Talk:Dirty War

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Contents 1 Move 2 Merge 3 New article? 4 Category:Dirty War and disambiguation 5 Holiday Marking the Coup 6 Clean up tag (January 2007) 7 Rename (POV title) 8 MORE DISCUSSIONS ON REASONS FOR THE DIRTY WAR ARE REQUIRED

[edit] Move

Shouldn't we move this into Proceso de Reorganización Nacional??? Is almost the same thing and both are inextricably related.

If nobody comments, I'll merge them together and then move in 2-3 days...

--Sebastian Kessel ^Talk 22:17, 6 October 2005 (UTC)

I'm not sure about it. The Proceso didn't consist of just the Dirty War, and I think some would argue that the Dirty War started before (while Isabel Perón was still nominally in charge and Rasput... I mean López Rega was involved with the AAA and so on). I think each article should be trimmed to avoid too much overlap with the other. --Pablo D. Flores (Talk) 02:12, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

But the way the article is worded leads you to believe that. How about making the original parts of this a big nice paragraph on "Proceso"? --Sebastian Kessel ^Talk 02:48, 7 October 2005 (UTC)

Why not just merge Proceso de Reorganización Nacional and Dirty War to form a new article, like History of Argentina (1976-1983)? Alr 22:17, 15 October 2005 (UTC)

Not a bad idea, though I somehow fear the article will be almost exclusively about the Proceso. Besides, that and the Dirty War article are more or less "settled", linked from all over, etc. History of Argentina already links to them and to the Falklands War, I suppose. The conflict with Chile mediated by the Pope might also deserve a short article.

I'm thinking there might be some that consider that equalling (or implicitly equalling, with a redirect) "Dirty War" and "Proceso de Reorganización Nacional" is POV. The military might have done something good (though I'm hard pressed to find examples). Please, bear with me the next few days and I'll try to get drafts of the two articles, trimmed as I proposed; if you guys don't like them, then go ahead with the merge. --Pablo D. Flores (Talk) 14:47, 16 October 2005 (UTC)

I think we are missing a BIG point here. Proceso de Reorganización Nacional was not only the title of the official military goverment, but also the excuse for the coup (To reorganize the crumbling nation). In this article, things such as the economical decitions and corruption should be present. On the other hand Dirty War reffers to the not-admited persecution and repression of civilians, by the military, under command of the governing body. If the information of both articles overlaps, then moving certain things to the other might be reviewed, but under no circunstances should they be merged in one single article. Mariano(t/c) 07:35, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

I would leave the two articles as separate, linked items, as the "Military Process" that began in 1976 was just one phase of Argentina's broader civil conflict that included the military repression in Tucuman in 1975 and AAA operations from 1973 onwards. It is also important to relate the Dirty War to armed operations of anti-military guerrillas between 1969 and 1979. --Elgodosimp 14 January 2006

The term Dirty War has a special connotation and importance since it deal with the abuses of power during milatary rule, and even though it corresponds to the time of "Proceso.." it should be handed separatedly.

"Dirty War" is a very common term, as "years of lead" (used in Italy, in France, in Morroco, etc.) Proceso de Reorganización Nacional, on the other hand, is really "technical". And there is no reason for Wikipedia to endorse technical terms, which may also be - as in this specific case - propaganda terms. This is no "process of national reorganization", or as much as the "Third Reich" was supposed to last 1 000 years. Neither terms are really appropriate; maybe it should be moved to "Dirty War (Argentina)", which would be specific and would not obey to Jorge Rafael Videla's evil language. Tazmaniacs

