'Dirty War' protesters' remains found

[Judi Lynn]

Posted 7/8/2005 10:34 PM Updated 7/8/2005 11:35 PM

'Dirty War' protesters' remains found
By Bill Cormier, Associated Press

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina — Investigators have recovered the remains of the woman who founded a legendary protest group against Argentina's Dirty War, nearly three decades after she was abducted, officials said Friday.
The remains of Azucena Villaflor and two colleagues were recently unearthed from a rural cemetery and identified through DNA tests, forensic anthropologist Carlos Somigliana said.

Villaflor helped to found the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, which emerged during the country's 1976-83 crackdown on dissent. The group has continued since then to demand an accounting of loved ones who disappeared.

More than 12,000 people died during the military junta's fight against leftists known as the "Dirty War" and the vast majority have never been found or identified. But the now-graying Mothers in their famous white handkerchiefs shouted for justice Friday following the announcement.

"We will not forget, we will not forgive! Punishment for those responsible!" the mothers chanted, tearfully hugging each other after the report by anthropologist Carlos Somigliana and his team.
(snip/...)

http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2005-07-08-argentina-remains_x.htm

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The Mothers of Plaza de Mayo

A group of women who became a symbol of human rights activism and courage. Dressed in black, they have been demonstrating for years every Thursday at 3:30 in the afternoon, in the famous Plaza de Mayo in Buenos Aires, demanding to know the fates of their loved ones. Marching around the statue of liberty, in front of the presidential palace, they used to tie white hadkerchiefs imprinted with names of disappeared sons and daughters, around their heads, and carry signs emblazoned with photographs of those about whose destinies they sought information. The Mothers' use of the imagery of Christian motherhood made them particularly effective against the professedly Catholic military regime.

The mothers are a symbol of courage; leading the struggle for justice, they started their demonstrations while the junta was still in power. Several of them, including their founder, Azucena Villaflor de Vicenti, disappeared themselves as a result.
(snip/)

http://www.yendor.com/vanished/madres.html



~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

KISSINGER TO ARGENTINES ON DIRTY WAR:
"THE QUICKER YOU SUCCEED THE BETTER"

Newly declassified documents show Secretary of State
gave green light to junta, Contradict official line that
Argentines "heard only what wanted to hear."

While military dictatorship committed massive
human rights abuses in 1976, Kissinger advised
"If you can finish before Congress gets back, the better."




U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger meets with
Argentine foreign minister, Admiral Cesar Augusto Guzzetti,
on October 7, 1976 (Photo courtesy of Clarín.com
(Argentina), http://old.clarin.com/diario/2003/12/04/p-
01001.htm)

Washington, D.C., 4 December 2003 - Newly declassified State Department documents obtained by the National Security Archive under the Freedom of Information Act show that in October 1976, Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and high ranking U.S. officials gave their full support to the Argentine military junta and urged them to hurry up and finish the "dirty war" before the U.S. Congress cut military aid. A post-junta truth commission found that the Argentine military had "disappeared" at least 10,000 Argentines in the so-called "dirty war" against "subversion" and "terrorists" between 1976 and 1983; human rights groups in Argentina put the number at closer to 30,000.


The new documents are two memoranda of conversations (memcons) with the visiting Argentine foreign minister, Admiral Cesar Augusto Guzzetti - one with Kissinger himself on October 7, 1976. At the time, the U.S. Congress was about to approve sanctions against the Argentine regime because of widespread reports of human rights abuses by the junta.
(snip/...)

http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB104/

[cynatnite]

1. Wow! Incredible!

Thank you for posting this. May justice finally be served.

[drduffy]

2. Kissinger

was and is slime. And here's wishing you a happy aneurysm, K. Preferably leading to a persistent quasi-vegetative state .... just enough to leave you conscious of what's happening to you.

[Merope215]

3. Jim Lehrer once said

that political satire became obsolete when Kissinger was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

This is a very sad story, and I'm glad some of it is finally beginning to come to light.

