Latest Rebellion by Military Casts Pall Over Argentina : Analysis

Argentines were planning a joyous celebration this weekend: rock music, opera and, naturally, tango, to celebrate the fifth anniversary of the return of democracy.

Now, as the tension ebbs after the third military uprising against President Raul Alfonsin’s government, thoughts have turned to martial music, and the festive mood has given way to uncertainty and melancholy.

The loyalist and rebel tanks that faced each other last Sunday never opened fire, and Alfonsin declared himself pleased that the immediate crisis was solved without concessions and without much bloodshed.

But virtually no one in Argentina saw the denouement as an unqualified victory for civilian rule, and few believe that the trouble has passed. To the contrary, Argentines once again face a 60-year-old reality: A sizable portion of their military remains willing and able to challenge elected authority. Subordination of the military to the government remains elusive.

A middle-ranking “loyalist” army officer, asked whether the rebels’ capitulation ended the confrontation, answered firmly: “This is only the beginning. Before, the military was divided, vertically and horizontally. Now we are united.”

He said the military does not seek political power but rather to regain the respect of years past that vanished after the harsh dictatorship from 1976-83 and the humiliating defeat in the Falklands War with Britain.

To many officers, that means ending the perceived persecution and actual prosecution of senior officers who led what human rights activists call the “dirty war” against left-wing subversion in the mid-1970s, in which at least 9,000 people were arrested and are presumed executed.

Soldiers remain proud of crushing the leftist guerrillas, who carried out killings and assassinations, and believe they made a return to democracy possible. They angrily reject the government’s position that many victims were innocent, punished for their views and not their actions. Most officers feel betrayed that the public and politicians deride and harangue them and that their leaders were put on trial for human rights abuses.

Government concessions following the last two revolts reduced the number of cases to a handful. Now the military, accustomed to a central role in Argentine life, demands total absolution and more.

“Let’s look at this seriously,” said Sen. Antonio Berhongaray. “What do these rebel sectors really want? A bigger share of power, power which was removed from them with the return of the constitutional system, power which they had held for 60 years.

“Amnesty, the budget, court trials--all these are excuses for an advance toward a greater share of power,” said Berhongaray, defense specialist for the ruling party, the Radical Civic Union.

Democracy wasn’t in danger, he said, “not because the rebels didn’t want to threaten it but because they couldn’t. They couldn’t because the entire society united against them. If this had continued a few hours more, a total strike would have begun, workers and businesses, supported by the whole world. No one would have given them credit even to buy a box of matches.”

Still, many units proved reluctant to do battle with officers whose demands they shared, even if it were to spawn a constitutional crisis jeopardizing democratic rule.

The internal army agreement ending the crisis averted a showdown with potentially drastic consequences: Alfonsin noted that if loyal units had opened fire, hundreds could have died. But if they had refused such an order, as some analysts consider likely, a full-scale civil-military conflict could have ensued.

The leader of the rebellion, right-wing Col. Mohamed Ali Seineldin, said about the loyalists a day after capitulating: “They and we thought the same, and because of that we did not want to fight each other. What we want is the restructuring of military power in Argentina.”

Alfonsin worked hard to appear the commander in chief. He said there would be no amnesty, that remaining trials would continue and that “there it is and there it will be until society decides otherwise.”

At the same time, he went part way toward defending the military’s role in the 1970s, saying the forces had waged “a struggle that was nearly a war to preserve the institutions of the nation.”

Among the rebels’ demands was a halt to what they see as a sustained anti-military propaganda campaign by pro-government media. Perhaps coincidentally, a national television station last week canceled a series of Argentine films that was to have been part of the anniversary celebrations. Many recent films deal graphically with the torture and killings of anti-government activists and other abuses during the “dirty war,” a phrase that itself irritates the armed forces.

About 500 officers and troops took part in the mutiny on Dec. 1, taking over the army’s infantry school. Loyalist units surrounded the insurgents, but the rebels broke out the next day, without resistance, and moved to a munitions garrison on the border of the capital.

In negotiations last Sunday with the army chief of staff, Gen. Jose Dante Caridi, the rebels claimed to have won a pledge that Caridi would step down in return for their surrender. Caridi had carried out a purge of officers involved in the previous revolts, and Alfonsin expressed faith in him. But Caridi also had sounded sympathetic recently to the mutineers’ goals, if not their methods, saying: “We have been intimidated for the last five years. It is time that they lift this chastisement.”

Public Clamor

The military’s unity was matched by public determination not to concede blithely the nation’s hard-won civilian rule, which implies subordination of its armed forces. Not since 1928 has an elected president handed over power to a successor chosen by the voters, as Alfonsin is determined to do after elections next year.

Tens of thousands of people took to the streets in defense of democracy, and not a single civilian sector spoke out for the rebels. All six previous Argentine coups since 1930 have been possible because of civilian support, but none was present this time.

The conflict also raised the specter of renewed polarization.

At the confused conclusion of the rebellion, mainly left-wing demonstrators used rocks to attack the mutineers guarding the gate of the munitions garrison. When the loyalist tanks withdrew, seemingly conceding without a fight, they also were stoned. Gunfire broke out--apparently some of it from ultra-rightists and leftists as well as police. Two demonstrators and a police officer were killed and about 40 people were hurt.

A powerful bomb was reportedly discovered and defused Thursday at a military building in the capital, and some conservative media began speaking of a possible resurgence of leftist violence.

Civilian/Military Breach

The breach between the military and the civilian political forces in Argentina hardly seems to have narrowed in the last five years. Low salaries and the reduction of the military budget and the size of the force by half have further alienated the army. A colonel in his 40s earns 11,000 australes (about $800) a month.

About 5,000 people marched in front of the Casa Rosada, the Argentine equivalent of the White House, on Thursday and Friday in the eighth annual vigil to remember those who disappeared in the “dirty war” and demand judgment of the guilty. Some marchers chanted anti-military slogans, including: “Rebels or loyalists, all soldiers are criminals!”

Nellie Gomez, a 62-year-old grandmother whose pregnant, 26-year-old daughter, Cristina, was arrested and then disappeared, said: “This small democracy is just starting to walk, but we are afraid it won’t become a toddler.

“The soldiers want us to stop criticizing them, to respect them,” she said. “But they are going to have to do many good things to make us forget what happened. They can’t order us to respect them. They have to earn it.”