[Marxism] Good imperialists vs. evil governments of the oppressed, round 199

[Nestor Gorojovsky]

 >
 > However - and I would welcome Nestor's input here - I question your
 > assumption.  The junta's economic policies were already failing before
 > the war.  It's true that Galtieri resigned after the failure of his
 > war policy, but the junta was still in place.  What brought down
 > Bignone?

 > Wasn't it the economic struggle? And why do you believe that if
 > Argentina had won the war, all its economic problems would have gone
 > away and the working class would have been powerless?
 >
 > Lou Paulsen

I have committed myself not to broach Cloke´s issue any more. But I have 
not said a word on broaching Alfonsín, who has died yesterday and seems 
to have been making the headlines as the "father of Arg democracy" as 
"La nación", the old oligarchic newspaper in Buenos Aires, headlined today.

Such a father, such a democracy. We had to wage a battle of many years 
to begin to turn our "democracy" into an useful tool in the hands of the 
people here, and this has been the consequence of Alfonsín.

A democratic outcome had become inevitable after the defeat in Malvinas, 
but Louis Pa. is right in that sooner or later the regime was bound to 
fall down. The issue was whether it would fall down due to popular 
struggle, which was gaining momentum or due to some kind of imperialist 
concoction. In fact, before the Galtieri period, the most "democratic" 
thugs -led by General Viola, who had replaced Videla as Prez- attempted 
a negotiated return to "democracy" in the Chilean style. Their non 
expressed but obvious candidate to Presidency was the then president of 
the Radical Party (that is Alfonsín´s party).

The hawks in the regime eventually broke the Viola line, and in the end 
set the stage for the Malvinas issue. I strongly recommend the article 
in Spanish by Lacolla to those interested in more details. But they were 
duped by history (and, perhaps, by their "allies", who wanted to get rid 
of these uncomfortable "friends").

Then, and to begin with: Bignone was himself the result of a coup, a 
_defeatist coup within the armed forces_, against Galtieri. To follow 
up: the non declared but obvious candidate of those coup officers was 
_no other than Raúl Alfonsín_. Reasons why he defeated Peronism on 
elections are a most interesting issue. But not to be debated on this 
thread.

Maybe some day.