Torture, clandestine centers and prison: the plight of a survivor of the counteroffensive of Montonera

There was seven hours of hearing: a feat for an oral and public debate. Just a break to go to the bathroom or have a coffee, a family sitting listening to a crowded room in turn and a day marked by the strength of the testimonies: it was the sending of the trial for the first time. ;humanity "Counter-offensive Montonera" Federal Court Number 4 of San Martín, which has a 9 repressors of the last military dictatorship attributed to an unlawful deprivation of liberty, torture and murder committed between 1979 and 1980.

"We waited more than 30 years, it was a cause that was filed and now we live it with emotion, we have a year of debate, so we do not have to exhaust our energies", said in the corridors a relative of 94 victimstrying to stop the anxiety, in one of the short intervals that the judges had S away from Korvez, Matías Mancini and Esteban Rodríguez Eggers.

A few minutes ago, the members of the Tribunal had made a controversial decision: they had raised a demand for the defense and accepted the request to withdraw the 5 repressors who sat on the bench – the others were following the debate by video conference or were absent. hearing due to illness. The room remained in a climate of waiting that closed hours later with the testimony of Virginia Croattothird and last witness of the day.

Author of the documentary "La crèche", She recounted her own experience as a girl in a daycare in Cuba that housed the sons of the Montoneros. There his mother, Susana Brardinelli, was responsible for the place; while his father was killed in September 1979 in Argentina. In fact, Virginia Croatto said to be the daughter of a father killed by the dictatorship. Armando Daniel Croatto It was an image of the union section of the Peronist organization, a former national deputy of the government of Héctor Campora and who fell into the counteroffensive with another boss, Horacio Mendizábal, in a military ambush.

It was the end of an exhausting audience. It all started with the expected declaration of the former ruler of montonero Roberto Perdía. In a story of nearly two hours, "El Pelado", as he is known in the circles of political militancy, explained in detail the logistics of the strategic counteroffensive of Montonera and the his role in the conduct of exile.

Then it was the turn of Daniel Vicente Cabezas, survivor of the counter-offensive, testimony as dramatic as enlightening how the intelligence apparatus of the army worked against the Montoneros.

This trial puts the accent on the actions of the hierarchies of the battalions 601 and 201 of the intelligence and the command of the military institute, all based on operations in Campo de Mayo: Jorge Apa, Roberto Dambrosi, Raul Muñoz, Jorge Bano, Eduardo Ascheri, Carlos Casuccio, Luis Firpo, Alberto Sotomayor and Marcelo Cinto Courteaux.

Nobody could remain unaware of his story. Sober, accompanied by a brief, Cabezas appeared for over an hour about his abduction and his captivity. ButThe story is not detached from the family tragedy that began in May 1976 with the death of his brother Gustavo, activist of the Union of High School Students (UES). From that moment, his mother, Thelma, began her search. After forming bonds with other mothers, was one of the founders of the Association of Parents of Detainees and Missing Persons for Political Reasons. This would be the continuation of a fateful course: state terrorism has persecuted the Cabezas family with sun and shadow.

Daniel Cabezas was exiled to Mexico in September 1976 and began studying cinema. Shortly after, influenced by the political activism of his family, he joined the ranks of the Montonero Peronist Movement. From the outside, he was one of the architects denouncing the crimes of dictatorship in Argentina and participated in the printing of the magazine "Evita Montonera".

-We were very young, my brother was 17 when he was sucked. Me, "he told the court, between two sobs, his voice languishing in several parts of history.

-How did you join Montoneros? Asked the prosecutor Gabriela Sosti.

He knew what Montoneros meant and that armed struggle was an option. When I heard about the counter-offensive, I always made it clear that I was risking my life and that of my family. I wanted to go home, the military in Argentina, fight with my old wife in search of my brother.

– And in what way was integrated into the counter-offensive?

-I went to a meeting with Miguel Bonbado in a bar in Mexico. I explained to him that my specialty was the audiovisual world and he told me that he already had a lot of colleagues in this task, then he recommended me to stay in Mexico. But soon after, another possibility came up and I did not doubt it. I participated in the group that made propaganda and political unrest.

