This is the second volume on the various coups and insurrections that plagued Argentina in the second half of the 20th century. For whatever reason, many Central and South American nations had difficulty keeping a stable democratic government after WWII. Some of it was due to internal corruption. Some of it was due to external forces of various socialist and communist groups that were trying to instill their form of government. Some of it was due to the desire of some military leaders to take over and run an authoritarian regime. Some of it was due to a combination of two or three of these forces.

Generally speaking, Argentina has had a fairly stable government even during some of these trying times, but that was not always the case. This particular volume covers the 1976 coup d'etat and the insurrection in the northwestern part of the country. It continues where the previous volume left off with the removal of Peron and the installation of his wife as the nation's leader. She was probably not the best choice as during her watch a fairly violent insurrection caused several instances of things like bombing of police stations, raids on military bases to steal weapons, hijacking of airliners and even taking over air fields, among a list of terrorist activities. There were the usual assassinations of government officials and at one time, an entire province was under their control.

Not surprising is that the military took the initiative of routing out these insurrectionists and it included the initial operational use of the Pucara, which included one of the prototypes and the first two production aircraft. It was in this combat that they proved their effectiveness. As is the case, the military was fed up with civilian leadership and took over the nation when Mrs. Peron was out of the country.

As usual the book is very well researched and unlike the previous edition, this one is extremely image intensive. This is something I appreciate and it makes for one of the thicker books in this series. It also reads well and is easy to follow, especially considering how convoluted these events can be. I enjoyed reading it and as such can quite easily recommend it to you.

May 2025

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