MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Garré opens Malvinas' conflict round of debates

“Malvinas is a national cause which unites all Argentines”, although the 1982 conflict “was manipulated” by a “terrible dictatorship” which was foundering, said Argentina's Defence minister Nilda Garré Friday during the opening of a round of conferences on the Argentine-British war.

Looking back at the Malvinas war 24 years later, is the name under which the debates are taking place in the Edificio Libertador seat of the Defence Ministry with the purpose of analyzing causes and consequences of the 1982 South Atlantic conflict.

"Unfortunately this national cause was manipulated in a difficult moment of our country's life, a terrible dictatorship, a dictatorship that to save a foundering political process lied about the true objectives they were after, unleashing a war and snatching a national cause", she underlined.

The round of debates, looking back to the 1982 conflict, will as of this year become an annual event extending from April 2 to June 14 involving the Ministry of Defence, the Joint Chief of Staffs, the three services' Chief of Staffs and other dependent institutions according to a release from the Argentine Defence Ministry.

"A useful, positive reflection that should help refresh memory, and analyze responsibilities and look for those responsible", indicated the Minister.

Malvinas is "one of the many crimes of the dictatorship, an irresponsible decision with terrible consequences" in loss of lives, trauma and because the war "seriously imperiled national interests".

However "it was also a war with luminous aspects, the heroism of soldiers, officers and the solidarity from all the Argentine people", underlined Ms Garré.

But following the war "not only did we have to bear defeat, frustration but also to soften responsibilities and to disguise failure, there was a concerted effort to forget those who had participated in those heroic events".

This meant hiding the returning servicemen when they set foot in the mainland, "they were victimized and there was no self criticism about the technical performance of our forces, which was imperative".

Ms Garre recalled that the "Rattenbach report" was meticulously "hidden", from the very inside of the Armed Forces as if it were "a war top secret, when actually secrecy only helped those guilty of the war".

"What happened and how it happened was silenced. Only five years later those thousands of young lads who had done the ultimate sacrifice for their homeland and who had been victims of the government begun to re-group and based on their experience became visible", underlined Garré.

But now "we must also listen to the entire society", including journalists, writers, cinema people and other personalities who with their reflections have made "great contributions to help reconstruct war memories and learn from the errors committed".

The round of debates on Malvinas will continue next May 23 in the University of Cordoba and June 7 in the National South University in Bahía Blanca.

This week Argentine Congress unanimously agreed to the creation of an all parties parliamentary observatory on Malvinas to promote academic activities linked to the country's sovereignty claims in the South Atlantic.