Bad Joke

Buenos Aires heard that the Government of President Pedro Ramirez was about to declare war on the Axis. Argentina's dominant Army clique, already disgruntled by President Ramirez' diplomatic break with the Axis, forthwith acted as though he were about to declare war on the Argentine Army.

Before dawn two truckloads of officers took over the Foreign Ministry, told Foreign Minister Alberto Gilbert over the telephone that his resignation had been "accepted." Others went to the Casa Rosada, and informed the Secretary of the Presidency, Enrique Gonzalez, that he also had "resigned."

Troops alerted all over Buenos Aires. At Campo Mayo were 18,000 men who, with the ist and 2nd Infantry Regiments, were ready to strike for the colonels. For the President the nth Cavalry, the 3rd and 4th Infantry stood to arms. Two top colonels, Juan Domingo Peron and Eduardo Avalos, and War Minister Edelmiro Farrell conferred with President Ramirez at his residence. Ramirez backed down, agreed to sacrifice his Foreign Minister and Presidential Secretary. Later he denied that he had considered declaring war.

People v. Army. The colonels had won again, at least temporarily. But their attempt to give Argentina an orderly, unified military government was floundering worse than ever. Knots of opposition, as yet ineffective but nonetheless significant, began to appear. Some of the army's generals began to look askance at Peron's strutting colonels. For want of a better leader some anti-totalitarians were turning to former three-day President Arturo Rawson.*Pro-Allied but indecisive, he had often proved disappointing.

The Argentine people, who have long considered their Government a joke, were beginning to think it a bad one. Some of them even did something about it. La Prensa, great and respected daily of Buenos Aires, attacked the savage press-gag laws, the Government which made them (see p. 46). Said Alfredo Palacios, Socialist elder statesman, in La Prensa: "The army is trained to defend the nation, not to govern it." Leaderless construction workers went on strike because "we don't like this Government."

*Anglo-Saxon names are fairly common in Argentina. Often belonging to families long in the country, they do not necessarily mean Anglo-Saxon sympathies.

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