In fact, it's "Dirty War" that is partial to Videla, and I suppose it relates to the need of the American governement to sell the crimes commited by their pet governments as part of a suposed "war". The "Dirty War" argument was the backbone of the military defense. They claimed they had been conducting a dirty war, but a war nonetheless, in wich they had had to come up with unorthodox methods, and then it was whitin their legal ability to carrying with those methods. As such, I very much take offense with this article being called "dirty war", even thought "dirty war" could redirect to the corresponding article, wich should be called "illegal repression". This change would not be POV since "illegal represion" was what the courts labeled it to be, and as such is inherently correct (inasmuch courts are who decide what is and what is not in agreement with the law). Moreover, it's the "Abuelas de Plaza de Mayo", and not "Madres de Plaza de Mayo", who claim for the dissapeared and appropiated children. "Mothers..." claim for the dissapeared themselves. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 201.250.227.151 (talk) 19:16, 22 December 2006 (UTC).

You are still mixing 2 different things: the military government, and the military repression. Even though one can be included in the other, they are not the same thing. For instance, the Proceso de Reorganización Militar brough a high economical debt to Argentina, while you can't say the same about the Dirty war. Mariano(t/c) 09:51, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

I agree with your comment. However, I'm sure some additional statements about Operation Condor, Guatemala, maybe Colombia's violencia, Uruguay and Paraguay dictatorships, and so on, could be included in the description of Dirty War. It is my understanding that this term refers to a period of Central & South American state terrorism characterized by anticommunism, starting from the late 1960s (Brazil) and continuing on until the end of the Sandinista government. Just as the Years of Lead, which was made to refer only to Morocco's year of leads, whilst the expression is used in Italy, in Turkey i think, and is common in French to design the European period characterized by left and right-wing terrorism (Italy, but also Germany and France), "Dirty War" is really a generic term which is not specific to Argentina. Tazmaniacs

I wouldn't merge them. "Dirty War" is a phenomenon that encompasses more territory than Argentina.-vap12

[edit] Merge

I believe the reasons for not merging are clear by now:

• there has been more than one dirty war (in fact, in w:es Guerra sucia is a disambiguation page);
• even in Argentina, the dirty war predated the beginning of the Proceso;
• even during the Proceso, government's actions did not consist solely in the dirty war.

I thus propose removing the merge tag. Taragüí @ 11:18, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

I agree. Mariano(t/c) 16:02, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

• So do I - OC wa not Argentina-only- removing now.24.127.115.13 07:17, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] New article?

The bulk of the article should definitely be transferred into a new "Dirty War(Argentina)" section. --—This unsigned comment was added by Valenciano (talk • contribs) 18:21, 27 February 2006.

[edit] Category:Dirty War and disambiguation

Content brought from talk page of WP:ARNB. Please continue discussion here, not there.

Given the date, I started to work on this complex topic and was lost in categories. Every article on the Dirty War, the Proceso and their participants has a bunch of these, which I think should point to one Category:Dirty War and sister categories/subcategories. I believe we should draw a nice category tree where we can make our Videlas, Galtieris and Astizes fit without so much wordiness. Also, the general categories of Category:Criminals don't include many suitable subcats. --Pablo D. Flores (Talk) 14:02, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

I like the idea of a category. Probably Category:Dirty War will be good enough for the time being. No need for Category:Dirty War victims or Category:Dirty War criminals (at least not yet). Mariano(t/c) 14:55, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

Past discussion in Talk:Dirty War and a recent comment mention that "dirty war" is a common term in other places and that "our" article should be called Dirty War (Argentina). Now I'm all for preemptive disambiguation, but I haven't seen anything about the Dirty Wars of other LA countries. Is it presumptuous to guess that most people who look for "Dirty War" are in fact looking for the Argentine one? I'm bringing this up because the objection has been made and, if we have to move all links from one title to the other (tiring!), I don't want to have to do the same with the category too. --Pablo D. Flores (Talk) 14:51, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm a North American with, I think, a fair layman's grasp of Latin American history. If I hear "Dirty War" without further qualification, I presume Argentina. Otherwise, I'd expect to hear it qualified (e.g. "Dirty War in Guatemala"). -- Jmabel | Talk 06:49, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

