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Interestingly, a year later, in an article marking the anniversary of the assassination of Archbishop Romero, Edward Schumacher, of the Times, noted that under Romero’s successor, Archbishop Rivera y Damas, “the church has moved to a more centrist position in the civil war between the Government and the guerrillas.”35 Of course, if the church now takes a centrist position, as opposed to its position under Romero, this constitutes an admission that the theme played by Treaster and the Times a year previously of an even-handed Romero was a lie (which it was). Is it possible that the Times always finds the church in the middle and is lying one year later as well? The question must remain open, as his successor has been much more circumspect than Romero. The willingness of the right wing and the army to murder people like Romero might have affected Archbishop Rivera y Damas’s ability to speak his mind freely and forced public caution. The point does not arise for Schumacher and the Times.36

2.3.4. THE LOSS OF INTEREST IN RESPONSIBILITY AT THE TOP

With Popieluszko, the media tried hard to establish that there was knowledge of and responsibility for the crime at higher levels of the Polish government. Soviet interest and possible involvement were also regularly invoked. With Romero, in contrast, no such questions were raised or pressed.

The media did note that Romero opposed aid to the Salvadoran junta (which Carter provided anyway), but they failed to convey the depth of his hostility to U.S. policy and the importance of his oppositional role (although it was far more threatening to U.S. policy than Popieluszko was to the Soviet Union). The press never mentioned the special emissary sent by Carter to the pope in an attempt to bring Romero into line, or the fact that the head of the Jesuit order in Central America was called to Rome, probably in response to this U.S. pressure.37 The media also suppressed Romero’s appeal to the military to refuse to kill, a fact that would have made much clearer how strongly opposed he was to the official policies, and how convenient his murder was to the rulers of El Salvador.

Although Romero was far and away the most important establishment figure aligned with the popular movements, the media pretended at first that the affiliation of his killers was a complete mystery. The Washington Post supposed an equal likelihood of a left- or right-wing source, and the Miami Herald noted on March 27 that “Both stood to benefit from any chaos his death might have created.” (No American paper suggested that Popieluszko might have been murdered by Solidarity sympathizers to discredit the Polish government.) This foolishness was the minority position—the bulk of the press suggested that the killer was probably a rightist, but of obscure connection. The reliable Duarte suggested that the killing was too professional to be indigenous—it must have been a contract job from the outside. This view was dutifully repeated by the New York Times, Time, Newsweek, and CBS News.38

If, as seemed very likely, the killer was a Salvadoran rightist, or someone in their employ, what was his connection, if any, with the army and security forces? We saw earlier that the linkages between the death squads and the army were close: there was at least some degree of common command, shared operations, and mutual protection. Could the killer have been a member of the armed forces? Given the links of the army to the paramilitary forces, wasn’t it likely that they knew who killed Romero? The U.S. mass media did not raise, let alone press, these questions. When D’Aubuisson’s link to the murder became public knowledge, the media failed to make this a big issue, and his close relations to the official forces were not examined and discussed. This is evidence of a propaganda system at work.

Any possible U.S. connection to the crime was, of course, “far out,” and could not be raised in the U.S. media. That we don’t do this sort of thing is an ideological premise of the patriotic press, no matter