AS THE British battle fleet sails southwards, rumours circulate about the British use of Chilean ports against the Argentinians. Chile and Argentina are in conflict over the possession of three small islands south of the Beagle Channel, and in 1977 came close to The difficulties General Galtieri could be seized upon by the Chilean dictator, General Pinochet, to deliver a stab to Argentina's back.
Galtieri is the fourth general to hold the office president since the military coup in Argentina in 1976. The coup was the end product of a process which the workers uprising in Cordoba, the second dustrial centre, in 1969 the Ongania military regime.
Ongania had attempted to impose lasting authoritarian government, was acreated mobilisation of Argenimmensely strong labour movement. The revolt in Cordoba - the 'Cordobazo' was defeated by the army after three days of struggle, and followed by revolts other Argentinian cities.
Ongania resigned in 1970. ine generals who followed him decided on a process of partial return to civilian rule. But the elecLONS which followed resulted in the election of the Peronist candidate Dr Hector Campora first free elections for 20 years. Any hope of a civil military alliance to keep control went out of the window.
The resurgence Peronism was remarkable.
By Michael Baumann in Managua NICARAGUA is mobilising to defend its revolution against further blows from the United States.
In the space of Reagan's threats have up by the bombing of two bridges near the Honduran border, soldiers counterrevolutionary band.
workplaces throughout the country to discuss the gravity of the situation and the immediate meetings, held in brought together representatives of every single union in the city. Similar gatherings have taken place In olnel arcas Emergency t'on. food distribution. price control. information, are being set into place There is wide popular decisive reponse to the US-backed attacks, including. for the incas ulco establishing a state of emergency in the country 15 March.
a suspension or ine consurunon, news broadcasts on capitalist-owned radio stations. and ordered pre-publication review of all newspapers and periodicals. broadcast Was political parties and all other organisations.
thirty days, at which time they may be renewed il deemed necessary.
Socialist Challenge possibility of faced by Argentina's Peron himself was president of Argentina between 1945 and He mobilised the working class around a programme nationalist cevelrooment Balancine between the capitalists and une workels. le cabitanscu on the post-war conditions of international boom to satisfy both the workers' demands for better conditions and the bosses' demands for higher profits.
Using state control of the agricultural sector he able buy cheap from the landowners and international rio mind grain meat market. The surplus was pushed into industrial investment and workers living standards.
His ten year period in government thus became ooked upon as an idyllic period Argentinian history. After the Peronist electoral VICTORY limself was brought bac JITO BE xie in 1974 0 President. But Peron and, after his death, his widow, Isabel, were unable to repeat the operation of the original Peronist government.
BRITISH TERRITORY BRITISH BASE Rival claims by Chile, Argentina and Britain in Antartica After years of austerity, wages were allowed to rise. Consumption TOSC but exports declined. The economy went into a spin Sections Peronist movement both the main labour federation the CGT and the radicals of ne retonist vortn and une Monteneros opposed the government When the generals saw what was happening they decided that the 'democratic interlude' had gone far enough. The result was the military coup without mass opposition brought General Videla to Violence WuCO power in 1976.
Since that time the successive generals have used the threat of 'terrorism' in fact the guerrilla SANDWICH 1S SOUTH POLE FALKLAND IS ORKNEY IS SOUTH Signy Is.
SHETLAND IS. Orcadas i SANDWICHTS Rothera -farada ANTARCTICA Pinochet organisations were all but 1976 anyway acreatea by launch wave repression against LOC Argentinian workers. General Ongania, Argentinian dictator until 1970 Thousands have been murdered and 15,000 have 'disappeared' which means they have been secretly abducted and most Lasti tortured to death by the dictatorship General Galtieri's agallisi the Falk lands comes in the wake of the biggest wave or trade union demonstrations for manly ycals There IS nO doubt that it is directed towards creating national unity in the face of the Juan Peron, President of Argentina from 1945 to 1955, with his first wife Evita government's difficulties.
Pinochet is of course a much better known figure than Galtieri. Brought to power by the anti-Allende coup 1973, Pinochet's period Ill office ses summed up by the fact ten per cent of Chileans live in exile Chile is the country in which monetarism has been most systematically put into practice under the direct supervision Milton Friedman.
The result has been a widening gap between the mass of workers and . the and mee increasily poarand increasingly fluent middle class. periodic rumours to the contrary, at no stage has the regime made even tentative moves towards democratisation or a democratic interlude The torture and the repres sion remain as vicious as ever The betweel Argentina and Chile over UNUC uninhabited islands south of the Tierra del . ruego primarily a dispute over rival claims to sectors of the Antarctic potentially rich minerals. The islands pro tect a region of sovereign which the isting the could give one or other party a better legal basi for their respective claims Both the Chilean and Argentinian claims howoverlap Britain's. For Britain as well, control over the Falklands and South Georgia has a least strategic significance, an protec British cases claim Argentinian military personnel already in the Antarctic.
ing formed to aid the population in construcLa country where the battle for culture and literacy remains one of the highest brigades artists, per• teachers. and lournalists nave been formed to ensure support to the means of comaccurate news and historical acpaid to the critical task of guaranteeing continued supply In the large central markets where most food is sold, a major effort has been made to enrol individual market-stall proprietors in the militia and vigilance commit, and in some cases to fortify the markets been dụg at the Roberto Huembes outdoor market in Managua, where two-thirds of the proprietors have already Join. ed the militia or the Sandinista Defence ComPrice committees have also been established to ensure that no one takes advantage of the hike food In Managua's Eastern Market, thirty-four CDSs are already on duty for precisely this pursupermarkets. the superunion is fulfilling the same All of these steps are proceeding calmly, in a The watchword was given by a member of the Government of National Reconstruction, nationally televised matter; it also requires production, work, and above all That is what the country
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on two fishing vessels in Nicaraguan territorial waters, and the killing of