Since nobody has said anything else, I've gone and moved this to the new Category:Dirty War. Please help recategorize the rest of the articles belonging there. —Pablo D. Flores (Talk) 21:22, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

In fact, it's "Dirty War" that is partial to Videla, and I suppose it relates to the need of the American governement to sell the crimes commited by their pet governments as part of a suposed "war". The "Dirty War" argument was the backbone of the military defense. They claimed they had been conducting a dirty war, but a war nonetheless, in wich they had had to come up with unorthodox methods, and then it was whitin their legal ability to carrying with those methods. As such, I very much take offense with this article being called "dirty war", even thought "dirty war" could redirect to the corresponding article, wich should be called "illegal repression". This change would not be POV since "illegal represion" was what the courts labeled it to be, and as such is inherently correct (inasmuch courts are who decide what is and what is not in agreement with the law). Moreover, it's the "Abuelas de Plaza de Mayo", and not "Madres de Plaza de Mayo", who claim for the dissapeared and appropiated children. "Mothers..." claim for the dissapeared themselves. Sebastián —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 201.250.227.151 (talk • contribs) 16:18, 22 December 2006.

Sebastián, please sign using four tildes (~~~~). Regarding the last part, you can correct the article if it's wrong; you needn't note it if it's clearly the case. About the name: the Wikipedia policy on article names is that we should use a form in common use, which is recognizable, natural, easy to link, etc. Moreover, "the current title of a page is not intended to imply that either the title name is preferred or the alternative name is discouraged in the text of articles." The term "Dirty War" is immediately recognizable to English-language readers, and it's the direct translation of the term used throughout the Spanish-speaking world to name that period of Argentine history.

Now, if there's a historian or a human rights group or a court ruling that explicitly disagrees with the use of the term, please show that, and we can add a note to the article explaining that "the use of the word 'war' is contested by XYZ on the basis that this was not a war, but illegal repression of dissidence combined with state terrorism; cf Theory of the two demons". In the trial of Miguel Etchecolatz a judge used the term "genocide", but AFAIK he spoke of the systematic workings of the Proceso, not of the Dirty War (which started earlier). —Pablo D. Flores (Talk) 20:04, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Regarding the first part of your answer, about the name, the fact is that "dirty war", in Argentina, is a politically charged term. It's not widely used, but in fact it's only used by the supporters of the "Proceso", being vocally opposed by the state, human rights groups, the courts, and the victims themselves. It is, in fact, widely used in english-speaking countries, but that is because that was what the Reagan administration called it, following such caracterization by the argentine junta.

As for the second part, regarding explicit disagreement with the use of the term, I can quote the final statements of the prosecution in the trial to the military junta (http://www.nuncamas.org/juicios/juntas/acusa.htm, in spanish) regarding the inadequacy of the term "dirty war", rejecting that there was a war, that the term "dirty" has some legal significance whatsoever, and that no exceoptional causes justified the disappearances. Moreover, and more importantly, I can quote the entire sixth part of the sentence in the same trial, specifically items b.1.3, a.1,a.3, 4 being extremelly relevant, as it analyzes the concept of "revolutionary war", and concludes there was no such thing, (in http://www.desaparecidos.org/arg/doc/secretos/conde.html, in spanish).

This is why I think redirecting "dirty war" to "illegal repression" or "state terrorism" would allow english speakers to access the article and, at the same time, use the correct (and, moreover, legally stated) name for such process. 201.250.221.25 17:04, 23 December 2006 (UTC)Sebastián

In general, being "widely used in English-speaking countries" is a strong reason to have it as a title. And you can't seriously claim that only defenders of the Proceso use the term "guerra sucia"; that's simply not true. There's no way to measure that, but as a sample, it's used in desaparecidos.org, in the Ministry of Education website, in derechos.org (reviewing the trial of Julio Simón), in this Clarín article, and in many other places. In some places it's used in "scare quotes", and in others it's explicitly stated that the term was favoured by the military; but like it or not, it has stuck. The title doesn't imply support for the view, and the title need not be an exact court-sanctioned description of what the article is about; "illegal repression" is so broad as to be useless, and "state terrorism" is a horribly loaded term; both things need qualification ("State terrorism in Argentina in the mid-1970s and early 1980s"?). Moreover, "state terrorism" may or may not cover the AAA and Montoneros (and I predict an endless and bitter argument over that).