But Cabezas' life was interrupted when his mother was arrested. He says that in Mexico he had met with two political cadres as Adriana Lesgart and María Antonia Berger, "that for me they were heroes".

He took some water, looked at the judges and, after a long silence, said: "My mother had gone to Mexico to tell what was going on in the country and when she returned to Argentina they had kidnapped. I begin to spread in exile a campaign of denunciation for the disappearance of my mother near Alfredo Lireswho was my political leader. We took requests and did several actions with the participation of intellectuals, such as a letter that he wrote Julio Cortázar. I will not detail what they did with it, the ESMA case is all this information, and the repressors who tortured her are sentenced to life in prison"

In December 1979, Daniel entered Argentina with a fake document participate in the strategic counteroffensive. He did not do it alone: ​​he came in with his partner and also an activist, Nora Hilb, with their children and with two other partners. Clandestino, his mission was to print a book, "Montoneros, the path to liberation". He explains: "It was the first of several projects we wanted to publish, and we managed to distribute it, and I also participated in graffiti on the street with phrases like "Resist, it's win""

Cabezas wanted to stay in the country, but the secret life was arduous. "It took us a long time to find a job, I sold books and we barely collected the pieces." It was difficult to have a normal routine as activists in Argentina, the care were extreme. " On August 21, 1980, he was arrested at the door of his house. When they entered, his wife was gagged.

"They asked me names of clbadmates, like those of Graciela Álvarezof Alfredo Liresthe military even knew their nicknames. They took us to a police station first. They beat me with open hands in the ears or beat me to the belly to leave no trace when the police doctor interrogated me. "

He lived a long journey in different places of detention until his transfer to Campo de Mayo. "I thought they were going to kill me, I heard the crickets sing, I felt the wet grbad on my feet, the tortures continued".

An officer was in charge. He explained how he could commit suicide with a cigarette filter. "He'd said to me: 'I'm here not to kill you yourself', then he grabbed the filter and told me that I could turn it into a point," he said. We were ready to know what to say and what to do if we were detained. " .

Soon, they took him to Devoto prison, then to Caseros, to Rawson and finally, they sent him back to Devoto, where He was released in 1984. He could never recognize the faces of his captors, who used to walk in civilian clothes and not in uniform. "They named my mother, they said" the old woman ", so they knew that I was detained at ESMA.".

There was an extraordinary episode. Thelma Jara de Cabezas accumulates in the heavy backpack of his life one more stone: the distortion they intended to make of their history. A story where the gang of sailors of ESMA received the collaboration of publishing house Atlántida with a clear goal: to realize it in a fake interview of the magazine "Para Ti" as a repentant mother of Plaza from Mayo. And also, a mother in freedom, when they kept her kidnapped in the main clandestine center of the navy. The newspaper article published on September 10, 1979 under the title "Talk to the mother of a subversive dead", at the time of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) visited the country after the denunciations in exile for the crimes of the dictatorship. Thelma was released in December of the same year.

– You were waiting for the repressive actions of the army? ask a plaintiff solicitor.

–We knew that the army wanted to get information from us through torture. And now, after so many trials, we know the whole picture: torture, robbery, murder, rape. This group of soldiers who operated Montoneros must also be considered a betrayal of the country, because they did not respond to the nation but in the service of an economic plan developed by England and the United States. That is, they were subordinate to the service empire.

Cabezas admits to having asked for military training, but that the organization has prevented him. His role was limited exclusively to propaganda and agitation.

-J & # 39; was on the last step, but the commitment of all was the same. I had admiration for the paintings of Montoneros, a time when I knew Silvia Tolchinsky, whom I admired deeply, killing her partner and continuing to fight.

According to the witness, there was a "deep conviction" of the grbadroots activists to join the actions of the counter-offensive in Argentina.

–Nobody forced us. Montoneros was our life and our family He says, in a dry tone, and the applause of the hall closes his long testimony.