Military leaders on lapse of those institutions in the face of the vast popular hostility towards the armed
The government forces.
has to simultaneously try to reduce people's capacity to respond trial - the issues at stake the and rebel by integrating the demands of the vanguard into its own projects.
To begin with, therefore, the government was simply demanding a purification of the armed forces, a selfcleansing' as the precondition for court of nine military leaders involved
THE TRIAL in the federal in the three juntas which terrorised Argentinian society from 1976 to 1982 has now been going on since April 22 this year. They are being tried under the December 1983 decree No 158 on charges of serious violation of human rights. This is a new occurence in Argentina which for the last half century has suffered frequent military coups. (1)
A further 1,700 members of the military are still awaiting trial but thousands more have been let off the hook on the grounds that they were merely 'obeying orders'.
The nine were brought to trial in a civil court after attempts by
President Raul Alfonsin to persuade the military to undergo a 'selfpurification'. The armed forces military tribunal found the men not guilty.
Although Alfonsin's Radical Party was re-elected on November
3 this year with an increased majority, the issue of the military will remain a key one for this government.
HORACIO MIGUENS
It is clear that for the present
Radical Party government, as for any bourgeois government, the armed forces are a key component of political power.
This is especially so in backward societies like Argentina's.
But what kind of armed forces does this constitutionally elected govern-
The chaotic situation in which the
Argentinian republic found itself folthe crisis of the military dictatorship had three basic elements;
an unpayable foreign debt of getting on for 45 billion dollars; a bloody and blind repression people; thousands deaths and political prisoners and an embarassing military
Malvinas war in 1982.
This defeat undermined the prestige of the Argentinian armed forces to such an extent that it was reflected in a slogan which declared; "They're use to the government, they're no use for war, the murdering military aren't edly the movement for human rights.
18 refused to condemn its own and a character of democracy in a backward and dependent country, and, whether consciously or not, goes beyond what bourgeois democracy is prepared to offer the masses in such a situation. The particular form of the repression against popular resistance, involving mass murder and near genocide, is not easily obscured even in the long-term.
The Alfonsin government therefore has a double objective. First it must make the military hierarchy acceptable, not only to the bourgeois institutions but among the whole of the working and for that it has to dismantle the putschist and reactionary sections of the army which still represent a threat to the actual continuation of constitutional democracy itself. On the other hand it must prevent the demands of the Argentinian people for human rights from going democratic aspirations in a certain direction. To do this the government grab from the people the legitimate mantle of justice and
Thus we can see the general framewhich official strategy is operating. It involves protecting the reintegrating them, with full rights, into their place in the political power structure. At the same time the government could drive a wedge into the movement for human rights, sowing confusion and dividing that movement by getting it to go through the institutions of the bourgeois state. (2)
Hoping for this self purification of the military, the Radical Party government demanded the trial of only those involved in the first three military juntas and of those only nine amongst the thousands of murderers and torturers. The others, it was claimed in an official statement had, limited themselves to obeying
So according to Alfonsin's reason"those most politically responsible for the excesses' were to be judged for the time being by military law in military courts. This was seen as a first step towards the necessary self-rehabilitation of the armed forces. exercising political power directly and not just defending it; this was how their particular interests developed. And above all at officer and noncommissioned officer level they were involved in savage repression at the time, in what they called the 'pact of armed forces therefore have no interest in this self-punishment, because to condemn individual leaders is to blame the entire military institution. Equally they have no interest "A victorious army is not accountable', military leaders point out. military reacted very negatively to the government's initiatives: they justified 'what was done against subversion'; they criticised and insulted the work of the National Commission on Missing Persons (CONADEP). This body was created by presidential decree to enquire into and get information on the
1. The first coup d' etat was in 1930 and then in 1943, 1955, 1962, 1966 and 1976. Since 1952, the date when the first presidency of General Juan Peron ended, no president has finished a term of office.
