Description
Foreword
This work has had two great “motors”: curiosity and indignation.
Curiosity was born in 1983, when I began to work on the subject
of the war conflict with Lieutenant General Galtieri.
I read and studied absolutely all the documentation about the events.
Not a word, nor a testimony nor a document told me that the Argentine government of that time planned to land in the Malvinas in April 1982. There was no choice, then, but to investigate from the British side.
And what a surprise! Not only the motives and interests, but the facts that were concatenated one by one, in a perfect harmonious relationship that would lead to the conflict of twelve years ago.
That first work was outlined in 1985 and as time went by, it was completed through the knowledge of facts that only confirmed the initial work.
From this point of view, the best lawyers that Lieutenant General Galtieri has had have been the British themselves. Finally, part of all this was presented before the Federal Chamber of the Federal Capital, in 1988.
Outrage has been the other “driver.”
Not only motivated by historical circumstances, which produce “anger”
knowing that they are in possession of our claimed dream, to which they are, undoubtedly, alien. It is also motivated by what we have done with the honor of three men who found themselves in an unintended historical situation and had no choice but to confront it.
With dignity, with patriotism.
They have not deserved nor do they deserve, by the way, the dishonor in which they wanted to be immersed.
Malvinas/82 is a deep pain.
As the poet would say, “in the throat, in the heart, in the memory.” But it is
also Unique Flag. Just as he left us a National Army, just as he left us heroes who walk among us, he has also left us a Spirit that today is—unfortunately—dispersed.
May God hope that this work reaches every Argentine through their reason to truly understand what happened. And may God also wish that, once the facts are understood, that Argentine picks up the cockade that he had put on on April 2 and took off on June 14 and pins it again on his chest, because that is where it should be.
Now that everyone has spoken.
Now that it seems that everything has been said. Now that they are calm.
Now it seems there is nothing to add.
Now that the victory seems to be absolute.
Now that they have managed to make shame, sorrow and oblivion flood us. Now, at this very moment, twelve years later.
Now, it is the time of Truth.
Introduction
The main task that will be developed in this work is to explain, after twelve years of occurrence, the events that led to the war conflict of 1982.
The outbreak of said war between the Argentine Republic and Great Britain is due to causes, motives and interests totally different from those that the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces and the National Court of Criminal and Correctional Appeals of the Federal Capital have collected as elements of charge to sentence the members of the Military Junta: lieutenant general
(RE) Leopoldo Fortunato Galtieri, admiral (RE) Jorge Isaac Anaya and brigadier general (RE) Basilio Arturo Ignacio Lami Dozo.
We will see that the conflict with Great Britain has nothing to do with the intentions of these men at the beginning of 1982. We will see that the conflict with Great Britain was neither sought nor unleashed by the Argentine Republic. We will see that the landing in the Malvinas Islands on April 2, 1982 was an act of defense. We will see that the history of events since the beginning of 1982 is interrupted with the incident that occurred on the South Georgia Islands, and from there on another story begins.
We will see, in summary, that the sentence applied, first by the Military Court and then by the Court of Second Instance, to Galtieri, Anaya and Lami Dozo, has not deepened the study of facts that are fundamental to analyze what happened in 1982.
The factual assessment on which the charges have been proven has been erroneous. The supposedly logical concatenation of circumstances has been erroneous. A rigorous and reasoned chain of events has not been applied; facts have been taken for granted in a partial and isolated manner; antecedents and consequences have not been taken into account. And furthermore, they have been taken out of context; That is to say, facts constituting charges have been considered proven, without having explained them in the set of circumstances in which they occurred.
In addition to the conviction that all the facts that have been judged comprise a political decision and that therefore they are not susceptible to justiciability, as explained before the Federal Chamber by the prestigious criminal expert Dr. Luis Berkman, it is appropriate to analyze the events that gave rise to the trial of the members of the Military Junta. The Military Court, in its ruling, stated that the decision to occupy the islands, that is, the landing in the Malvinas on April , is a “government” or “political act”, not subject to jurisdictional control, but they are The “preparatory acts of the political decision to occupy the islands” and the “subsequent execution of the decision” can be judged.
