Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
and company-grade officers, none of them ranking higher than colo-
nel, planned the whole affair. Colonel Juan Domingo Perón, then an
anticommunist nationalist with fascist leanings attributable to his work
as military attaché in Italy, was among the leaders of the GOU. No
single policy issue united this secret clique. Instead they felt contempt
for venal civilian politicians, resentment of political interference in
military affairs, and fear that political unrest would lead to communist
rebellion on the part of the working class.
More than 10,000 troops took part in the Revolution of 1943, a far
grander movement in scale than the anti-Yrigoyen affair 13 years before.
Cavalry and infantry troops spilled out of their suburban encampments
in three great processions that met at the Casa Rosada. No great public
celebration attended this coup, nor did any overt opposition. Perón
apparently helped pen a manifesto that in florid language justified the
coup, denouncing the Castillo government for “venality, fraud, pecula-
tion, and corruption”—the usual crimes. It also called for “national
sovereignty” in international affairs. “We support our institutions and
our laws,” the manifesto stated, “persuaded that it is not they [at fault]
but men who have been delinquent in their application” (Potash 1969,
I:197). Over the first several days of military governance, the GOU
eliminated two generals who had claimed the interim presidency and
settled on its favorite, General Edelmiro Ferrell.
At the time, few took note of the announcement that President
Ferrell had appointed Colonel Perón as head of the Labor Department.
Soon Perón would take advantage of Argentina's transition to an indus-
trial society.
Industrialization and the State
The 1930s witnessed a continuance of the fundamental changes in
the economic infrastructure and social makeup peculiar to urban
Argentina. The Great Depression proved a second stimulus for the
nation's industrialization, the first having been World War I. Once
again, consumers could not purchase imported items either because
they were not available due to the industrial downturn in Europe or
because they lacked sufficient income to purchase foreign “luxuries.”
The alternative was to buy domestically manufactured goods. In fact,
the long-term industrialization of the country permitted industrial pro-
duction gradually to eclipse agriculture and livestock raising.
National industrialization received a great deal of help from govern-
mental promotion, despite a desperate and successful attempt in 1934
