Buenos Aires (April 2, 12.00) A little more than 30 years have passed since that April 2 of 1982 where the Malvinas Islands were recovered, and in Argentina there are still many unanswered questions left; but there is one that divides most opinions: Was the Malvinas War a patriotic feat or was it the last attempt to perpetuate the power of a dictatorship that languished?
Apart from the political parties and the spokesmen of the system, which are always so servile to imperialism that deliberately disqualifies the Malvinas War, there are also some sectors of the Left that question it as a mere adventure of the military dictatorship.
This anti-war stance takes an irrefutable fact: the armed conflict was led by the same dictatorship that imposed a genocide on the Argentine people. But it also chooses to forget a fundamental fact: the feat was a warlike confrontation between a quasi-colonial country attacked more than 150 years ago and an imperial power usurping of territory that declared the war.
The reconquest of the islands was an open challenge to the colonialist and imperialist global order and for this objective reason it is clear that it was a just, anti-imperialist cause, beyond whose circumstantial directed it. Give or take some obvious differences and without trying to impose on the reader incontrovertible parallels, this is what is happening now in the Syrian conflict, where the Syrian people and their authorities fight against global imperialism and its ambitions.
Today, 35 years after the war, there are 4 claims that remain as valid as June 14 1982 when the last artillery shell was fired:
Memory first; not to forget and pay homage to all the soldiers who gave their lives in defense of our territory that our islands deserve. They fell under the fire of the bullets of British imperialism, which had the American support and still continues occupying our islands. Also to those who returned mainland and were hidden for years because of Anti-Malvinas governments.
Justice, so that the government can listen and take care of the needs of ex-combatants since the state has neglected all these years which has led hundreds of them to depression and even suicide.
True, to reject and mark the demaligning attempts that led successive national governments after the fall of the military dictatorship, from Raul Alfonsin, to the present day with the appeasement of Mauricio Macri and his Foreign Minister Malcorra.
After all this time and despite all the attempts to erase them from our memory and hide our heroes, there is a sentence of their hymn that today is more valid than ever and commits us not to lower our arms, their is no more beloved ground, in the extension of our homeland . Malvinas tierra Argentina.
Santiago D’Lucca is an Argentine Spanish translator. You can follow him on Twitter: @rojoparanoico
The views of the author do not necessarily reflect those of Al-Masdar News.
48 - 48Shares
Be Civil
This is a Civilized Place for Public Discussion
Please treat this discussion with the same respect you would a public park. We, too, are a shared community resource — a place to share skills, knowledge and interests through ongoing conversation.
These are not hard and fast rules, merely guidelines to aid the human judgment of our community and keep this a clean and well-lighted place for civilized public discourse.
Make it better
Improve the Discussion
Help us make this a great place for discussion by always working to improve the discussion in some way, however small. If you are not sure your post adds to the conversation, think over what you want to say and try again later.
The topics discussed here matter to us, and we want you to act as if they matter to you, too. Be respectful of the topics and the people discussing them, even if you disagree with some of what is being said.
Now the hard part!
Be Agreeable, Even When You Disagree
You may wish to respond to something by disagreeing with it. That’s fine. But remember to criticize ideas, not people. Please avoid:
Instead, provide reasoned counter-arguments that improve the conversation.