A Blue-and-White Frenzy

By Thomas A. Sancton

Argentines forget their differences in a burst of patriotism

NOW...TO THE DEATH! proclaimed the posters that appeared all over Buenos Aires last week. Above that stark message was the image of a bullet-riddled Union Jack. Beneath it, in fine print, was the English inscription, "I'm sorry." To the right, a bold warning: "We knew how to give our lives for our Malvinas. And now we will know how to kill whoever tries to take them away from us."

Nothing could have better symbolized the mood of fierce national pride, defiance and determination that reigned in Argentina as the population reacted to a major exchange of blows last week in the battle for the Falklands. After a series of seemingly effortless British successes--the retaking of South Georgia Island, the bombing of the Falklands' airstrips and the sinking of the cruiser General Belgrano--Argentines savored the notion that in destroying H.M.S. Sheffield they had evened the score. Declared a Buenos Aires taxi driver: "We're going to clobber the English so hard they'll know who the Argentines are."

The entire country seemed to be in the grip of a patriotic fever. In the capital, blue-and-white national flags adorned everything from office buildings to shop windows to taxicab antennas. Cafes, shops and hotel lobbies buzzed with excited talk of the latest news. Television shows were repeatedly interrupted by grave-sounding announcers reading war bulletins before the backdrop of the national emblem. Crowds gathered outside newsstands to peruse the latest reports. On the Plaza de la Republica, women sat in the sun knitting wool socks, caps and scarves for the troops on the islands.

The crisis had performed the almost miraculous feat of welding a historically divided and complex society into a united front. A local Gallup poll published in Buenos Aires last week indicated that 90% of those questioned believed that Argentina should use force if necessary to retain its sovereignty over the islands. Only 4% favored a settlement plan that included the withdrawal of the troops who have occupied the Falklands since the April 2 invasion.

Even the country's main opposition groups, despite their criticism of the ruling junta's internal policies and dismal economic performance, have strongly backed the leadership on this issue. Explained Air Force Chaplain Father Roque Manuel Puyelli, who spent three weeks on the occupied islands: "The Argentine people are certain about this war and what it means. Only two days before the invasion everybody could sense the dissension within the country, problems with the working classes. After the invasion, all the other problems went back behind the curtain, a long way away." Not surprisingly, government officials have been delighted by the groundswell of popular support. "They are absolutely euphoric," said a senior aide in the office of President Leopoldo Galtieri. "Everyone's dancing in the hallways. It's like a party."

Behind that new-found solidarity lay 149 years of smoldering bitterness over the loss of the Malvinas, which, as every Argentine schoolchild is taught, were seized by the British in 1833. But a more immediate stimulus to national unity is a government-controlled propaganda campaign that effectively plays on the Argentines' long-frustrated dream of national greatness and destiny.

The authorities on April 30 put newspapers, radio and television under a system of self-censorship that tended to limit their coverage of the war and gave a clear impression of successive Argentine victories. The British attacks on the Port Stanley airstrip on May 1, for example, were described in a headline of the Buenos Aires daily La Razon as Argentina's SUCCESSFUL COMBAT, IN THE AIR, SEA AND LAND. The mass-circulation picture magazine Gente y la Actualidad appeared at week's end with a huge yellow headline declaring: WE ARE WINNING. Television viewers were treated to a number of bedside interviews with the latest national hero, Lieut. Eduardo Perona,. a hospitalized and bandaged Mirage pilot who shot down a British Sea Harrier jet last week before bailing out of his plane.

For all the government's propaganda efforts, however, the sinking of the General Belgrano early last week came as a brutal shock to the Argentines. Nowhere was the loss felt more acutely than in Punta Alta, a coastal city of about 50,000 that lies outside the Malvinas command base of Puerto Belgrano, some 350 miles south of Buenos Aires. News of the sinking threw a pall of mourning over the whole city, where the families of many of the dead and wounded live. In the local shops and streets, people talked of the disaster in hushed, listless voices.

As the slow process of counting and identifying the casualties dragged on, relatives of the sailors waited anxiously at the gates of the naval base, speaking little, listening to their car radios. One by one, they received the news: dead or alive. An officer's wife, on learning that her husband had been rescued, erupted in tears and laughter.

As potential targets of British bombing attacks along the coast, Punta Alta and other southern coastal cities last week ordered nighttime blackouts. Schoolchildren began wearing identification tags with their name and blood group, and ducking under their desks in air-raid drills. "The war has really come home to us," says a Punta Alta housewife. "We thought the British navy would never come down [to the South Atlantic], or if they did, that the guns would never come out and none of the ships would be lost. We never thought it would go this far." Asked if the barren, storm-blown Malvinas were worth all this sacrifice, she answered without hesitation: "Definitely!" Added a travel agent in the southern port of Comodoro Rivadavia: "If we pull out of the Malvinas, I would commit suicide."

There was another side to the Argentines' sense of national unity and purpose: a growing xenophobia directed not only against the British but against Americans. Those onetime friends were no longer as popular as they were before the U.S. announced its support for Britain on April 30. While there were remarkably few reports of personal mistreatment of either Britons or Americans living in Argentina, the signs of ill feeling were unmistakable. The Argentine magazine Tal Cual lampooned British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher as a "pirate, witch and assassin." Radio stations were playing fewer English and American records. The Franco Inglesa, one of Buenos Aires' fashionable pharmacies, last week pointedly dropped the Inglesa. Fearing an increase of hostility, the U.S. embassy last week recommended that "nonessential" members of its 95-person staff and some dependents of diplomatic officials leave the country temporarily. A few U.S. companies were taking similar steps.

However the crisis is resolved, the Argentines had already achieved much of what they had sought at the outset of their bold and headstrong venture. For once, they were cheering and dying for a common cause. Despite the obvious exaggerations of their propaganda, they had proved that they had greater military capability than many outsiders had given them credit for. Most important, they had forced the world to take them and their claim to the Malvinas seriously. "This war has shown that we can stand up and say we are somebody," said a Buenos Aires businessman. "No one likes wars. We are not used to wars. But when it came to a test, the military, who have been such a tangible part of Argentine life, proved that they could do what they were supposed to do." Perhaps. But a bigger test for the country's rulers will come after the war is over and the uncommon unity it produced begins to unravel.

--By Thomas A. Sancton. Reported by Barry Hillenbrand,Gavin Scott/ Buenos Aires

With reporting by Barry Hillenbrand, Gavin Scott/Buenos Aires

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