include history into the page, you
should. But then start from where the Institution was founded BY LAW - 
So, I looked into the official pages and posted what I found. If you would
like to contribute with a piece that states something like: Opposition to
WHINSEC - then by all means.
But let's stick to the facts and not forget intellectual verifiability
Comments as those made in the past in this page by certain individuals are
considered under Wikipedia policy libelous, and must be deleted.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by EDJO97 (talk • contribs) 16:30, 6 May 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Can we stay on Subject 

message: made this edit, twice, and I reverted both times for the following reason: the current text is sourced. The edited text,
:The focus later changed to fighting 'terrorists'".
is not corroborated by the source, which describes only how the terminology used by WHINSEC-trained troops changed, not any actual shift in policy wrt. which groups where targeted, and the edited text does seem to imply such a change. QVVERTYVS (hm?) 11:41, 17 April 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Terrorists 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just added archive links to  on Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add  after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add  to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
*Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20080601201339/http://www.claremont-courier.com:80/pages/Topstory020307.1.html to http://www.claremont-courier.com/pages/Topstory020307.1.html
When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true to let others know.
Cheers.—cyberbot IITalk to my owner:Online 19:57, 27 February 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just added archive links to  on Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation. Please take a moment to review my edit. If necessary, add  after the link to keep me from modifying it. Alternatively, you can add  to keep me off the page altogether. I made the following changes:
*Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20120907141950/http://www.soaw.org/about-us/equipo-sur/212-delegations/3940-ecuador-will-cease-participation-in-school-of-the-americas to http://soaw.org/about-us/equipo-sur/212-delegations/3940-ecuador-will-cease-participation-in-school-of-the-americas
*Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20120913080548/http://uscode.house.gov/download/pls/10C108.txt to http://uscode.house.gov/download/pls/10C108.txt
*Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20130508163548/http://www.southcom.mil/aboutus/Pages/General-John-F--Kelly.aspx to http://www.southcom.mil/aboutus/Pages/General-John-F--Kelly.aspx
*Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20130404035708/http://www.northcom.mil:80/leaders%5Fhtml/ to http://www.northcom.mil/leaders_html/
*Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20080830014629/http://www.laweekly.com/news/news/teaching-torture/1495/ to http://www.laweekly.com/news/news/teaching-torture/1495/
*Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20091003205201/http://www.counterpunch.org:80/hodge11032004.html to http://www.counterpunch.org/hodge11032004.html
*Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20060420081445/http://www.commondreams.org/views03/1118-15.htm to http://www.commondreams.org/views03/1118-15.htm
*Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20060613113136/http://www.lawg.org:80/misc/training_manuals.htm to http://www.lawg.org/misc/training_manuals.htm
*Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20070119150531/http://www.soaw.org/new//newswire_detail.php?id=1076 to http://www.soaw.org/new/newswire_detail.php?id=1076
*Added archive http://web.archive.org/web/20110418083429/http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2903309148620605209 to http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=2903309148620605209#
When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true or failed to let others know (documentation at ).
Cheers.—cyberbot IITalk to my owner:Online 17:37, 22 March 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Hello,
please excuse me if I'm asking a stupid question, but is there a source proving that Saddam Hussein was at the school? During my studies I invested some time in the life of Saddam Hussein and this seems rather unlikely to me. He was a long time guerilla warrior against al-Kazim before the second coup d'Etat of the Baath Party brought him into gouvernement office. I think he was never actually in the military and Iraq wasn't considered an US-Ally at the time, this was rather the British influence zone.Tortososs (talk) 23:20, 12 July 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah, this was vandalism. Removed.TheTimesAreAChanging (talk) 02:02, 14 July 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Saddam Hussein 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified 2 external links on Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
*Corrected formatting/usage for http://www.northcom.mil/leaders_html/
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20120310235019/http://www.gpoaccess.gov/fr/ to http://www.gpoaccess.gov/fr/
*Added  tag to http://www.axisoflogic.com/cgi-bin/exec/view.pl?archive=138&num=20097
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 06:12, 27 July 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Why is there no explanation of where this institute came from or when it began? It's vague.
Makes you want to believe the cynics who say anything negative gets removed.63.155.53.122 (talk) 13:00, 13 January 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  No history 

message: An IP gutted the page, and I restored it, noting a cited reliable source that goes against the basis of the IP's blanking. In doing the restore, I got a warning about a deprecated source. Any idea which source is the deprecated source, so I can help find a replacement for it? —C.Fred (talk) 18:24, 20 April 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Deprecated sources