[blogslut]

4. We've been fucking with

Central America for decades. We fuck with all of the smaller countries all over the world.

Doesn't anybody get it yet?

None of this has ever been about protecting us or them. It's never been about spreading Democracy or freedom. It's been about keeping these little nations in utter chaos so they'll never be autonomous. An autonomous nation isn't as exploitable as one run by a tyrant or a thug.

[me b zola]

8. Under the thumb of the US

Reading 'Confessions of an Economic Hit Man' connected the dots for me, including why Wolfawitz was chosen to run the World Bank.


Bless these mothers who have been demanding answers for so long.

[WhiteTara]

14. you forgot

while sucking all the natural resources they could find and steal.
:grr:

[ReadTomPaine]

5. Now playing worldwide, courtesy of John Negroponte.

Current photo of the CIA Torture plane used for "extraordinary rendition". Notice the new registration number - the former one was N379P

Jet Is an Open Secret in Terror War

By Dana Priest
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, December 27, 2004; Page A01

The airplane is a Gulfstream V turbojet, the sort favored by CEOs and celebrities. But since 2001 it has been seen at military airports from Pakistan to Indonesia to Jordan, sometimes being boarded by hooded and handcuffed passengers.

The plane's owner of record, Premier Executive Transport Services Inc., lists directors and officers who appear to exist only on paper. And each one of those directors and officers has a recently issued Social Security number and an address consisting only of a post office box, according to an extensive search of state, federal and commercial records.

Bryan P. Dyess, Steven E. Kent, Timothy R. Sperling and Audrey M. Tailor are names without residential, work, telephone or corporate histories -- just the kind of "sterile identities," said current and former intelligence officials, that the CIA uses to conceal involvement in clandestine operations. In this case, the agency is flying captured terrorist suspects from one country to another for detention and interrogation.

The CIA calls this activity "rendition." Premier Executive's Gulfstream helps make it possible. According to civilian aircraft landing permits, the jet has permission to use U.S. military airfields worldwide.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A27826-2004Dec26?language=printer

[Monkie]

6. and THIS is why i don't believe the Al-Qaida BS,where is the blowback from

South-America Vietnam Philippines or just about anywhere else the American foreign policy machine went on the rampage.
If all the darkskinned people really are terrorists white people would be dying like flies.
when people where exposing the likes of Kissinger in the 70's and 80's they where ridiculed as conspiracy theorists. *frustrated* :P

[Judi Lynn]

7. The "terrorist" label is the label developed to replace the "commie" label

Since Reagan and the Republicans have taken responsibility for wiping the terrifying "commies" off the face of the earth, and crowning themselves Rulers of the Universe, they have learned they still have a few pockets of resistance, and have to manufacture stories and labels for the remaining people living on land they want to control.

Gotta demonize them first, to justify destroying them.

You're right about the war which has been ongoing against any domestic resistance to right-wing agression. It's indefensible.

[UpInArms]

24. Kissinger labeled them "terrorists"

http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB73/index3.htm

Washington, D.C., 21 August 2002 - State Department documents released yesterday on Argentina's dirty war (1976-83) show that the Argentine military believed it had U.S. approval for its all-out assault on the left in the name of fighting terrorism. The U.S. Embassy in Buenos Aires complained to Washington that the Argentine officers were "euphoric" over signals from high-ranking U.S. officials including then-Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.

The Embassy reported to Washington that after Mr. Kissinger's 10 June 1976 meeting with Argentine Foreign Minister Admiral Guzzetti, the Argentine government dismissed the Embassy's human rights approaches and referred to Kissinger's "understanding" of the situation. The current State Department collection does not include a minute of Kissinger's and Guzetti's conversation in Santiago, Chile.

