Difference between revisions of "Left Wing Terrorism in Argentina"
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==Tragic Week== | ==Tragic Week== | ||
| − | ''"La Semana Tragica"'', or the tragic week, begins on January 7, 1919, when police launch a crack down on militant workers, who had been striking for several days, at the Vasrna Metallurigical plant, killing some. In retaliation, a general strike, backed by anarchists and syndicalists, was called for January 10 and 11. | + | ''"La Semana Tragica"'', or the tragic week, begins on January 7, 1919, when police launch a crack down on militant workers, who had been striking for several days, at the Vasrna Metallurigical plant, killing some. In retaliation, a general strike, backed by anarchists and syndicalists, was called for January 10 and 11. |
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| + | Placing the city under martial law, President Yrigoyen appointed Colonel Luis Dellepiane as the commander of riot control forces, after which disturbances subsided. The 5th and 12th Cavalry Regiments arrived on 12 January, and 300 marines and a mountain artillery regiment also entered Buenos Aires. On the morning of 13 January 1919, a group of anarchists attempted to seize arms and ammunition from a local police station but were forced to retreat after coming under fire from a marine detachment from the Argentine Navy Cruiser "San Martin". The role of young army lieutenant Juan Doming Peron, future president of Argentina, is disputed by historians. The leftist Vanguardia newspaper claimed that over 700 deaths were recorded on Tragic Week, as well as 2,000 injured. Professor Patricia Marchak estimates the total number of workers killed in the uprising and immediate aftermath at more than 100. The conservative La Nación newspaper reported the number of workers killed in the uprising at around 100 and 400 injured. The police forces suffered 3 killed and 78 wounded. | ||
==1920s violence== | ==1920s violence== | ||
Revision as of 01:14, August 8, 2018
From 1880-1930 the anarchist movement in Argentina existed relatively undisturbed in the main cities.
Tragic Week
"La Semana Tragica", or the tragic week, begins on January 7, 1919, when police launch a crack down on militant workers, who had been striking for several days, at the Vasrna Metallurigical plant, killing some. In retaliation, a general strike, backed by anarchists and syndicalists, was called for January 10 and 11.
Placing the city under martial law, President Yrigoyen appointed Colonel Luis Dellepiane as the commander of riot control forces, after which disturbances subsided. The 5th and 12th Cavalry Regiments arrived on 12 January, and 300 marines and a mountain artillery regiment also entered Buenos Aires. On the morning of 13 January 1919, a group of anarchists attempted to seize arms and ammunition from a local police station but were forced to retreat after coming under fire from a marine detachment from the Argentine Navy Cruiser "San Martin". The role of young army lieutenant Juan Doming Peron, future president of Argentina, is disputed by historians. The leftist Vanguardia newspaper claimed that over 700 deaths were recorded on Tragic Week, as well as 2,000 injured. Professor Patricia Marchak estimates the total number of workers killed in the uprising and immediate aftermath at more than 100. The conservative La Nación newspaper reported the number of workers killed in the uprising at around 100 and 400 injured. The police forces suffered 3 killed and 78 wounded.
1920s violence
On December 24, 1927, anarchists planted bombs at two U.S. bank branches in Buenos Aires resulting in the multiple injuries of twenty bank staff and customers.[1] The Italian Consulate in Buenos Aires was bombed on 23 May 1928 and seven were killed and nearly 50 wounded in the anarchist bombing.[2] On 24 December 1929, 44-year-old Italian-born anarchist Gualterio Marinelli was killed in his attempt to assassinate Argentine president Hipólito Yrigoyen but he manages to wound two policemen.[3] On September 6, 1930, Yrigoyen was deposed in a military coup led by General José Félix Uriburu.
Military crackdown
Throughout the 1930’s the Left Wing Radicals were weakened by the success of the Military Junta led by General José Félix Uriburu. The Uriburu regime shut down Anarchist and Communist presses and made it difficult, if not impossible, for anarchists to spread their ideals.[4]Uriburu ordered the mass deportation of Spanish and Italian workers that had joined the anarchists and the changing political, economic and social conditions "led to the decline of this movement, particularly in its manifestation within the labor movement".[5]
Nevertheless, on January 20 1931, three anarchist bombs went off at three strategic places on the Buenos Aires railway network, killing three and wounding 17.[6]
Dirty War
During the 1970s, leftist guerrillas caused at least 5,000 casualties among the military and police forces, according to a recent article by Spanish journalist Carmen Muñoz from Periódico ABC in 2011.[7]
Notes
- ↑ "U.S. Banks Bombed in Buenos Aires. Branches Of National City And Boston Concern Are Wrecked", The Sun, 25 December 1927.
- ↑ "7 Killed by Bomb in Buenos Aires", The Sun, 24 May 1928.
- ↑ "Argentine President Escapes Assassin. Three Shots Fired at Car of Yrigoyen in Capital Assailant, Killed by Guards, Said to Be an Italian Anarchist", Daily Boston Globe, 25 December 1929.
- ↑ Argentine Unions, the State & the Rise of Perón, 1930-1945, Joel Horowitz, p. 13, University of California, International & Area Studies, 1990
- ↑ Politics and the Labor Movement in Latin America, Víctor Alba, p. 44, Stanford University Press, 1968
- ↑ "Blasts Kill Three in Buenos Aires", New York Times, 21 January 1931.
- ↑ "El 70% de las 18.331 víctimas eran civiles apolíticos, por eso no reclamaron sus derechos al Gobierno. No se conocían, eran sindicalistas, jueces, judíos, católicos, extranjeros... El 30% eran uniformados agredidos en situación de descanso, por lo que son civiles según el derecho internacional." "Las víctimas del terror montonero no cuentan en Argentina", Periódico ABC, Carmen Muñoz, 28/12/2011