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bloodravenlib's review against another edition
4.0
See my blog post on it:
http://itinerantlibrarian.blogspot.com/2005/09/booknote-confessions-of-argentine.html
http://itinerantlibrarian.blogspot.com/2005/09/booknote-confessions-of-argentine.html
febeyer's review against another edition
4.0
“Confessions of an Argentine Dirty Warrior” is quite a story to untangle without a good knowledge of Argentina’s recent history, but it'll be worth your effort. Adolfo Scilingo was an Argentinian naval officer who participated in "death flights” during the dictatorship of the 1970s. Left wing political prisoners were drugged, stripped naked, then loaded onto planes and dropped into the ocean. With no bodies, there could be no certainty what happened and the victims are known as the disappeared of Argentina’s dirty war. Democracy returned to Argentina in the 1980s, and in the 1990s President Menem gave impunity to those who had committed human rights abuses during the dictatorship, i.e. the military.
Under these circumstances, Scilingo made a series of confessions to the author of this book, Horacio Verbitsky, investigative journalist and former member of the left wing guerrilla group, the Montoneros - many of the people dumped from the planes were Montoneros or their family members. Scilingo’s detailing of the torturing of prisoners is harrowing - the sort of thing you are disturbed by but find gripping reading. It must have been somewhat surreal reading these confessions during Menem's government, knowing that Scilingo and many like him weren't being punished at all.
Scilingo was the first to break the armed forces' silence on the abuses. He had become an alcoholic and was motivated by guilt. A visit in January 2020 to the Museo Internaciónal para la Democracia in Rosario, Argentina reminded me about reading this book. The museum, located in a beautiful historic building on the city’s main drag, was opened in 2017 and is part of the Alliance of Museums of Social Justice. As they manifest themselves here in New Zealand, social justice causes can make me groan and in Argentina the left wing uses the history of the dictatorship to discredit any right wing opposition, no matter how far removed from the military junta. However, although undoubtedly political, the museum was excellent.
In an exhibition about Operation Condor there was a looped video of Scilingo confessing. Operation Condor was the secret US plan to overthrow leftist governments in Latin America, it also recommended paramilitary type operations to crush guerrillas. The guide told me that Scilingo is now in jail in Spain having been extradited there. In Spain there is a law allowing those who committed crimes outside Spain to be tried. Scilingo is now claiming his innocence, the guide said, he claims he made his confessions up. I’m not sure about that, but certainly a lot of navy officers took the defence that they were just following orders from those higher up. Scilingo is serving a thirty year term.
I highly recommend this book to anybody wanting to begin to make sense of the bitter divide between the left and right in Argentina, known as ‘la grieta’, and in Latin America as a whole. The military dictatorship was responsible for thousands of murders and this wound is often reopened in Argentina. Under the recent right-wing government of Mauricio Macri, the opposition, led by the Kirchneristas, accused the government of being a state of assassins in an attempt to draw parallels with the dictatorship. I couldn't take this seriously although many of my leftist friends in Argentina did. An advantage of this book is that it largely allows the perpetrator to speak for himself - which was the best approach.
Under these circumstances, Scilingo made a series of confessions to the author of this book, Horacio Verbitsky, investigative journalist and former member of the left wing guerrilla group, the Montoneros - many of the people dumped from the planes were Montoneros or their family members. Scilingo’s detailing of the torturing of prisoners is harrowing - the sort of thing you are disturbed by but find gripping reading. It must have been somewhat surreal reading these confessions during Menem's government, knowing that Scilingo and many like him weren't being punished at all.
Scilingo was the first to break the armed forces' silence on the abuses. He had become an alcoholic and was motivated by guilt. A visit in January 2020 to the Museo Internaciónal para la Democracia in Rosario, Argentina reminded me about reading this book. The museum, located in a beautiful historic building on the city’s main drag, was opened in 2017 and is part of the Alliance of Museums of Social Justice. As they manifest themselves here in New Zealand, social justice causes can make me groan and in Argentina the left wing uses the history of the dictatorship to discredit any right wing opposition, no matter how far removed from the military junta. However, although undoubtedly political, the museum was excellent.
In an exhibition about Operation Condor there was a looped video of Scilingo confessing. Operation Condor was the secret US plan to overthrow leftist governments in Latin America, it also recommended paramilitary type operations to crush guerrillas. The guide told me that Scilingo is now in jail in Spain having been extradited there. In Spain there is a law allowing those who committed crimes outside Spain to be tried. Scilingo is now claiming his innocence, the guide said, he claims he made his confessions up. I’m not sure about that, but certainly a lot of navy officers took the defence that they were just following orders from those higher up. Scilingo is serving a thirty year term.
I highly recommend this book to anybody wanting to begin to make sense of the bitter divide between the left and right in Argentina, known as ‘la grieta’, and in Latin America as a whole. The military dictatorship was responsible for thousands of murders and this wound is often reopened in Argentina. Under the recent right-wing government of Mauricio Macri, the opposition, led by the Kirchneristas, accused the government of being a state of assassins in an attempt to draw parallels with the dictatorship. I couldn't take this seriously although many of my leftist friends in Argentina did. An advantage of this book is that it largely allows the perpetrator to speak for himself - which was the best approach.
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