All the reasoning carried out in this regard has been wrong. There were simply no preparatory acts based on the political decision to land in the Malvinas on April 2, 1982. As for the “acts of execution of the decision”, they are neither more nor less than the product of a state of necessity and legitimate defense, as a result of the aggression of Great Britain in March-April 1982, an argument that was rejected by the Military Court.
The Attorney General of the Armed Forces, opportunely, when presenting his request (Body 30, page 3557 of the process), in his “General presentation of the facts”, points 1, 2, 3, 5, and 12, recognizes the British aggression and recognizes having fought a defensive war; This statement is not deepened, the factual support is not investigated and, therefore, it remains exhausted in itself.
On the other hand, the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, in its ruling, Considering No 39 (Body 45, page 9764), states: “…it is not possible to put forward a case of legitimate defense against an aggression caused by an unspecified threat, lacking entity in the face of the interests at stake.” Faced with these statements that appear to be so forceful, but that in reality do not correspond to what really happened, it is then essential to frame the events correctly within the sequence in which they occurred, in order to then interpret them considering their causes, the antecedents and the consequences.
What, then, is the general line of reasoning that has been used regarding the events of 1982? It is this:
1st Lieutenant General Galtieri, together with his comrades from the Navy and Air Force, planned—starting in the first weeks of 1982—a military operation that would allow the Argentine Republic to recover the island territories of the South Atlantic.
This planning was carried out, in practice, on April 2, 1982. The “after” of the taking of the islands, that is, their defense, was not planned, as a result of the military reaction not having been foreseen. British.
2nd On the occasion of the incident that occurred in the month of March 1982 on the South Georgia islands (an incident that is not clear to many, to such an extent that it is confused with an Argentine action - "Operation Alpha" -, which could have served as justification to disembark in the Malvinas), the opportunity was taken advantage of and what was already planned was carried out on April 2.
3rd As a result of said operation and having produced a British military reaction of magnitude, not foreseen by the Military Junta, and due to the negligent and improvident behavior of its members, the war conflict occurred that culminated in the fall of Puerto Argentino on the 14th. June 1982.
This is, in brief, the general reasoning underlying the investigation carried out by what is commonly known as the “Rattenbach Commission.” That is to say, the intentionality in the conduct of the three former commanders, distributed as follows:
planning: “preparatory acts”, viij
the disembarkation: “political decision”,
subsequent military events: “acts of execution.”
This structure of reasoning, this preconception, is present in the preliminary investigation carried out by the “Rattenbach Commission” (CAERCAS), it is present in the interrogations carried out by the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces, in the formulation of the questions of fact and in the sentence; Also, why not mention it, it is the version accepted by public opinion about the facts.
All of this reasoning, from the beginning to the ruling of the Federal Court, is wrong. History is another.
Perhaps it would even be worth mentioning here the verses from a popular Argentine song—and which can be applied to the official British report on the conflict—which express: “If History is written by those who win, that means that there is another History.” The task, then, is to narrate that other History - the true one - on evidence and evidence added at the time to the process, and not taken into account at the time (such as the Report of the former commanders in chief), or whose aggregation was requested and was not granted by the Military Court (like the so-called Franks Report).
The narrative will be covered based on the following assumptions:
1st The planning that was ordered towards the end of 1982 and beginning of 1982 had no planned execution date; much less in the immediate; much less with a view to April 2, 1982. This will destroy the concept of what are called—by the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces—“preparatory acts.”
2nd The Georgias incident, in March 1982, was the “trigger” of the situation. This incident was not caused by the Argentine Republic and is not the implementation of “Operation Alpha”. This incident was the beginning of another History, from the moment that, magnified by Great Britain, it was used to justify aggression. It also created a state of necessity and legitimate defense for the Argentine Republic.
3rd There is no such magnitude British “reaction”. There is a British aggressive action planned for a long time. From this point of view, we will develop how Great Britain leads events towards a war confrontation in the South Atlantic and why it does so (which will lead us to study British interests and motives).
All this with the citations of events prior to 1982 and in some cases later, which will allow us to unravel the truth and explain some events whose scope – at the time of their occurrence – was not glimpsed. The development of this third point will allow us to understand why the Argentine landing in the Malvinas on April 2, 1982 was a defensive act and why subsequent events are justified in a context of a state of necessity and legitimate defense.
We will then begin the task, developing point by point.