2. See 'International Viewpoint No 75 May 6, 1985. International Viewpoint 9 December 1985
International Viewpoint 9 December 1985 character of the repression. The military demanded that a larger part of the budget should be allocated to military spending. Furthermore, on the rare occasions when open trials against members of the military took place in the civil courts, they set up obstacles. In the face of outright hostility from society as a whole and signs of intense dismay from political circles, especially the government, the armed forces closed ranks and the military judges finally declared the members of the three juntas innocent. The case for the defence
So Alfonsin's first initiative turned out badly; the military proved allergic to self-purification and would have to be cleaned up by force. The obstinate refusal of the military left no choice for the Radical Party administration; the Federal Chamber would have to take on the judiciary procedure.
The clever official attempt to of human rights was to succeed for a time in sowing confusion and demobilising the leadership of the masses. However, CONADEP's report went a lot further than the government had anticipated and stimulated more awareness among large sections of the popua print run of several thousand copies of the report, entitled (Never Again), ran out in only two 170,000 copies have been distributed.
The provocative character of the military court and the permanent and persistent attempts of the security services have brought to light the continuing existence of a repressive human rights movement following the opening of the civil trial in April 1985. Sections of the population were also beginning to understand Alfonsin's game. The danger of this was written into the whole strategy he adopted since it was inevitably carried out under conditions of relative democracy. The recent exposure of his actions to public scrutiny created a new awareness which saw through to the true character of the 'fight against subversion' and the trials.
The prosecutor general, Strassera will first of all try to show how the accused tried to hide the facts; then he will try to show the facts; and then he will try to show that the accused, even if they deny having
Borders, cannot fore cannot justify the fact that they conduct. (3) To rarefiec sins, prove repress from organisation which some people accuse us of, stated General S. Rivero to the Interamerican Junta for Defense in adding straight away that the represwas conducted by the generals, and brigadiers-generals each force. It was not conducted by such and such a dictator or such and such a dictatorship, as we try to make international public opinion believe ... the war was conducted by the military the country through their commanders in chief". (4) counsel is made up of 21 lawyers for nine accused and it does not act as a bloc because each lawyer is only concerned with saving his own client and not the military dictatorship as a whole. As there is obviously no margin of manoeuvre for a global political defence, they realise that it is a matter of every man for himself. And with this search for an individustrategy has appeared acrimony and personal and political differences between the ex-commanders. There is who swares that 'a son of a bitch', there is Harguindeguy, Videla's minister of the interior who replies in the same vein that "This is the work of that ... son of a bitch, Massera.'
The enormous weight of evidence of the statements of prosecution witnesses which are contradicted and which show contrast starkly with the and forgetfulness, the contradiction and the refusal to answer of most of witnesses for the defence. this has forced the defence counsel to change tactics and go for attempts to challenge the conduct of the trial.
During the hearing several protests have been made, claims of violation of the rights of the defence and even a demand for the suspension trial. These are the only real arguments being used by the counsel defending these torturers. In the face of this, the tremendous power of the testimonies presented by prosecution witnesses has unmasked the premeditated and organised terror that the people (and even some leaders of the bourgeoisie) were subjected to by the most cruel and reactionary dictatorship Argentina has
Orgeira, the defence counsel for General Viola, one of the most compromised of the military leaders, served as an example to his colleagues through his methods of defence which aimed to influence public opinion. The defence asserted that in Argentina a 'war had opened up' and that in times of war 'anything is justified.' He backed up this argument by the, at times, barely disguised allegation that all the disappeared were subversive terrorists, or that such and such a prosecution witness was involved in "political or trade-union activity'.
The accused were forced to use such methods in order to try and defend such crimes as kidnapping, rape, assassination, pillage and theft from the homes of the disappeared; and even to defend the kidnapping and handing over to the military (sometimes in the form of commercial some 200 children of
All these horrifying details have come out in the last 16 and a half evidence in the 282 cases presented by the prosecutor one would have any doubt in Argentina today that these delinquents should be condemned to prison in perpetuity without further ado, if it were not for the political accused with all that that implies in terms of compromising wide government circles and danger of creating precedents for future judiciary action.
