Massacre at El Mozote

This story is a story that’s been shrouded in mystery,
Not told too often as it’s often done in history,
You’d have to dig through journals, electronically,
And find remnants of the cold war erased from memory.
 
It was in early December back in 1981,
When the Atlacatl Battalion went into the little village,
With counter insurgency tactics to flush out the enemy,
But this event went beyond any sort of pillage.
 
Guerilla fighters were known to sometimes dress as civilians,
The brilliance of hiding in plain sight like innocent bystanders,
And the right-wing government had gotten assistance,
From Reagan’s administration using very repressive standards.
 
On the tenth of December when the army arrived
They questioned anyone involved or may had contrived,
For those who may have helped or befriended the FMLN,
Had information and intel or they were just as guilty as them.
 
The following day they were all taken to the town square,
Made to lay face down on the ground during the sordid affair,
Then the men were separated from the women and children,
They were taken to houses, the church and the convent.
 
Interrogated and tortured then for no reason murdered,
The soldiers released a hell for what they were ordered,
And we can tell this account because of those who escaped,
That some of the women and even little girls were raped.
 
A woman who hid nearby heard their screams and cries,
“Mama they are killing us” some children yelled in demise,
Another person who witnessed said of their horror filled pleas,
They slit their little throats and some were hung from trees.
 
The rest of the town was then all burned down,
To hide the evidence of this sadistic extermination,
But what can poor farmers and peasants really do?
Against a government bent on communist annihilation.
 
The next day they went to nearby settlements and towns,
Continuing their diabolical slaughter until the sun went down,
Evil that day had shown its true face then tried to erase,
As their bodies and their homes were all set ablaze.
 
Journalists dared venture there to write about the genocide
They discovered charred remains and all that they tried to hide.
And the truth eventually saw the light despite all denial,
Yet in the years to come no one was ever brought to trial.
 
The government issued an apology some three decades later,
But in civil war with civilian deaths they don’t find the perpetrators,
It happens everywhere around the world, they call it collateral damage,
But the truth of it is when humanity is lost, men resort to being savage.
 
In all more than seven hundred lives perished or disappeared,
Some count beyond a thousand, but the exact number is unclear,
Their bodies were never identified, only the names of the lost,
Right versus left, brother against brother, but at what cost?
 
By no means is this an attempt to get political but it’s critical,
That we become aware of these atrocities that are so criminal,
People are stripped of their human rights when governments prey,
It’s happens everywhere, throughout history even to this today.
 
In the name of freedom and democracy there’s a bit hypocrisy,
When innocent women and little children are killed.