Day of Remembrance for Truth and Justice

[Dim Witty]

Come to La Plaza de Mayo tomorrow to commemorate the 30,000 victims on the anniversary of the March 24, 1976 military coup d’état. Keep memory alive.

 

[Quilombo]

I don't need a calendar reminder because every year, and with increasing loudness the Mileistas engage in dictatorship apologia this time of the month/year.

Take a look at Twitter: Trending in Argentina "It wasn't 30,000" - disgusting people hiding behind screens.

They remind me of holocaust deniers who say it wasn't 6 million/didn't happen, but simultaneously think it was both a good thing and should have been more.

 

[antipodean]

The government announced they will now declassify all documents relating to this era, something which no Argentine government to date has done. Seems this act has caused discomfort in some sectors who seek to politicize memory of the victims of atrocities and violence committed during this era by denying the right to memory to some.

Anyway here is the official video released by the government yesterday which promotes a more inclusive memory of all victims, not just one side or those who suffered at the hands of one kind of leadership. Interesting to note that while condemning the executions and forced disappearances committed by the military of the day, they also acknowledge and condemn the forced disappearances committed by Juan Perón and Isabel Perón in the years prior, as well as the murders and violence committed by left wing terror groups.
There is also a detailed explainer around their take on the 30.000 number and and an excerpt from the interview with ex-Montonero Luis Labraña. (A number which if 30000 or 3000 doesn’t change the fact that serious crimes against humanity were committed).
It makes for an interesting shift in Argentine official dialogue by a democratically elected government.

 

[FrankPintor]

I don't need a calendar reminder because every year, and with increasing loudness the Mileistas engage in dictatorship apologia this time of the month/year.

Take a look at Twitter: Trending in Argentina "It wasn't 30,000" - disgusting people hiding behind screens.

They remind me of holocaust deniers who say it wasn't 6 million/didn't happen, but simultaneously think it was both a good thing and should have been more.

Even worse, the perpetrators went to extreme lengths to disappear the evidence, and the victims, and then claim that it couldn't possibly have been so many.

As we discussed this time last year, the 30,000 figure wasn't actually picked out of the air, no matter how many trolls want to flood the zone, there are serious indications that it may very well have been that many.

Is Milei serious about the declassification of records kept at the intelligence agency SIDE? Hasn't he already fired everyone at the National Archives who might curate them? From the BA Times "The Archivo Nacional de la Memoria is now run by Natalia Oriolo, an expert in cryptocurrencies", that pretty much says it all: just more trolling.

 

[QuilmesSlo]

I think it is fine to question these figures in a serious manner.

 

[Sojourner]

I don't need a calendar reminder because every year, and with increasing loudness the Mileistas engage in dictatorship apologia this time of the month/year.

We can discount or magnify the numbers on either side of the "dirty war" and stipulate the horror of the military repression - it went beyond comprehension.

What we can not stipulate, however, are the murders and terrors committed by the revolutionaries on the Argentine populace through the 60's and 70's, and that is simply because, as the video presents, we don't know them. They are not erased from history, but the memory blurred. I think a curious disconnect occurs where we feel responsible for what "our" military does and demand accounting, but, hey, revolutionaries gotta revolt. No need to look much further.

The revolution happened (my wife lived through it) and it was as widespread as described in the video and the revolutionaries did what they do - playground bombings and all. Recognizing that takes nothing away from the victims of the military and gives a better understanding of a particularly ugly passage in Argentine history. The video was just a start. I would like to know more.
.

 

[cortazar]

Anyone who wants to live in an intellectually free society should support the ability to question narratives, present alternative evidence, and freely express their personal experiences and opinions. In this case, obviously I mean efforts to get an honest account of the dirty war and express feelings of grievance. I also support anyone's ability to openly express positive opinions about either position of a conflict, including admiration and justification of vilified groups.

However, don't forget the source of video posted above, which was produced by people with ideological, political, and economic interests in portraying all things "left" as evil counterforces of good society. This is the same government that recently expressed its very broad interpretation of concepts like "sedition" and "crimes against the republic."

I consider the corrosion of meaning an attack on intellectual thought. The abolition of nuance presents downstream risks to discourse about present and past, including:

• A culture that justifies abuses of the past as necessary responses to greater evil
• A culture that encourages a fear of self-expression and critique.

Notice how many historical situations these apply to! Memory is important.

 

[FrankPintor]

Go ahead and question the figures, the narratives, present alternative evidence (if you can find it), but remember: one side (and only one side) has worked for years, with all the resources of the state, to first, disappear the victims, and then to disappear the evidence.

Whereas the victims of the other side are known, because it suited the same state to investigate those crimes.

If I understand correctly, the military destroyed as many records as they could, and refuse even to name the missing (adopted) children the Mothers and Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo are still finding.

I don't think there are any honest accounts out there, simply because so much evidence has been hidden and destroyed. I think it's really time for a German Holocaust-style law based on the (limited) evidence we have, to make it a crime to question the events. Villaruel, Espert, and their cronies could then get to spend more time with Alfredo Astiz.

 

[Dim Witty]

The government announced they will now declassify all documents relating to this era, something which no Argentine government to date has done. Seems this act has caused discomfort in some sectors who seek to politicize memory of the victims of atrocities and violence committed during this era by denying the right to memory to some.

Anyway here is the official video released by the government yesterday which promotes a more inclusive memory of all victims, not just one side or those who suffered at the hands of one kind of leadership. Interesting to note that while condemning the executions and forced disappearances committed by the military of the day, they also acknowledge and condemn the forced disappearances committed by Juan Perón and Isabel Perón in the years prior, as well as the murders and violence committed by left wing terror groups.
There is also a detailed explainer around their take on the 30.000 number and and an excerpt from the interview with ex-Montonero Luis Labraña. (A number which if 30000 or 3000 doesn’t change the fact that serious crimes against humanity were committed).
It makes for an interesting shift in Argentine official dialogue by a democratically elected government.

Some never tire of polishing a turd.

 

[ArgentinaVet]

Go ahead and question the figures, the narratives, present alternative evidence (if you can find it), but remember: one side (and only one side) has worked for years, with all the resources of the state, to first, disappear the victims, and then to disappear the evidence.

Whereas the victims of the other side are known, because it suited the same state to investigate those crimes.

If I understand correctly, the military destroyed as many records as they could, and refuse even to name the missing (adopted) children the Mothers and Grandmothers of the Plaza de Mayo are still finding.

I don't think there are any honest accounts out there, simply because so much evidence has been hidden and destroyed. I think it's really time for a German Holocaust-style law based on the (limited) evidence we have, to make it a crime to question the events. Villaruel, Espert, and their cronies could then get to spend more time with Alfredo Astiz.

This is a total misrepresentation of the facts as I understand them.

In the 1980's the former Military Government was judged, the high echelons imprisoned for their crimes/excesses, and in the 1990's Carlos Menem issued a pardon so the country could move forward.
From 2003 on the Kirchner's (somehow) revoked the pardons and hundreds of previously pardoned members of the military are back in prison; for the last twenty years or so the only side of the story being told is that of the Marxist guerrillas who are not in prison today and many of whom were participants in the K governments.

Stop and ask yourself who were these Marxist guerrillas, what was their objective and what were they doing in the late 1960's and in the 1970's up to the March 24, 1976 golpe de estado. Keep in mind that from 1973 until the 1976 coup that Argentina had a democratically elected Peronist government. The Montoneros and ERP were Cuban inspired and funded who aimed through violence, murder, and terrorist attacks to overthrow the constitutional Argentina state and install a Cuban style Marxist dictatorship, including the seizure of all private property and privately owned businesses.