Several statements have come forward confirming the accusations of torture. 'Videla knew what was going asserted Robert Cox, the exdirector of the Buenos Aires Herald in his evidence on April 29. 'Camps and Etchecolatz were the first to interrogate me' affirmed Jacobo Timmermann, a former head of the newspaper La Opinion, in the witness stand on May 3, 1985. 'I was able to recognise General Camps', declared Alfredo Bravo a former trade-union leader and currently working for Alfonsin's administration, on May 8. Some military staff confirmed these testimonies. Carlos Hours, a former officer and deputy police inspector in the provin ce of Buenos Aires, recalled that *Haroldo Conti, the joumalist and writer, was dragged along the floor till his arms were raw'. A previous military ruler between 1971 and 19 73, General Lanusse confes. sed on May 13 that Massera said that what happened to Sajon (press representative from 1971 to 1972) was done in full recognition of the conse. quences and with the authorisation of the junta' (5)
3. •Diario del Juicio, a bourgeois commercia weekly, Вцепов Aires, May 1985.
Quoted in Nueva Presencia, democratic weekly of the Jewish community in Argentina, No 412, May 24, 1985. Diario delicio No to are from the All the quotations
19
legion. They represent just one aspect of the terrifying repression exercised by the military dictatorship as a means of crushing the population and imposing an economic model which would serve the interests of the financial oligarchy and, to a lesser extent, bourgeoisie. The testimonies us to have at least a slight appreciation of the impact which these revelations along with those which appeared in the CONADEP report, had on the Argentinian people.
The broad awareness of the masses, amplified by a rejection of repressive crime against humanity, to a wider understanding. For sections
'fight against subversion'; the economic plans of Martinan de Ho detes minister of venince in the Malvinas are all part irresponsible and parcel of a huge lie and represent an attack against the entire Argentinian people. This has been one of the most immediate effects of the
At the same time the witnesses have been able to show that it was not a matter of errors or excesses and that there were not just nine people responsible. In the the former chief superintendant of Federal Security (the training service of the federal police
Armando Luchin 'there were as some try to argue. was ordered from above, state itself. So torture action of subordinates going too far.? (6) The government changes tack
The trial has demonstrated to the Argentinian people that the repression was carefully planned and that it was implemented against all oppositionists housewives, intellectuals, artists etc. It has shown that it was not just the higher echelons of the military who were involved and that the vast majority of officers and noncommissioned officers were implicated at the time. Basically the armed forces constituted a virtual apparatus of extermination, a legitimised terrorist state.
And it was here that the government itself became ensnared in its own trap. In contrast to the escape route which Alfonsin originally hoped for in order to ensure the effectiveness and continuity of the repressive apparatus, the trial, which was con20 ceived of as being the end of the government, sparked off wide discussion and has brought about a certain clarification in the minds of the people.