On 20 September 1976, Ambassador Robert Hill reported that Guzzetti said "When he had seen SECY of State Kissinger in Santiago, the latter had said he 'hoped the Argentine Govt could get the terrorist problem under control as quickly as possible.' Guzzetti said that he had reported this to President Videla and to the cabinet, and that their impression had been that the USG's overriding concern was not human rights but rather that GOA 'get it over quickly'."

After a second meeting between Kissinger and Guzzetti in Washington, on 19 October 1976, Ambassador Robert Hill wrote "a sour note" from Buenos Aires complaining that he could hardly carry human rights demarches if the Argentine Foreign Minister did not hear the same message from the Secretary of State. "Guzzetti went to U.S. fully expecting to hear some strong, firm, direct warnings on his government's human rights practices, rather than that, he has returned in a state of jubilation, convinced that there is no real problem with the USG over that issue," wrote Hill.

...more...

[Judi Lynn]

25. It's hard to believe, even now, that labeling everyone else "terrorists"

goes back that far! He seems to have been "ahead of his time" as most of us were still thinking of everyone left of right-wingers as being simple "commies," the term which, through misuse, carried the implication of baby-eating, eye-gouging terrorists.

The last document in that series was also worth examing, in showing the amazingly abrupt change in the U.S. Government's relationship with these Argentinian government cretins as soon as Jimmy Carter was elected.

That one would show ANYONE there is a grand difference between Democrats and the Horde of Deviant Imbeciles.

[mahina]

10. Me too, but this reminds me we struggle not just for ourselves but for the

rest of the world. We have a chance to be that shining city on a hill that is in our hearts but we have a lot of bad shit to reconcile, and stop. I really think when the American people got saturated with TV and advertising we just stopped paying attention to what our government was doing, and this, and El Salvador, and Chile, and Nicaragua, and Cambodia, and Laos, and horror in poor countries all over the world was the cost born. By others of course. We were too busy.
Lets wake up from this nightmare and be America again.
Lets not fall asleep again as soon as we get a Democrat in the White House. We have a debt to pay.

[mahina]

9. Nominated, thank you...remembering the mujer desaparacida in Chile as well

and how they kicked Pinochet OUT.
A heartening and instructive film, "A Force More Powerful" documents how this was done against a seemingly overwhelmingly powerful tyrant.

We can do it too people.

[Judi Lynn]

13. Thanks for the documentary title. I really need to see it. n/t

[mahina]

17. Here's where to get it, I want a copy in every library in America.

http://www.thepeacecompany.com/store/prod_audio_aforcemorepowerful.php
A Force More Powerful

"When people decide they want to be free. There is nothing that can stop them." -Desmond Tutu

A Force More Powerful is a two-part documentary series on one of the 20th century’s most important and least known stories—how non-violent power overcame oppression and authoritarian rule. In South Africa in 1907, Mohandas Gandhi led Indian immigrants in a nonviolent fight for rights denied them by white rulers. The power that Gandhi pioneered has been used by underdogs on every continent and in every decade of the 20th century, to fight for their rights and freedom.

In the 1960s, Gandhi’s nonviolent weapons were taken up by black college students in Nashville, Tennessee. Disciplined and strictly nonviolent, they successfully desegregated Nashville’s downtown lunch counters in five months, becoming a model for the entire civil rights movement.
In India in the 1930s, after Gandhi had returned from South Africa, he and his followers adopted a strategy of refusing to cooperate with British rule. Through civil disobedience and boycotts, they successfully loosened their oppressors’ grip on power and set India on the path to freedom.
In 1985, a young South African named Mkhuseli Jack led a movement against the legalized discrimination known as apartheid. Their campaign of nonviolent mass action, most notably a devastating consumer boycott in the Eastern Cape province, awakened whites to black grievances and fatally weakened business support for apartheid.
In April, 1940, German military forces invaded Denmark. Danish leaders adopted a strategy of “resistance disguised as collaboration”- undermining German objectives by negotiating, delaying, and obstructing Nazi demands. Underground resistance organized sabotage and strikes, and rescued all but a handful of Denmark’s seven thousand Jews.
In 1980, striking workers in Poland demanded independent unions. Using their leverage to negotiate unprecedented rights in a system where there was no power separate from the communist party, they created a union, Solidarity. Driven underground by a government crackdown in 1981, Solidarity re-emerged in 1989 as Poland’s governing political party.
In 1983, Chilean workers initiated a wave of non violent protests against the military dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet. Severe repression failed to stop the protests, and violent opposition failed to dislodge the dictatorship- until the democratic opposition organized to defeat Pinochet in a 1988 referendum.
Reviewing a century often called the most violent in human history, this series is the story of millions who chose to battle the forces of brutality with nonviolent weapons-and won.