I'd rather see other editors' POV in addition to ours. This article has a high profile and shouldn't be renamed lightly (or stay wrongly named). I notice a lot less activitiy lately, possibly because everybody's hot and/or on vacation. Please, let's wait a bit more. —Pablo D. Flores (Talk) 19:53, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

English-speaker USian here. First, this is a hard question, and I agree with Pablo-flores that we should go slow & generate more opinions than 2 or 3, and consensus. Second, my preliminary reactions to the discussion thus far: Tentatively, it seems best to me to use "Dirty War" as the article head for this (Argentine) article, because it has a specific and recognized meaning in English-speaking world. "Dirty War in X" should be used for non-Argentine dirty wars. I understand, and sympathize with, the concern about the historical provenance of the term "dirty war". But regardless of its historical provenance, it seems that's the most common term in the Eng-speaking world. BUT the historical provenance / naming concerns should be addressed right up front, with a sentence in the intro paragraph, and then more detailed discussion in the article. ... If there's significant usage of both "Dirty War" and other specific terms, then I think it would be reasonable to pick the one that has historically neutral provenance. ("Preliminary reactions" because I'm willing to be persuaded.... This is a hard question.) --lquilter 20:45, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Sebastian for pointing us these quotes. Do not hesitate in editing yourself, as per Wikipedia:Be bold (I've had a quick look at the documents you've provided, but haven't got the time yet to become familiar with them). Saludos! Tazmaniacs 02:10, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Holiday Marking the Coup

Might be worth mentioning the recent creation of a holiday marking March 24, 1976 coup by the current Argentine congress, and the huge march that happened on that day March 24, 2006. Also the current efforts by Kirchner to challenge the 1990 pardon for former junta leaders.

The new holiday has been mentioned, but there's still some pretty delicate work to do regarding Kirchner's stance on the Dirty War, more than devoting just one paragraph to it. —Pablo D. Flores (Talk) 21:22, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Clean up tag (January 2007)

I've put a clean-up tag, this is an important subject which deserves better treatment. The article is not clear (too many individual additions, but things don't just sum up). I've corrected numbers, but it should start by clearly stating that 30,000 people were "disappeared" between 1976 and 1983 — and not only 11,000, as recensed in 1983 by the CONADEP (who only registered cases proved on an individual basis: as in Chile, because of the very nature of "disappearance", it is quite difficult getting each person's individual life and death registered). More than twenty years have passed between 1983 and today, and we should use today's numbers. Furthermore, beside simple copy-edit (in particular to go to the point and reduce words a maximum - average reader's concentration, especially on Wikis, is low), the article should not ignore the period between 1973 and 1976, starting by the Ezeiza massacre. Disappearances began before Videla, under Isabel Peron's rule, who has just been arrested in Madrid. Finally, it is a complete right-wing bias to claim that the Dirty War was a legitime offensive against guerrillas: most victims were not guerrilleros, and the Dirty War responded to a complex and active social environment, and made possible a neoliberal adjustment of the country which would not have been so easy if trade-unions and the global population wasn't terrified. This article needs the attention of a specialized historian: meanwhile, the most blatant mistakes must be corrected. Sources are welcome. Tazmaniacs 01:25, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