Furthermore, this clarification does not just concern the role played by military because the Church hierarchy, the trade union bureaucracy, bourgeois politicans and judges also appeared as accomplices according to evidence at the trial. "Thus we saw the apostolic nuncio playing tennis with Massera whilst nuns and catechists tortured and assassinated in ESMA (the Naval Engineering Monsignor Grasselli handling the file persons as if it was a shopping list; or Lopez Rega preput into retirement. We saw politicwho, in other circumstances, had been prepared to give their blesgenocide now seeking to champions of the cause bureaucrats suddenly amnesic and ignorant of the crimes committed the working class and its leaders; judges who delayed people seeking a writ of habeas corpus in their offices - people who later found themselves among the missing; ambassadors who closed their doors to those being persecuted in order not to get in bad standing with the dictatorship and many other things government's objective two-fold; on the one hand to get the forces to purify themselves and at the same time to control the goal contained an internal contradiction between the need to understanding with the military high-ups and the need to take on board democratic interests. It was this contradiction that made it impossible for the government to totally under its control. For instance the CONADEP report largely contradicted, not only the arguments put forward by the dictatorship but also even Alfonsin's
It has therefore become necessary tack in two parallel directions. It must put a stop to the debate which is animating the population by reaching some kind of consensus, if that is still possible. In order necks of the middle ranks in the army are implicated evidence at the trial, the whole concept of the duty to obey must be reformulated in order to adapt it to the latest revelations. This forminitially acted as a safety valve but following the revelations of the extent and nature of the crimes committed by subordinate military concept has now At the same time Alfonsin's government is also looking for a second option in developing the idea of a possible future exchange of prisoners between the two parties. There remain 14 political prisoners inherited from the dictatorship plus three by Alfonsin, who have still not been released, doubtless to safeguard the possibility of a future amnesty which would apply to those currently in gaol and to those condemned military men who were not part of any group of former commanders. The implementation of one or other of these measures will depend on the development of the situation and on the government's margin for manoeuvre.
•Within our armed forces an emotional turmoil was created affected, in a negative way, the ability to analyse the legality of an order received by a subordinate,' Senator A. Berongaray, in charge of the defence commission of the Radical Party recently stated. And he added that the concept of the duty of obedience will free from responsibility the vast majority of those who could have been accused' in the repression. (8) These people have not been either judged or sentenced and the Radical Party is already declaring them innocent. How can the limits of the duty of obedience be defined? "Through a judicial decree can act as a sort of test case', according to this senator. But what would be the verdict of such a judicial
From the regime's point of view the most important thing is to slow down the trial, to halt the avalanche of revelations which every day place question marks on the role of the armed forces as an institution and to contain the wave of accusations which are unfolding against the whole
'Nueva Presencia", No 412, May 24, 1985
7. 'Decimos', the monthly organ of the families of detained and missing per. sons. Monsignor Grasselli, priest linked the military high command had his parish office a list of all the facts rounding missing persons who were in arm hands, with the date of the kidnappin the probable location of the place detention etc. He used to 'advise' membe of the families of the missing who came to him as a mediator.
Jose Lopez Rega, known as the Rapu of Peronism, was the strong man in repressive Isabel Peron government 1974 and 1975 General Suarez commander of the First Army Corps i first years of the dictatorship was sible for setting up several concen camps. Both were members of the Italian lodge, P-2 and have now Пес country Decimos', op. cit., No 4, Augur International Viewpoint 9 December 1985
Argentina. The so-called separation of the three powers of the bourgeois state (the executive, the legislative and the judiciary) is one of the themes of Alfonsin's government to justify his approach.
The desire to lessen the impact of the trial was illustrated in the attitude of the prosecutor, who raised objection witnesses and reduced by 427 (from 709 originally to 282) the number of cases presented during the hearing 'because of a super abundance of proof and because *more than sufficient, Presented was the evidence
At the same time Prosecutor Strassera, who had taken a correct attitude towards the prosecution witnesses, nevertheless had to declare to the press that the indiscriminate character of the repression made it difficult to distinguish 'between the victims, those who were guerilleros and those who were not, thus mistrusting ahd misrepresenting the efforts of those officers and troops who risked their lives in fighting against subversion.' (9) He also lamented the fate of those who belonged to the task groups and who "risked their lives, were not given recognition from the rest of society and had to watch subversive delinquents appear as innocent victims'. (10) In the light of these kind of statements we can only repeat with the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo [the organisation of parents of the missing]; 'what is behind such assert- Demonstation outside the Argentine embassy in Paris (DR) ions if not an attempt to save thousands of middle ranking soldiers of the armed forces who participated in the savage repression operated against our people from 1976?' (11)
The press coverage of the trials in Argentina, which was very extensive, did not go beyond the limits set by the politicians in this respect. But the succession of evidence gradually raised the question of the responsibility of the armed forces as a whole and the press began to limit and restrict more and more the information coming out on this subject and began to interpret the different testimonies according to its own viewpoint. So, for example, the daily paper of the reactionary oligarchy, the Buenos La Nacion, attempted to distort the courageous statements of witnesses who sometimes found themselves being accused of collaboration with their own torturers in such headlines as Yet another case of collaboration with subversive elements'. The newspaper Clarin which presents the views of the slightly more enlightened bourgeoisie in Buenos Aires stopped publishing anything on the trial after a while and only gave out limited and partial information. There were exceptions to all this, like El Periodista, a progressive
International Viewpoint 9 December 1985 independent weekly or Nueva Presencia the democratic weekly of the Jewish community of Argentina.