[shelley806]

20. This is so beautiful it made me weep...TU so much for your links! nt

[mahina]

18. Another Awesome, awesome resource:

http://www.aeinstein.org/organizations.php3?orgid=88&typeID=4&action=printContentTypeHome&User_Session=5a269e97156c16ab6c8f95172165e51d

The Albert Einstein Institution is a nonprofit organization advancing the study and use of strategic nonviolent action in conflicts throughout the world.

We are committed to the defense of freedom, democracy, and the reduction of political violence through the use of nonviolent action.

Our goals are to understand the dynamics of nonviolent action in conflicts, to explore its policy potential, and to communicate this through print and other media, translations, conferences, consultations, and workshops.

Some books available, for download or modest price:



Gene Sharp's new book, Waging Nonviolent Struggle: 20th Century Practice and 21st Century Potential

There are lots of real classics of peace research here, genius and wisdom.

I'd also reccommend a book called Organizing for Social Change by Kim Bobo. It refers to the 90s in the title but you know what? Not that much has changed.
With aloha

[mahina]

19. Another Awesome, awesome resource:

http://www.aeinstein.org/organizations.php3?orgid=88&typeID=4&action=printContentTypeHome&User_Session=5a269e97156c16ab6c8f95172165e51d

The Albert Einstein Institution is a nonprofit organization advancing the study and use of strategic nonviolent action in conflicts throughout the world.

We are committed to the defense of freedom, democracy, and the reduction of political violence through the use of nonviolent action.

Our goals are to understand the dynamics of nonviolent action in conflicts, to explore its policy potential, and to communicate this through print and other media, translations, conferences, consultations, and workshops.

Some books available, for download or modest price:



Gene Sharp's new book, Waging Nonviolent Struggle: 20th Century Practice and 21st Century Potential

There are lots of real classics of peace research here, genius and wisdom.

I'd also reccommend a book called Organizing for Social Change by Kim Bobo. It refers to the 90s in the title but you know what? Not that much has changed.
With aloha

[Zorra]

11. More right wing murderers.

Right-wingers are a bunch of sick fucks, no?

Is it genetic? Are they unevolved throwbacks with reptilian brains and DNA?

Someone should do an intense physical study of right wingers. Their general and continual lack of compassion, conscience, morality, and violent behavior suggests that they may possibly be evolved from a different species than humans.

[lateo]

12. It could happen here too.

This is why we should always be vigilant.

[WhiteTara]

15. Thank you for the great post

It was excellent information, laid out very well. Kissinger should be tried for war crimes. I understand he can't leave the country or he will be arrested. I hope that justice pervails and that he goes on trial with Pinochet.

[MisterP]

16. they had Nazis helping out: all South America was a Nazi cesspool

really taking off with the later Peron and the wonderful coup in Brazil.

[shelley806]

21. This entire thread is incredible. Thanks so much. I'm nominating it

to keep it around, and bookmarking it. (and sending it to family, friends)

[mahina]

22. Never give up!

:grouphug:

[Judi Lynn]

23. The links you provided are very worthwhile. Thanks.

I found this site with some quotes I've not heard before:

http://religioussciencebaltimore.org/snv/snv2005.htm

One being: Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.

Salvor Hardin

Good one!

[Theres-a]

26. kick