A Tale Of Two Americans In El Salvador

TWO young Americans went to El Salvador to try, in their own ways, to do some good and to help the people.

One came back. The other didn't.

Jennifer Casolo, a 28-year-old church activist, worked with Christian Education Seminars in El Salvador, escorting groups of U.S. visitors.

Christopher Babcock, a 25-year-old schoolteacher, worked at the Escuela Americana in El Salvador, teaching junior-high-school students.

Last November, Casolo was arrested and imprisoned for 18 days on charges of hiding weapons for the El Salvadoran rebels. She was released because of insufficient evidence and returned to the United States.

Last November, Babcock was killed during an all-out rebel attack on the capital city of San Salvador. A rifle grenade - almost certainly fired by the rebels - exploded near his head.

Casolo insists she was in the wrong place at the wrong time. She denies knowledge of the weapons found buried in the back yard of the house where she lived.

Babcock was clearly in the wrong place at the wrong time. He was closing the garage door of his house, which happened to be only a short distance from the presidential palace.

Casolo is now on a nationwide speaking tour, where her appearances in churches and on campuses win fawning attention.

Babcock is now in Holy Cross Cemetery in Spokane, mostly forgotten by the media and the U.S. public.

Casolo is widely hailed as a heroine and called a martyr - although she was never physically mistreated by El Salvador's government.

Babcock is a hero only to his former students, his fellow teachers, and his family - although he paid with his life in the rebel attack.

A comparison between Babcock and Casolo - two very different people - may not be entirely fair. But the fact that she received so much publicity, while stories about him quickly faded, cannot be dismissed as the difference between living and dying.

Just imagine if Babcock had been teaching school in a rural village and had been killed by government troops: The outcry in this country would have been deafening. Liberal activists, with the help of sympathetic media, would have kept his name in the headlines and on the airwaves for months.

If you don't believe that, think of Benjamin Linder. He was the young American who in 1987 was killed by Nicaraguan contras while working on the side of the Sandinista government. He was made a martyr for the cause, and his name is still a potent symbol years later.

Sen. Brock Adams, to his credit, said just before Babcock's funeral that the young man ``died the death of a martyr.'' But few U.S. activists echoed that description; many seemed embarrassed by it.

After all, they implied, Babcock was teaching primarily the sons and daughters of El Salvador's elite. He was not politically involved in opposing the democratically elected government. He was not lambasting the U.S. government for its policies in El Salvador. He did not seem to believe that the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN) rebels were the solution. All unforgivable sins.

``Chris was interested in the people down there, and he was interested in the cultures,'' says his father, Jack Babcock, a salesman. ``He was not active politically. The only thing he did was teach school.''

Jack Babcock believes that his son's death was a quirk of fate, and that the rebels did not target him purposely. But he is skeptical that a change in government would make much difference:

``The rebels aren't going to do any more good than the government that's there. One side has the power and the other wants the power, and the money. To say that the rebels are going to do something for the people is supposition. I think it's naive.''

Kay Babcock, Christopher's mother, a school librarian, says her son ``felt that for things to really change down there, it would have to come from the young people, the future rulers.'' She added:

``He had students whose fathers were killed by the death squads, and whose fathers were in the death squads. So politics was something you just didn't talk about in school. Chris saw an opportunity by setting himself as an example.''

He evidently set a good example. Kay Babcock has received many letters from Christopher's students and fellow teachers.

Some excerpts:

``Our life will never be quite the same without him.''

``He was an excellent role model as teacher, soccer coach, and player.''

``Chris gave his all to his students as well as to his friends.''

Of the letters, Kay Babcock says: ``They made me feel that maybe (his death) wasn't in vain.''

Although she went to visit her son in Central America once, they didn't discuss politics much. ``I think he purposely did not talk a lot because he didn't want to worry me,'' she says.

``He saw the horrors of war and realized that neither side was a saint by any means. My own personal feeling is that if U.S. aid were cut off, the guerrillas could take over. All I know is, the guerrillas killed my son.

``I just pray that whatever comes out of this war, there's some good, strong and Christian leadership. Somewhere the killing has to stop.''

As for comparing her son to Casolo, she says:

``I don't think he would ever have gotten up on the soap box. He was too low-key for that. He was more of a doer than a sayer, you might say.''

And although she says Christopher was not religiously active, ``within himself he was. He was very highly principled, and anything that went on down there - the dishonesty, the poverty, the fighting, the torture - it bothered him very deeply.''

Much of the killing in El Salvador can be blamed on the army and government. The murder of the Jesuit priests is a deplorable example.

But in the past 18 months, the FMLN guerrillas have killed nine mayors, a regional governor, the attorney general, a conservative priest, journalists, rebel defectors, and a former chief justice of the Supreme Court.

And a Spokane schoolteacher.

As Jennifer Casolo is celebrated by U.S. activists and the nation's media, it is only fair to remember Christopher Babcock as well.