During the trial there was a division between the two types of Argentinians who coexisted under the dicatorship: the secret and the conspicuous, there were those who gave in by keeping quiet and those who suffered in flesh and blood the unrelenting repression.' So wrote the monthly publication of the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo in August. Hebe P. de Bonafina, president of that organisation, who participated in the first hearing and was asked to remove the white scarf (a symbol of the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo) from her head because it was considered a too obvious symbol. But as she herself remarked at the trial 'they did not dare ask the military to take off their uniforms. If we can't use symbols, then what do they think a uniform is?' (12)
The fact that a missing person might have been a 'terrorist' or a "subversive' is now becoming a factor of less and less importance in popular thinking and that is true even for the most depoliticised in society. The official line has therefore begun to develop the responsibilities for the repression onto society as a whole; it would be simplistic to point the finger at the blows inflicted by the military and only accuse that section of the population, because such armed coups d'etats 'have always been civil and military with a heavy civil responsibility in the ideological back up. We must therefore assume this responsibility.' (13) This is what Alfonsin said when addressing the armed forces last July. Following this line of argument, it is logical that if everyone is responsible then no one person can be blamed; if we were all guilty then no one really is. This immediately abrogates the real political and military responsibilities.
The left parties in Argentina, depending on their political affiliations and their mass base, more or less all consider the trial of the Junta chiefs as inadequate because it is limited to nine officers. At the very most the trial is considered by them to be a 'step in the right direction.
"La Nacion', Buenos Aires, June 13, 1985.
Idem.
11. Madres de la Plaza de Mayo (MPM) the monthly journal of the organisation of the same name, No 8, July 1985.
12. *Nueva Presencia', cit., No 420, July 19, 1985.
13. 'Decimos', op. cit. No 4, August • 1985.
21
The Workers Party (PO), which until 1977 described itself as belonging to the international current led by the French PCI of Lambert and has break with this current, sees the trial as merely a smokescreen. According to the statements of its leader, Jorge
Altamira, 'the trial is a manoeuvre because its goal is to save the armed forces' even if there have been 'some positive things to come out of it.
This was not wanted by the government because of the explosive nature of the subject.' (14) This view is not surprising coming from people who think that, in the present stage of the class struggle, Argentina is ment of imperialist penetration' bec-
'this democracy is like a fin-
The Movement for Socialism (MAS), the former Socialist Workers Party, also calls itself Trotskyist, believes according to the slogan they use on demonstrations that 'the nine are not enough, we want the lot'. For them the trial is however seen in positive light since 'only a real Pontius Pilate could prevent hundreds more trials opening up.' For this organifall of the dictatorship meant, within the context of a 'revolutionary situation', a 'virtual democratic revolution'. (15)
For the Communist Party (PCA), the trial is so positive that a few months ago it dropped the slogan 'trial and punishment' of the guilty. For as
Zamorano, the and leader infuenced Argentine League for the Rights of Man (LADH), explained, ' the trial already exists and in any case we are for punishment.' (16) He modified by admitting that 'we have had problems in formulating our slogan up till now. It is for judgement and punishment of all those guilty, absolutely all those guilty of repression in our country' (17)
Humanism and Liberation' current of Christian Democracy, the left and progressive wing of the Christian petty bourgeoisie, the vehicle of the trial of ex-members of the juntas we are going on the right road.' (18)
According to the Peronist Youth, on the other hand, this is a trial whose outcome can only be speculated on and [is based on] low political manoeuvres, according to of their leaders, Dante Gullo. (19)
In the case of the Partido Intransigente (PI) which has a petty bourgeois, democratic anti-imperialist base, to them the trial is positive, although it does not go far enough. They declare that what is needed is to 'carry on the investigations until the whole truth is established, to punish the 22 guilty for their unbelievable and to finish definitively with impunity: (20)
Across this spectrum of positions we can see that the Argentinian left tends to alternate between a purely instrumentalist characterisation of the trial, seen as a straight manoeuvre, the case of the PO; and an what a government deems to be the best way to judge those responsible for the repression as in the case of the 'Humanism and Liberation' grouping.
