General Jorge Rafael Videla ( ; ; 2 August 1925 – 17 May 2013) was an Argentine general, politician and dictator who served as the president of Argentina from 1976 to 1981 during the National Reorganization Process.
He came to power in a March 1976 coup d'état that deposed Isabel Perón. His rule, which occurred during the Dirty War (1974–1983), was among the most infamous in Latin America during the Cold War due to widespread human rights abuses including murder, abduction, torture of activists and political opponents along with their families at secret concentration camps. In addition, the children of female prisoners were systematically kidnapped. An estimated 13,000 to 30,000 political dissidents were killed or disappeared during this period. Videla relinquished power to Roberto Viola in March 1981.
In 1985, two years after the return of a representative democratic government, he was prosecuted in the Trial of the Juntas and convicted for large-scale human rights abuses and crimes against humanity during his rule. He was released in 1990, following a pardon from President Carlos Menem. Videla was arrested again in 1998 after he was found guilty of the kidnapping of children. He remained under house arrest until 2008, when he was sent to a military prison. On 2010, Videla took full responsibility for his army's actions during his rule. Following a new trial, on 2010, Videla was sentenced to life in a civilian prison for the deaths of 31 prisoners following his coup.Life sentence for ex-Argentina leader on Al Jazeera English 2010 (video) On 5 July 2012, Videla was sentenced to 50 years in civilian prison for the systematic kidnapping of children during his tenure. The following year, Videla died in the Marcos Paz civilian prison five days after suffering a fall in a shower.
Early life and family Jorge Rafael Videla was born on 2 August 1925 in the city of Mercedes. He was the third of five sons born to Colonel Rafael Eugenio Videla Bengolea (1888–1951) and María Olga Redondo Ojea (1897–1987) and was christened in honor of his two older twin brothers, who had died of measles in 1923. Videla's family was a prominent one in San Luis Province, and many of his ancestors had held high public offices. His grandfather Jacinto had been governor of San Luis between 1891 and 1893, and his great-great-grandfather Blas Videla had fought in the Spanish American wars of independence and had later been a leader of the Unitarian Party in San Luis.Seoane-Muleiro: El Dictador. Ed. Sudamericana (2001).
He began his primary studies in his hometown, and later continued them at the Colegio San José in Buenos Aires, run by Bayonne parents, where prominent figures from the Argentine political and business scene also studied, including former President Hipólito Yrigoyen.
On 7 April 1948, Videla married Alicia Raquel Hartridge (28 September 1927 – 5 November 2021) daughter of Samuel Alejandro Hartridge Parkes (1891–1969), an English Argentine professor of physics and Argentine ambassador to Turkey, and María Isabel Lacoste Álvarez (1893–1939). They had seven children: María Cristina (1949), Jorge Horacio (1950), Alejandro Eugenio (1951–1971), María Isabel (1954), Pedro Ignacio (1956), Fernando Gabriel (1961) and Rafael Patricio (1963). Two sons (Rafael Patricio and Fernando Gabriel) joined the Argentine Army.
Army career Videla joined the National Military College (Colegio Militar de la Nación) on 1942 and graduated on 1944 with the rank of second lieutenant. After steady promotion as a junior officer in the infantry, he attended the War College between 1952 and 1954 and graduated as a qualified staff officer. Videla served at the Ministry of Defence from 1958 to 1960 and thereafter he directed the Military Academy until 1962. In 1971, he was promoted to brigade general and appointed by Alejandro Agustin Lanusse as Director of the National Military College. In late 1973 the head of the Army, Leandro Anaya, appointed Videla as the Chief of Staff of the Army. During July and , Videla was the Head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (Estado Mayor Conjunto) of the Argentine Armed Forces. In , the President, Isabel Perón, appointed Videla to the Army's senior position, the General Commander of the Army.
Rank Date of promotionSecond Lieutenant22 December 1944Lieutenant15 June 1947First Lieutenant3 November 1949Captain1 March 1952Major18 July 1958Lieutenant Colonel28 December 1961Colonel17 January 1966Brigade General23 November 1971Lieutenant General20 October 1975
Coup d'état
Upon the death of President Juan Perón, his widow and Vice President Isabel became president. Videla headed a military coup which deposed her on 1976, during increasing violence, social unrest and economic problems. A military junta was formed, made up of him, representing the Army; Admiral Emilio Massera representing the Navy; and Brigadier General Orlando Ramón Agosti representing the Air Force.Unlike most other countries, in the Armed Forces of Argentina, the Army rank of Lieutenant General (Teniente General), the Navy rank of Admiral (Almirante) and the Air Force rank of Brigadier General are equal and approximate to three-star or four-star ranks. See Military ranks of Argentina.
Presidency Two days after the coup, Videla formally assumed the post of President of Argentina.
