and the actual building of the obstacles. Other groups were specialized in making molotov cocktails, while messages and molotov cocktails were distributed by motor bike to various locations. Logistic support was provided to supply young activists at the front lines with a continuous supply of bricks to throw at the police. Small groups of women prepared food for the various teams. These small production and defense teams emerged throughout Córdoba without any preestablished plan.
The spontaneity of the grass roots movement and the rapid organization of the resistance undermined the repressive state. The Cordobazo gave people confidence in the power of mobilization, the strength of their number, the ability to organize a protest, and the force to make the government change its authoritarian policies. Particularly worrying to the military junta was the presence of snipers, and the attempt of a revolutionary vanguard to organize the protests and assume its leadership. The nightmare of a revolutionary insurrection was becoming a likely reality for the Argentine military, and they intended to discourage future protests with massive displays of force. The military junta did not just move into action to protect property and lives but to quell the challenge to their authority and the order which they sought to impose on society. These deeper motives become clear after a close examination of military crowd control tactics.
Military Conceptualization of Crowds
The Cordobazo was military doctrine come true. Contemporary field manuals of the Argentine army explained that vanguardism and mass mobilization were the two principal strategies of revolutionary warfare.22 Attempts had been made in the 1960s to start a guerrilla insurgency, but they failed because of the lack of resonance within Argentine society and the energetic military response. The Cordobazo proved to the military and the left that the consciousness of the working class was ripe for a mass insurrection.
Army instructions on how to control violent crowds began with the assumption that mass mobilizations were inevitable because every society has malcontents. The causes of popular dissatisfaction and collective violence identified by Argentine military analysts and revolutionary thinkers such as Marx, Lenin, Mao, and Guevara were remarkably similar: social and economic inequality, authoritarianism, frustrated expectations, and relative deprivation among large segments of the population. The roots of mass protest were subdivided into economic, social, psychological, and political causes.23 Typical of the Argentine army field manuals was the complete absence of any reference to concrete situations or historical events. The instructions were presented in an objectifying language as if they built on universal and timeless knowledge, but behind the neutral, almost clinical, descriptions rested a keen awareness of national circumstances.
The social, economic, and psychological causes of popular dissatisfaction relate largely to the unequal distribution of wealth in society: widespread poverty, high unemployment, and an unjust concentration of land and capital. Social factors, like stark class divisions, high illiteracy rates, a poor educational system, and inadequate health services, will make people feel frustrated and hopeless. These feelings translate psychologically into a lack of faith in the government. People have a profound feeling of injustice and believe that the government does not intend to make amends. There reigns uncertainty and anxiety about the future provoking alternatively aggressive and apathetic behavior.24
Finally, the Argentine army manuals identify the political causes of unrest: a repressive government which does not respond to the aspirations of its people, proscribes certain political interests, and does not tolerate a political opposition. The field manuals indicate furthermore the danger of a polarization in society between the middle class and an extreme right and left wing.
Did President Onganía recognize the political situation in Argentina of the late 1960s in this diagnostic instrument devised by the staff of Army commander Lanusse? Onganía ruled in an authoritarian fashion, Peronism was proscribed, a large part of the Peronist movement was swinging to the political left and talking about class struggle, while there was also a noticeable growth of right-wing nationalist splinter groups. Furthermore, there was widespread indignation about the proscription of political parties, the concentration of wealth, thwarted social mobility, an unjust land tenure system, the dependency on multinationals, and rising unemployment. Finally, the feelings of injustice pervading the angry protests in Córdoba resonated throughout the country.
Why did Onganía not change his political course? Onganía decided to follow his original long-term strategy for transforming Argentina. One of his principal advisers, General Osiris Villegas, convinced him that the development of Argentine society was a matter of national security. The communist incursion in Argentina would have less chance if the government stimulated the country’s industrial, regional, political, scientific, and military development.25 Onganía envisioned a three-stage development that began with a rapid modernization of the economy, was followed by economic growth allowing for a period of social reforms, and eventually led to a mature democracy.26
The only problem was that these changes could take as much as twenty years. Many Argentines were unwilling to wait so long, and this impatience might stimulate the rise of a revolutionary movement. In this situation, the army field manuals stated that insurrection movements could only be prevented from taking root when “the original causes have been removed or attenuated, or when the repressive action has been sufficiently effective and energetic to discourage new subversive actions.”27 Lieutenant-General Onganía chose repression rather than reform to deal with civil unrest.
What does a crowd try to obtain, according to the Argentine military specialists?28 The crowd wants to display its strength in public, demonstrate its popular support, intimidate the authorities, and demoralize the security forces. An outburst of violence provokes panic among the people, paralyzes their normal activities, and challenges public order. It may create a revolutionary climate and be used to test the strength of the legal forces. The emergence of an urban insurrection consists of two main phases and one subsidiary phase: the gathering of a large multitude, the organization of civil disturbances and, if the occasion arises, the creation of martyrs.29 The armed and security forces must focus their repressive action on these three phases.
The army field manuals stated that crowds do not arise spontaneously, but that they are summoned by activists and professional agitators. These agitators infiltrate labor unions, student organizations, or political movements, and then inculcate revolutionary ideas creating a fertile climate for civil disturbance. They translate the people’s legitimate demands into a discourse that coincides with their hidden political aspirations. They try to create a common enemy, like the military dictatorship, foreign imperialism, or the capitalist system. Once the idea has caught on that a street demonstration is necessary, then the leading activists choose a public space such as a park, square, or avenue to hold a protest. There, they provoke the collective violence and trigger the crowd’s psychological mechanisms. During the street fighting “seemingly fanatic or insolent elements (so prepared to act) will contaminate in an irrational manner the persons who are near them, influencing the mood of the crowd and pulling along the moderates and undecided.”30 The crowd is thus seen as the fertile soil of collective violence and revolutionary action, so public gatherings must be forbidden during times of military repression.31
According to the field manuals, all civil disturbances are tightly orchestrated. They write about the crowd as if it were a regular enemy force carrying out a tactical plan with military precision. There is an external crowd commander who observes the protest area and confrontation from an apartment or office building. The external commander gives orders to an internal commander about when and where to incite the collective violence. The crowd commanders are located near mail boxes and street signs or wear visible signs so that they can be identified easily. Most multitudes contain activists who carry banners, placards, and protest signs conveying the grievances, and are aided by an agitation group shouting slogans. Their place will be eventually taken by other activists who will incite the demonstrators to violence.
Protest crowds organize their