You should provide sources first, then change the numbers. I was about to revert everything, but I saw there were sourced data. CONADEP said 9,000 and I've never heard otherwise; moreover, I wasn't aware that CONADEP had investigated the Peronist governments (I'm pretty sure they didn't). You shouldn't quote estimated numbers as facts, or speculate about the methods of CONADEP, or denounce that the article has a bias because it doesn't have your bias. The messy style can be corrected later; let's first concentrate on getting our facts right. Same goes for CONADEP. —Pablo D. Flores (Talk) 01:38, 2 February 2007 (UTC)*

[edit] Rename (POV title)

I recall Wikipedia:Naming conflict guidelines here:

"Descriptive names - Choose a descriptive name for an article that does not carry POV implications. For instance, what do we call the controversy over Qur'an handling at Guantanamo Bay? The article is located at Qur'an desecration controversy of 2005. Note that the title makes no statement about who is the (more) guilty party: it does not "give away" that conclusion; in fact the article itself draws no conclusion. Similarly, the article on the September 11, 2001 attacks does not assign responsibility for the attacks in the article name."

The term "Dirty War", as one contributors here-above pointed out a few months above, is POV. It was used by the junta itself to claim that although "dirty", it was a "war", with the obvious "the end justify the means" saying in mind. However, "war" is not a neutral term (the Algerian War was called by French government a "public order operations" until the 1990s, and you may see the Wikipedian conflict concerning the 2006 war in Lebanon against Hezbollah, a conflict which reflected the US media's late use of the word - while French media used the term "war" very quickly, showing different perspectives). As the 1985 Trial of the Juntas pointed out, there was no state of war. The repression targeted civilians, not belligerents. Thus, law aspects differs. This is important, as minor officers involved in illegal acts would be judged "irresponsible" if they were in a state of war, when what is considered as a crime in peacetime is accepted by laws of war (those who read French or Flemish may see in the Belgian parliamentary report concerning the Belgian stay-behind network a juridical discussions about the laws of war, state of war and peace-time). Finally, "Dirty War", although it seems in English to refers mainly to the repression in Argentina, is a generic term that may and is used in different circumnstances (Turkey, but even more broadly, the Algerian War was also qualified of being a "Dirty War", with, as far as I know, the intent of denouncing torture & crimes committed by the French Army - and not at all of justifying them!). I guess the case doesn't need much more arguing. The problem now would rather be what title to choose? Human rights abuses during the Argentine military junta might be something to go on, as it is NPOV, and rather coherent with other articles such as Human rights and the United States. Furthermore, it would also envisions the creation of a broader article Human rights and Argentina, which could deal about this topics without being confined to this time-period (recent disappearances of Jorge Julio López, etc. - This article by Reporters Without Borders is one source to work on). Thanks for input, que le vayan bien a tod@s ! Tazmaniacs

Thanks for feedback, greetings! Tazmaniacs 18:52, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] MORE DISCUSSIONS ON REASONS FOR THE DIRTY WAR ARE REQUIRED

Only briefly does this article mention that the Argentine government was faced with communist revolutionaries operating in Che Guevera style guerilla warfare campaigns. What of the people who were afraid of these communist thugs? What about the many killed by them? The entire term "Dirty War" is non-neutral point of view - it is the point of view of communists. To the victims of communism throughout Latin America, this war was seen as a major campaign against a destructive and violent political ideology. And further - it was the communists who refused to wage their war in clear terms, and instead resorted to guerilla warfare. 1,500 dead is nothing in such a battle. Certainly, the Americans have killed far more civilians than that just in attempting to secure Baghdad. In reality, the number is so small because the Argentine people - then as now - reject communism, unlike the people of Iraq who are fighting for their freedom from foreign military powers.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 72.89.214.69 (talk • contribs).

The article is about the Dirty War. If you whish to add more (sourced!) information to the other side of the war, do so at the appropiate articles (e.i. Montoneros), but avoid subjective comments such as "Argentine people - then as now - reject communism". --Mariano(t/c) 13:13, 26 March 2007 (UTC)