Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
The Dirty War
The new military rulers instituted the Process of National Reorganisation, known as El Pro-
ceso, and this was headed by the notorious Jorge Rafael Videla. Ostensibly an effort to re-
make Argentina's political culture and modernize the flagging economy, El Proceso was
little more than a Cold War-era attempt to kill off or intimidate all leftist political opposi-
tion in the country.
Based in Buenos Aires, a left-wing guerrilla group known as the Montoneros bombed
foreign buildings, kidnapped executives for ransom and robbed banks to finance its armed
struggle against the government. The Montoneros were composed mainly of educated,
middle-class youths; they were hunted down by the military government in a campaign
known as La Guerra Sucia (the Dirty War). Somewhere between 10,000 and 30,000 civil-
ians died - many of them simply 'disappeared' while walking down the street or sleeping
in their beds. Many were tortured to death, or sedated and dropped from planes into the Río
de la Plata. Anyone who seemed even sympathetic to the Montoneros could be whisked off
the streets and detained, tortured or killed. A great number of the 'disappeared' are still un-
accounted for today.
The military leaders let numerous aspects of the country's well-being slip into decay,
along with the entire national economy. When Ronald Reagan took power in the USA in
1981, he reversed Jimmy Carter's condemnation of the junta's human-rights abuses and
even invited the generals to visit Washington, DC. Backed by this relationship with the
USA, the military was able to solicit development loans from international lenders, but en-
demic corruption quickly drained the funds into their Swiss bank accounts.