In the same way that the economic plans of Martinez de Hoz were eventually exposed as meaning a huge drop in the buying power of the workers and the military adventure in the Malvinas provoked a huge feeling of disillusion and frustration only overcome by the fall of the dictatorship, so the trial of the heads of the military strips away the last laurels which the military caste could rest on; that of the fight 'against subversion This was not, as they claimed, a fight against 'armed terrorists' in defence of the population, but a war against all forms of resistance, opposiorganisation against the The human rights movement revives
The judicial process shows that the disappearance of 30,000 activists, the death and imprisonment of thousands of others and the exiling of tens of thousands of people who were fighting the dictatorship was linked to an economic plan which aimed at establishing a kind of new economic model in Argentina. This same plan prevents the present goverment from checking in any way Argentina's increasing economic dependence, with all its consequences of unemployment, impoverishment
It is thus that, slowly but surely, sections of the population who were hitherto indifferent are beginning to discover the real character of the repression and its essential objective. The Argentinian people may not mobilised in a big way at the moment (for it is not easy to get rid of the yoke of eight years of terror) and it may not have the political advantage for a while. However, the very mention of a possible or amnesty, even disguised, for those rapists, thieves and murderers or those responsible kidnappings would a firm and indignant response from
Sections of the workers movement - especially the most combative unions and the anti-bureaucratic groupings within the unions - are slowly becoming involved in the fight for democratic rights which is inseparably linked are most deeply felt among the people and can mobilise them in an ongoing
These demands can strengthen the movement for human rights which, if it does not involve the broad masses, going slowly in that direction. Such the crisis that the movement suffered last year. Thus the prolonged strike and occupation of the multinational Ford Motor Company, was openly supported by of the Plaza de Mayo, who in turn, on the occasion of a demonstration for the release of political prisoners, got the support of the Internal Commission of the Struggle in Fords.
types of action show the way forward.
The movement for human rights -most notably the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, the parents of the detained and disappeared, the Centre for Legal and Social Studies - is, to a large extent, a response to the 1984 crisis and constitutes a vanguard of the struggle against the dictatorship and also against the current government. The movement has a long and hard struggle ahead to achieve its demands. This is no less true today when they are confronting an enemy which dispenses with the need for naked repression in order to obtain a consensus around its political initiatives.
On August 2, this year, an action supported by more than 100 organisations and initiated by the Mothers
Plaza de Mayo attracted between 40,000 and 50,000 people, who demonstrated in front of the government palace chanting the slogan 'No to amnesty' and Judgement and punishment for all the guilty: On September 6 more than 50 ,000 people filed past the congress buildings around the main demand "No impunity for any of the guilty?.
These are not huge numbers but they mark a reactivation and a relative stabilisation of the human rights movement's capacity to mobilise. bit this begins to challenge the logic of class rule and of bourgeois democracy.
It is in this context that the class struggle is posed today, around the question of human rights and it is around this that revolutionaries should
14. El Periodista', No 45, July 19, 1985.
15. 'Decimos", op. cit, No 4, August 1985.