America Releases Documents Detailing Involvement in Argentina's Dirty War

Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger’s approval of Argentina’s decision to move forward with their repressive campaign has been suspected for years and confirmed since at least 2004 when theNational Security Archive released a secret memo recounting a conversation between assistant Secretary of State for Human Rights, Patt Derian, and the US ambassador in Buenos Aires, Robert Hill.

The two met in April 1977 and discussed a meeting between Henry Kissinger and Argentine Foreign Minister Cesar Augusto Guzzetti. Kissinger gives Guzzetti explicit permission to move forward with whatever they must do to repress “terrorism.”

American Secretary of State John Kerry delivered the initial group of documents and records detailing America’s involvement in Argentina’s 1976 armed coup.

“I have presented the initial tranche of declassified papers to President Macri with more coming,” Kerry said in a conference with Argentina’s Foreign Minister Susana Malcoma.

Kerry pointed out that the delivery follows President Obama’s commitment to distribute data contained in U.S. government records regarding the coup. Included in the documentation is military intelligence from that era.

Washington declassified, in 2002, over 4,000 State Department wires and other records from that era. When Obama visited Argentina in March, he announced his plan to produce the previously classified reports available.

2016 notes the 40th anniversary of the 1976 armed coup which overthrew President Isabel Peron. The coup was the start of the “Dirty War” when 30,000 Argentines were detained, abused and killed.