Rumsfeld: El Salvador Can Be Iraq Model

SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador - Iraq (news - web sites) can learn from the recent history of El Salvador (news - web sites), a country wracked by civil war that has developed into a stable democracy and close U.S. ally, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Thursday.

Rumsfeld, speaking at the U.S. Embassy here, thanked the Salvadorans for supplying troops for U.S. operations in Iraq. El Salvador, with about 370 soldiers in the only other country in the Western Hemisphere that currently has troops there.

"We are deeply in your debt," Rumsfeld said during a Veterans Day ceremony honoring U.S. and Salvadoran soldiers. He held up El Salvador as "a nation that understands well the human struggle for liberty and democracy."

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=514&e=5...

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Reminds me of a song I heard:

Somewhere in El Salvador there's a grave for 700
pits full of guts and kids who were tortured and hunted
By death squad soldiers who won't ever be purged or punished
Piad for by a government that our tax dollars funded
El Mozote (x3)
But that was so long ago and our officials have retired
And once the stench is gone it's easy to forgive liars
And there's so many atrocities this nation's since acquired
And a My Lai dosen't mean much when the papers stay quiet

(El Mozote by Screeching Weasel)