Talk:Leopoldo Galtieri

Excuse me?

Can anybody substantiate the following, which is featured on the article as of 07:37, 6 January 2006 (UTC): Even in his teens he was already keen to see Argentina resolve disputes over territory with force.. Thanks in advance, elpincha 07:37, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

Never heard of. Citation is needed.(82.134.28.194 (talk) 13:36, 10 May 2010 (UTC))

Death squad

Galtieri's leadership of the death squad mentioned in the lead paragraph, although cited, is not mentioned elsewhere in the article. As per WP:LEAD, the content of the lead section should summarize the most important content of the rest of the article. Also, it should not introduce content which is not found anywhere else in the article. So, it seems that this fact about Galtieri should either be moved to another section of the article or else this information needs to be expanded upon within the article. Thanks, GentlemanGhost (talk) 20:17, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Economy

The article writes:"He attempted to repair the economy by slashing spending, selling off remaining government-owned industries, squeezing money supply and freezing salaries." Galtieri never made any privatization.With the sole exception of Pinochet , all military governs in Latin America were for state owned enterprises.Oil, telephone,etc. were state monopolies in Argentina, during all military governments.Agre22 (talk) 20:58, 4 February 2009 (UTC)agre22

Lead is not neutral

I see 2 neutrality problems at the lead. The first one is the piped link "during the [[National Reorganization Process|last military dictatorship]]". "Dictatorship" is a derogative word that places an unatributed bias in the article. And it's also unneeded; National Reorganization Process, without piped links but just by it's name, is the name given to the historical period and its use carries no partisan bias in either direction, so it would be better. To say that he was president "during the National Reorganization Process" is a statement that neither supporters nor detractors would find incorrect or misleading.

Same thing goes for the Intelligence Battalion 601. "Death squad" is a derogative label, while "special military intelligence service" is not. If desired, it may be possible to expand (but not in the lead, in the body of the artice) what things did that battalion did and their relation with Galtieri, as another thread requests. But in the end, it's the reader who should develop his own opinions about the topic. MBelgrano (talk) 01:33, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

I don't see a neutrality problem in the lead. It was a military dictatorship, they were known as death squads; that is what they did. We don't need to add euphemisms, which is what you're suggesting. Justin talk 09:01, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

No euphemisms would be used. None of either modifications I suggest would distort or conceal any factual truth about all this, they would just remove the use of words that imply an asumed viewpoint. Those words, "dictatorship" and "death squad", may not be euphemisms, but they are Words that label MBelgrano (talk) 13:57, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

The modifications you suggested conceal factual truth, the current version presents an accurate description. An accurate description in common usage does not fall foul of the guideline you suggested. Regards, Justin talk 17:13, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

You can use the Words that label argument the other way around. The world knew the Junta period more as a military dictatorship than NRP. I think you could apply them both in the opening sentence as suggested in WP:Neutral_point_of_view/Noticeboard#.22Dictatorship.22_statement. Leaky Caldron 19:35, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

I will answer here things that were said at the noticeboard, as ultimately this is the better place for doing so. First of all, I did not notify here that I requested opinions there, because nobody is "accusing" anyone of anything. There was here a case of 2 users with disparate perspectives about the article, and the debate would be more productive if there were more users involved. That was the idea when I informed this there: bring more uninvolved users here to enhance the debate with more perspectives (at least, that's what I understand the NPOV noticeboard is for).

Second, the expresion "long standing consensus text" is completely false. Ths topic has never been discused before in this article (there are only 3 previous threads, and no archived discussions. The fact that a text was there from long ago because there was nobody around to notice it does not mean there was consensus about it.

The policies on fringe theories are completely uncalled for here. The debate about the legitimacy or not of the 1976-1983 period (whatever we call it), is a big national debate that divided opinions in society. If anyone of you is not familiar with the context, I will explain: during those years there was important activity of guerrila groups, such as Montoneros or ERP. During the government of Isabel Perón there was an order enacted to kill the subversion by any means necesary, shortly after a coup deposed Isabel and started this millitary government to follow such order. The consequent debate is the classical debate of whenever it can be acceptable to dismiss civil rights in order to face a social threat, or if such threat should be fighted keeping all such rights intact. By "classical" I mean that this is a kind or political debate that, under specific contexts or solved in specific ways, is frequently faced by most countries from time to time along their histories (a close and recent example of the same is the debate on the legitimacy of the war on terrorism started by the US after the attacks to the twin towers). And, as usual, society tends to accept the authoritarism during the danger, and condemn it when the menace is gone.

As you can see, the provision about fringe theories at the NPOV policy is not intended to apply at situations like this. Fringe theories are things such as "the earth is flat" or "the president is a shapeshifter alien", not this: this a case of equally valid viewpoints where the dispute should be treated as such. Yes, currently there's very little popular support for the actions taken at those years, but that doesn't turn them into "fringe theories" nor allows to treat the debate as if the current state of it has always been such. Disgusting as it is, the millitary junta did have high popular support at it's begining, ad its method were indeed accepted by society (have you ever heard the expression "Algo habrán hecho"?).

