Argentina Haunted By History

By JANICE C. SIMPSON

Anticipation crackled in the air as nearly 500 human rights activists, journalists and other spectators crowded into a Victorian-style courtroom in downtown Buenos Aires. For eight months the chamber had resounded with the chilling testimony of 833 witnesses as they recounted tales of murder, torture and abductions in the night committed against suspected subversives during six years of military rule from 1976 to 1982. But a heavy silence fell over the room as six appeals-court judges filed in last week to deliver their verdict on the nine military leaders who had been charged with responsibility for what Argentines now call the "dirty war" against leftist terrorism.

In a steady, almost monotonous voice, Court President Leon Carlos Arslanian read a summary of the justices' 2,000-page decision. He and his brethren, he explained, had studied the country's criminal code and all the legal depositions presented to them. They had consulted international law specialists and considered the theories of conventional and revolutionary warfare, as well as the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church. But, said Arslanian, "we have not found one single rule that justifies, much less excuses, the authors of facts that have been brought before this trial."

With that, Arslanian pronounced Jorge Rafael Videla, 60, President of Argentina from 1976 to 1981, and his navy commander, Admiral Emilio Massera, 60, guilty of homicide, illegal detention and other human rights violations. The two were stripped of their military rank and sentenced to life imprisonment. Three co-defendants, including Roberto Viola, 61, who succeeded Videla as President, were found guilty of lesser charges, deprived of military rank and given sentences ranging from 4 1/2 to 17 years. The remaining four officers--among them General Leopoldo Fortunato Galtieri, 59, who as President from 1981 to 1982 initiated the ill-fated war with Britain over the Falkland Islands--were acquitted.

The court's historic decision disappointed human rights activists, who had hoped for harsher sentences that would ease the pain suffered by families and friends of the estimated 9,000 people who disappeared during the dirty war. After Arslanian read the decision acquitting Galtieri and the others, Hebe de Bonafini, president of the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, angrily donned a white kerchief embroidered with the human rights group's mournful motto, MAY THE DISAPPEARED APPEAR ALIVE. When De Bonafini refused to remove the offending garment, the judge ordered her to leave the courtroom. "I had no other way of protesting but to put on my kerchief when I heard that the killers were absolved," she told reporters. Later that evening, hundreds of other protesters marched through the city streets chanting "To the murderers, prison now!"

The verdict "will not close the chapter on investigations," said Emilio Mignone, a leading human rights activist. "It will do just the opposite, prolong them indefinitely." Indeed, attention quickly turned to the 1,700 cases pending against 300 or so lower-ranking military officers charged with carrying out the dirty war. Said Mignone: "There have to be more trials of military leaders now."

Despite the controversy over last week's verdict, Argentines could still take pride in the trial, which marked the first time that civilians in any of Latin America's chronically coup-prone nations have openly held the military accountable for misconduct. Bringing the guilty to justice was made all the more arduous because the repression was carried out in secret. Later, evidence that could have served as proof was destroyed. "One can imagine the difficulties that the appeals court met if it did not wish to depart from the norms of strict legitimacy," said Ernesto Sabato, a novelist who headed a citizens' commission that investigated the disappearances. "Thus with all the defects the trial could have had, we ought to consider it an honorable demonstration of Argentine democracy for a world where there was never anything like it."

Much of the credit for that triumph of democracy belongs to President Raul Alfonsin, 58, who celebrated his second anniversary in office last week. Alfonsin has made a national reckoning with the years of terror one of his administration's top priorities. Thus he swiftly repealed the immunity measure that his junta predecessors had pushed through in their final days in power. In October 1984, when a military tribunal predictably found nothing "objectionable" in the junta's actions, Alfonsin moved the case against them into the civilian courts. The President declined to comment on the verdict last week, but so, significantly, did the military, which many observers had feared would never sit silently by while others passed judgment on its misdeeds.

Since he won the presidency in December 1983, Alfonsin has faced other challenges with similar aplomb. The trial notwithstanding, his most notable achievement so far may be the near miraculous attempt to rescue Argentina's seriously ill economy. In February, Alfonsin named Juan Sourrouille, 45, an unknown academic, as Economic Minister. Rejecting the International Monetary Fund's orthodox austerity measures, Sourrouille devised an even tougher remedy, known as the austral plan. The scheme, named for the currency that replaced the devalued peso, is a blend of wage, price and currency controls, government spending cuts and tax increases. The most important ingredient, however, was the government's unprecedented promise--personally guaranteed by Alfonsin--that it would no longer print money to cover its deficit spending.

Since the plan's introduction in June, inflation has dropped from a sizzling annual rate of more than 2000% to a relatively mild 33%. For the first time since 1978, the treasury is showing a surplus, and interest payments on the country's $51 billion external debt, which includes $8.1 billion owed to U.S. banks, are up to date. Only 18 months ago, Argentina was on the brink of default.

During the past few weeks, a number of international economists and bankers have made pilgrimages to Buenos Aires to see the miracle for themselves. "We have profound admiration for the courage and skill with which the government has seized the nettle and acted to curb inflation and to set this country back on the road to growth," World Bank President A.W. Clausen told a group assembled at Argentina's Central Bank last week. David Mulford, Assistant U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, declared during a visit last month that Argentina would be an ideal candidate for his government's new Baker loans (named after Treasury Secretary James Baker), which will provide low-interest funds to help Third World debtors stimulate long-term economic growth. Mulford is among many experts who clearly hope that Argentina will set an example for other distressed lenders.

Despite its remarkable progress, however, Argentina is far from cured. Economic experts agree that permanent recovery is dependent on the government's ability to lift wage and price controls without reviving inflation. Alfonsin must also induce more private investment and woo back the approximately $25 billion in capital that fled the country during inflationary times. Finally, the government will have to return to private hands some of the 300 or so state-owned enterprises, which lost a total of $2 billion last year. All of this will require public confidence that inflation has truly been conquered.

Alfonsin's Radical Party made a strong showing in congressional elections last month, an apparent sign that the public approves of the President's performance. But it is still too early for Alfonsin to declare a total victory in his campaign to restore international respect for Argentina. He has promised union leaders a still undetermined wage increase early next year to make up for lost purchasing power. Businessmen are clamoring for similar price relief. The trials next year of the 300 lower-ranking officers accused of crimes in the dirty war--and a separate trial, now under way, of Galtieri and two other junta members for mismanaging the Falklands war--will stir up more debate over who bears the ultimate responsibility for the ghosts of the past. The trials may also further strain the patience of the military, which may be weakened but is still a potentially powerful force in Argentine affairs. Most important, Alfonsin will have his hands full trying to strengthen the spirit of democracy in his country. "In Argentina, we are dealing with 55 years of democratic crises," said Alfred Stepan, a Columbia University expert on Latin America. "But it has a different feel to it this time. People are attaching a much deeper value to democratic processes and institutions."

There was a promising sign last week that the country is indeed heading in the right direction. A few hours before the verdict in the junta trial was delivered, the government announced that it had lifted a 60-day state of siege under which constitutional guarantees against arbitrary arrest had been suspended. Alfonsin declared the siege in October to clamp down on an alleged conspiracy by twelve right-wing officers and civilians to disrupt the Nov. 3 congressional elections. The siege ended 15 days ahead of schedule. In that instance, as in so many others, Alfonsin appeared to have moved faster than even some of his supporters had expected.

With reporting by George Hatch and Gavin Scott/Buenos Aires