Human rights violations
The military junta is remembered for the forced disappearances of large numbers of students. The military junta took power during a period of terrorist attacks from the Marxist groups ERP, the Montoneros, FAL, FAR and FAP, who had gone underground after Juan Perón's death in , and violent right-wing kidnappings, tortures and assassinations from the Argentine Anticommunist Alliance, led by José López Rega, Perón's Minister of Social Welfare, and other death squads. The Baltimore Sun reported at the beginning of 1976 that, In the jungle-covered mountains of Tucuman, long known as 'Argentina's garden', Argentines are fighting Argentines in a Vietnam-style civil war. So far, the outcome is in doubt. But there is no doubt about the seriousness of the combat, which involves 2,000 or so leftist guerrillas and perhaps as many as 10,000 soldiers."'Viet war' growing in Argentina," James Nelson Goodsell, The Baltimore Sun, 18 January 1976 In late 1974 the ERP set up a rural front in Tucumán province and the Argentine Army deployed the 5th Mountain Brigade of the 2nd Army Division in counterinsurgency operations in the province. In early 1976 the mountain brigade was reinforced in the form of the 4th Airborne Brigade that had until then been withheld guarding strategic points in the city of Córdoba against ERP guerrillas and militants."5 Policemen Dead In Argentina Violence" Times-Union (21 August 1975).
The members of the junta took advantage of the guerrilla threat to authorize the coup and naming the period in government as the "National Reorganization Process". In all, 293 servicemen and policemen were killed in left-wing terrorist incidents in 1975 and 1976. Videla narrowly escaped three assassination attempts by the Montoneros and ERP between February 1976 and April 1977.
Justice Minister Ricardo Gil Lavedra, who formed part of the 1985 tribunal judging the military crimes committed during the Dirty War, later declared, "I sincerely believe that the majority of the victims of the illegal repression were guerrilla militants".Amar al enemigo, Javier Vigo Leguizamón, p. 68, Ediciones Pasco, 2001 Some 10,000 of the disappeared were guerrillas of the Montoneros, and the People's Revolutionary Army. However, the campaign of repression actually intensified after the guerrillas were defeated and it was during this time, when they targeted the church, labor unions, artists, intellectuals and university students and professors, that the junta accumulated the greatest number of victims.
According to human right groups, an estimated 15,000 to 30,000 Argentines "disappeared" while in the custody of the police or the military. Among the victims were two French nuns (Alice Domon and Léonie Duquet) who had taught and cared for Videla's disabled son, Alejandro. Some 1,500 to 4,000 were drugged into a stupor, loaded into military aircraft, stripped naked and then thrown into the Rio de la Plata and Atlantic Ocean to drown in what became known as "death flights." Between 10,000 and 12,000Detenidos-Aparecidos: Presas y Presos Políticos Desde Trelew a la Dictadura, Santiago Garaño, Werner Pertot, p. 26, Editorial Biblos, 2007 of the "disappeared," PEN (Poder Ejecutivo Nacional) detainees held in clandestine detention camps throughout the dictatorship, were eventually released under diplomatic pressure.Political Injustice: Authoritarianism and the Rule of Law in Brazil, Chile, and Argentina, Anthony W. Pereira, p. 134, University of Pittsburgh Press, 2005 Terence Roehrig estimates that of the disappeared "at least 10,000 were involved in various ways with the guerrillas".
In the book Disposición Final by Argentine journalist Ceferino Reato, Videla confirms for the first time that between 1976 and 1983, 8,000 Argentines have been murdered by his regime. The bodies were hidden or destroyed to prevent protests at home and abroad. Videla also maintained that female guerrilla detainees allowed themselves to become pregnant in the belief they would not be tortured or executed, but they were. The children whom they bore in prison were taken from them, illegally adopted by military families of the regime, and their identities were hidden for decades.
Despite the government officially denouncing antisemitism, the Argentine Jewish community were disturbed by the actions committed by Videla's regime, with one 1977 Jewish source suggesting 600 of the 8,000 killed, arrested or kidnapped since the coup had been Jews. According to human rights organisations in Argentina, between 1,900 and 3,000 Jews were among the 30,000 who were targeted by the Argentine military junta. It is a disproportionate number, as Jews comprised between 5–12% of those targeted but only 1% of the population. Historian Daniel Muchnik attributed this to many Jews gravitating to political activism and armed resistance groups such as the ERP and FAP during the period. However, testimonies from Jewish Argentines suggest that they were targeted for being Jewish. Many torture victims were said to have seen pictures of Adolf Hitler and swastikas on walls of torture chambers and interrogators uttering antisemitic epithets. Jews were also known to have suffered antisemitic harassment while in the Argentine military. Between 200 and 300 Jews were subject to attacks, often by their superiors.
Some 11,000 Argentines have applied for and received up to US$200,000 as monetary compensation from the state for the loss of loved ones during the military dictatorship.State Terrorism in Latin America: Chile, Argentina, and International Human Rights, Thomas C. Wright, p. 158, Rowman & Littlefield, 2007 The Asamblea por los Derechos Humanos (APDH or Assembly for Human Rights) believes that 12,261 people were killed or disappeared during the "National Reorganization Process".Las cifras de la guerra sucia: investigacion a cargo de Graciela Fernandez Meijide, Ricardo Snitcofsky, Elisa Somoilovich y Jorge Pusajo, p. 32, Asamblea Permanente por los Derechos Humanos, 1988 Politically, all legislative power was concentrated in the hands of Videla's nine-man junta, and every important position in the national government was filled with loyal military officers.
Economic policy
As Argentina's new president, Videla faced a collapsing economy racked by soaring inflation. He largely left economic policies in the hands of Minister José Alfredo Martínez de Hoz, who adopted a free trade and deregulatory economic policy.
Martínez de Hoz took measures to restore economic growth, reversing Peronism in favour of a free market economy. Inflation rate decreased somewhat, but remained still high.