Of the failed attack against José Martínez de Hoz to the Montoneros obsession – 14/04/2019

The United States government handed over documents to Argentina on Friday. the seventh of its kind, since the first "batch" was received in 2002. As the previous ones are declbadified elements that were previously kept as "secret" or "confidential", among others, and refer to violations of the rights of the man committed in Argentina between 1975 and 1983, the last date of the return to democracy.

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The Minister of Justice, Germán Garavano, received last Friday 40,000 new documents from the declbadification announcements made by former President Barack Obama to Mauricio Macri during his March 2016 visit.

This last installment, which complements the previous ones, highlights new elements, already known but containing documents of agencies such as the CIA, the FBI, the Department of Defense, concerning Argentina these years. the: the kidnappings of the opponents, the tortures, the execution of the Carter commission. But they also talk about terrorist guerrilla act.

It is also very clear from the new material sent to Argentina that the US government has taken care to strike hard – or simply to establish "denied" access – information contained in these documents. elements that engage their forces or reveal the intelligence methodology and search used by their agents, their local contacts and the US Embbady in Buenos Aires.

Learn more about Patricia Derian

As the under-secretary for human rights, and still distinguished in Argentina, the late leader of former President Jimmy Carter records many documents that we can now read as having been declbadified . Some in the first deliveries and others are now known. Derian came to Argentina three times and received up to 5,000 reports of human rights violations in Argentina by the bloody military regime. It is Derian who made them known to the international community and even met Emilio Mbadera. In her latest writings, she has sent a document on the badistance programs of the International Committee of the Red Cross for Refugees and Prisoners in Argentina. For example, he says that in 1978, the ICRC visited some 4,000 Argentinian detainees in 32 detention centers to help them.

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Southern Command's activities

Confirmation is confirmed owned by Argentina at one of the commands of the Ministry of Defense that in 1975, he formed the Argentine Army, especially in Panama, where was built the emblematic school of the Americas. Assistance programs, for example in Latin America, reached $ 16.24 million that year.

Argentines have been one of the main beneficiaries of training programs. with Ecuadorians and Hondurans from the air academy. The documents show the high interaction of forces with command, as never before seen, with budgets, participation in training, the Argentine forces being one of the most involved in the region with Brazil and Bolivia.

The Montoneros obsession

Communications between the State Department and the CIA intense monitoring of the guerrillas, its terrorist attacks, its training, internal and external, as well as its search and repression.

For example, various cables dating from November 1979 titled Terrorism, Training in Montonero, and Plans of Operations in Argentina (coinciding with the first counter-offensive) record the arrest of a woman who attempted to cross the border. With an interference device In addition to having all the insignia of the group, he had a FAL rifle and the cable tells that the detained woman betrayed and drove the security forces to a group in the province of Córdoba. the "North Column", a group of seventeen people, according to the head of the attack against the house of the former Secretary of the Plan, Walter Klein.

At that time, intelligence sources in the United States, whose names were barred in the cables, indicate that "the main training ground of the combat unit is Lebanon, where they received training from the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) ". Informants pointed out that the group of combatants The Montoneros "were well trained, well disciplined" and efficient.

The telegrams of the State Department of 1979 also follow movements in Latin America and Europe. For example, he says that some militants (still considered terrorists in this jargon) without political indoctrination were still sent "to a base in Mexico", where they were "trained in propaganda, philosophy montonera" but without training military. Among the elements they use, there are TNT explosives, electronic devices of all kinds, French, Israeli, German, American, Chinese and Soviet weapons.

The cables also talk about the group's sites in Africa, who already knew the United States "The Argentine terrorist organization, The Montoneros, has changed the focus of activities in East Africa, the Tanzania in Maputo, Mozambique ", says one of the documents. And one of the reasons for their move was that the Tanzanian government refused to recognize the Argentineans as a movement of liberation and resistance, which put them in danger.

The killing of Francisco Soldati and other attacks

As shown by the cables, US officials believe that the attack on Walter Klein, Secretary of the Plan, Sept. 27, 79, "was only the beginning of a series of events. planned attacks against others, officials and facilities. "And he says that Argentine military intelligence "I was waiting for an attack" against the Minister of Economy José Alfredo Martínez de Hoz himself.

"But the increase in security measures has led the montoneros to change their mild attack in Klein," injured with his family during the brutal attack, but having survived. The two policemen who were in the garage died of asphyxiation during the explosion of the attack.

After a series of attacks that can be described as "unsuccessful" on the morning of November 13, 1979, the group committed a terrorist attack against Francisco Soldati, one of the men of 39, cases related to Minister Martinez de Hoz. And from the first moment, the cables that were secretly sent to the United States already understood that Montoneros was behind and explained it in detail.

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The attack, which took place in Cerrito, between Santa Fe Avenue and Arenales, began in the morning when the businessman's car was traversed by a truck that starts to shoot with men and women from the organization. The death of Soldati and his driver, also caused by the explosion of a grenade, is told in Washington in great detail that warns of how Montoneros is trained to "steal weapons and deposit them. in the country".

As Clarín has already published, the documents state many deaths of guerrillas, the ERP, as Santucho or Montoneros, as well as Horacio Mendizábal, one of the leaders, died of injuries caused by a clash with the police near the city. a supermarket in the province of Buenos Aires. "He was in a coma for several days," said an American source, "he could not be questioned," so there's "little information" about identities and projects "on the other active Montoneros.

Cuban support

The Castro government is present in the US intelligence activities, which however blocked or erased much information in the new distribution of documents.

In a memorandum of military intelligence containing information denied, however, it can be read that, in the "Cuban support to leftist nationalist movements", a Cuban diplomat saw "regularly with representatives of Movimiento Izquierda Revolucionaria de Chile". Biedma, kidnapped and disappeared in Buenos Aires, "He received $ 75,000 from a Cuban official to support IFOR activities in Argentina." According to the Americans, Cubans used their diplomatic presence to keep in touch with "terrorist groups" and Chileans in Argentina. By the way, the Cuban embbady has registered two officials killed by the dictatorship.

Learn more about El Cóndor

The new documents, as already reported by this newspaper, contain numerous references to the operation aimed at exterminating leftist opponents abroad. A CIA cable tells the meeting of the heads of the secret police of Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay and Uruguay in May 1976 to create a "new unit" intended to exterminate the leftists in Europe and other Latin American countries. The meeting took place in Chile and the new unit was called "Theseus" by Theseus, the Greek king who killed the Minotaur with pineapples.

"The agreement of the Condor countries to regulate their operations against subversive objectives" stipulated that each government (military regimes in reality) had to pay $ 10,000 for its operating costs. And they had to pay $ 200 "before the 30th of each month" as a fee. The dictatorship pact indicated that troops on mission needed a "viaticum" or a payment of $ 3,500 every ten days. And they also gave them $ 1,000 to buy clothes before starting their mission.

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The documents submitted this Friday in Argentina indicate that Europe was interested in the Condor plan and even "wanted to imitate". And they give as proof the visits to Buenos Aires of the intelligence services of France, the United Kingdom and the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG). They spoke here of "methods of establishing an anti-subjectivation organization similar to" Cóndor ", according to a CIA cable dated April 7, 1978. As this newspaper has already been published, the documents indicate that the Brazilian dictatorship did not want to participate in kidnapping opponents in Europe and that it prevented other South Americans from carrying out these activities.