As for references, that page can hardly be a reliable source for this. It's a tourist guide. The statement of the "Proceso de reorganización nacional" name being limited to extremist groups is of course unreferenced. On the contrary, it's easy to find history books that talk about such historical period under that name (or under it's short version, "Proceso"), or mainstream media using it as well when talking about related topics. Just a few examples to begin with. Book "Breve historia contemporánea de la Argentina" by Luis Alberto Romero (ISBN 978-950-557-393-6), chapter VII, page 207, called "El Proceso, 1976-1983". Non-extremist uses of the word "proceso" (even under critical contexts, that portrait it as an icon of something bad): Media bussinessman Daniel Vila, talking about a project of law here: "...has a seriousness comparable only with the institutional coup d'etat of March 76. This law, its pretext of changing a military Process law, lies one of the larger debris that Argentina can get to assist: the plunder that the law is going to make on society as a whole, the plundering of the plurality of information". Omar Osvaldo López, politician of Chubut, said at here: "I'm not exaggerating. To hear people say that the modus operandi was to go to a house, arrive in vans hooded, breaking the doors kicking it and any person in its path, hitting in the most brutal way in memory, at the style of the time of the sad military process occurred in Argentina". MBelgrano (talk) 03:01, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

The issue is how the Government of the time is labelled in Argentina and the rest of the sources. They label it a military dictatorship, that is how it is described in the vast majority of sources. In the vast majority of sources, military dictatorship will preceded NRP. I have only ever seen fringe groups on the far right refer to it as the NRP solely. Are you disputing that? Justin talk 09:27, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I am. You said that only fringe groups with biased support for it would call it that way, without any reference stating so. On the contrary, I have proved it's false by giving counter-examples: a history book by a reliable author (with ISBN, chapter and page number included), a notable businessman and the head of a political department of Chubut, none of which can be qualified as extremist, fringe or far-right. Even more, Romero simply relates the events without involving his opinions about them (as any good historian should do), but from the quotes of the others we can clearly notice that they are vocal critics of that government. And yet, they call it "Proceso". Why? Because both terms are used in normal speech, and "Proceso" lacks the derogating power of "dictatorship", but isn't used to denote support. That's entirely your own idea. You can reference that "dictatorship" is also used, but not that "Proceso" implies support. MBelgrano (talk) 17:42, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Remeber that just because all the sources at your disposal call the govermenment a dictatorship it's not enough to state that's there academic consensus on doing so and that other approaches would be "fringe" or extremist. See Wikipedia:Reliable sources#Academic consensus and Wikipedia:No original research#Synthesis of published material that advances a position MBelgrano (talk) 20:03, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Can you set out here exactly what you want it to be called? You've had advice from NPOV. Was that not acceptable? Just lay it out for us. Leaky Caldron 20:08, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

As I explained there, simply calling it "National Reorganization Process" would be the ideal way: all this concerns of Justin about the name being biased, disputed or used by specific groups is entirely product of his own interpretation. If the name should be labeled somehow, "military government" would be better, as done by Cyclopia, but it may also bring some unnecesary word cluttering, and "last" would be a temporal word that should be avoided if possible. But those are secondary concerns, I would have no problem to settle with it. The battalion may be called "special military intelligence service", or directly by the name "Intelligence Battalion 601" (however, this may be confusing) MBelgrano (talk) 20:31, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

So why did you go to NPOV Noticeboard? IIRC a number of editors suggested a fusion; using both to maintain NPOV. It isn't only Justin's interpretation. Leaky Caldron 20:56, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Removal

The article deals with his removal in quite sketchy terms ("Falklands capital Stanley was retaken by the British forces in June 1982, and within days General Galtieri was removed from power"). Given that he was in charge of the government and the armed forces, what was the actual mechanism by which he was removed? Was he arrested by the police, or was there a coup, or something else? His obituary in the Times gives the impression that he wasn't popular with his fellow officers and they were glad to get rid of him, but the article doesn't go into any detail and I'm not really qualified to flesh it out. -Ashley Pomeroy (talk) 15:25, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

There wasnt much election nor debate those days, the bunch of generals with more power (and the american wink) simple took office, just Galtieri did when he removed Gral Viola a few months before --Jor70 (talk) 15:52, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

Let's just say one if a well feared dictator. In a matter of hours, people dare to throw coins at the grounds of your Royal...I meant Presidential Palace. If people fear you to a such small extent, you must be a hippie. Then there is no time to quit, rather than being ousted. (83.108.30.141 (talk) 01:30, 17 July 2010 (UTC))