Funding for this
Training Facility was not appropriated in the early part of 1993. My
brother lobbied for continuation of the Diplomatic Security training. The Marana
Training Facility continues today and is one of a few Apache Helicopter
Attack Battalion training facilities. It is home to in-service
training for
Federal law enforcement officers of the Wildlife Officers Association
and is
home to the Physical Surveillance School - US
Customs Service Academy.
The article from the Tucson
Newspaper and the letters I received explain some of what the program
did when my brother George E.
Payne coordinated the Training there for the Diplomatic Security
Service, U.S. State Department until 1993. Pictures of at trip to D.C.
with my brother in the fall of 1992 during the campaign of
Clinton-Gore. The Reagan Administration's lasts acts were to cut
funding for many of these important services, including but not limited to Diplomatic Security, Boarder Patrol Agents, and Air Marshals. You will notice the word "negotiators" being used below. This trip was part of the negotiation that failed to keep the facility in use by Department of State, Diplomatic Security for purposes that would benefit agents even today and may have averted such events as the Blackwater incident that took place September 2007. And of course HINDSIGHT IS ALWAYS 20-20 but when dealing with the cost of OVERSIGHT one might say that there was a lack of uncanny alacrity on the part of those responsible for halting such programs.
While reading the book "The DSS and The Manhunt for the Al-Qaeda Terrorists" I found out why this program was probably discontinued along with many other programs that Diplomatic Security Service thought important. It speculated a bureaucratic move because of a diplomat not following RSO's recommendation. It reminded me of conversations my brother and I had many times regarding members of the Diplomatic Corp not taking recommendations of their protectors. I found the following on this site:
DSS agents were suspicious of Quainton (ANTHONY C. E. QUAINTON), in particular, because of his history. In February 1992, while Quainton was serving as the U.S. ambassador to Peru, the ambassador’s residence in Lima was attacked by Shining Path guerrillas who detonated a large vehicular-borne improvised explosive device in the street next to it. A team sent by the DSS counterterrorism investigations division to investigate the attack concluded in its report that Quainton’s refusal to follow the RSO’s recommendation to alter his schedule was partially responsible for the attack. The report angered Quainton, who became the assistant secretary for diplomatic security seven months later. Shortly after assuming his post, Quainton proclaimed to his staff that “terrorism is dead” and ordered the abolishment of the DSS counterterrorism investigations division.
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