Since World War I, Argentina’s international economic relations have become triangular in nature, with clearly differentiated buying and selling markets. One axis has been the United States, the primary supplier of goods and capital. In recent years, however, a new partner has occupied the privileged position on the other side of the triangle—held by Great Britain until the 1950s and later by Western Europe—as purchasers of Argentine products. The Soviet Union has become Argentina’s number one client, absorbing from 1980 to date between 20 and 40 percent of the country’s exports, and it promises to occupy an even greater place in various sectors of the Argentine economy. As the recent war in the Malvinas demonstrated, the political and strategic implications of these ties are quite evident.1
This article seeks to provide a historical analysis of the diplomatic and commercial origins of Soviet-Argentine relations. In so doing, it attempts to elucidate a topic that has been almost ignored in the literature. Using primarily unpublished documentation, it also attempts to shed light on whether this growing relationship of recent years is merely circumstantial or the result of long-standing trends that only now are beginning to be appreciated.
Background, 1917-39
Since the Russian Revolution, the history of relations between the Soviet Union and Latin America is closely linked to changes in Soviet foreign policy generally. Moreover, these relations have developed simultaneously on two planes, each of which, depending on the period, played a decisive role. One plane was that of formal state ties; the other, relations between the Soviet and Latin American Communist parties, this latter frequently once removed through organizations like the Third International (Comintern), the Cominform, and, more recently, the conferences of Communist and Workers parties.2 For this reason, the present analysis will include discussion, as appropriate, of the activities of the Argentine Communist party, parties of other countries, and international Communist organizations. Likewise, it will take into account the position of the United States, which helps to establish important contrasts and to clarify many events.
It is possible to identify distinct stages in the history of Soviet foreign policy. The fundamental thrusts differed in each stage, although the turns in (or changes of) direction were not abrupt, but corresponded to external and internal processes that had already been developing. The first stage extends from the First Congress of the Communist International in 1919 to the late 1920s and is characterized by a foreign policy that pursues the triumph of world revolution.
In this period, primacy was attached to the European working classes (the German and Hungarian revolutions, for example). The Latin American countries, considered semicolonial or dependent, were left to develop their processes of liberation in accord with the unfolding of socialist revolution in Europe. Diplomatic relations with Latin America did not yet play a decisive role in Soviet strategy, rather the aim was the formation of local Communist parties. The International Socialist party, forerunner of the Argentine Communist party, was thus founded in 1918 in response to events in Russia.3
Toward the end of the 1920s, with the confirmation of Stalin’s leadership and the triumph of the thesis of “socialism in one country,” which resulted in part from the failure of revolution in Europe, the Soviet Union decided to consolidate its own economy while the Latin American Communist parties emphasized the defense and development of the “first socialist state.” The internationalist emphasis, however, was not abandoned, and in 1928 a South American Secretariat was created within the Communist International that marked a growing recognition of the region’s importance. In this same period, trade relations were also reestablished, a necessary initiative designed to strengthen the Soviet economy. The Latin American country of greatest interest to the Soviets in this latter perspective proved to be Argentina.4
The history of Argentine-Soviet relations had a tumultuous beginning. Diplomatic ties with Russia had been severed a few days after the revolutionary events of October 1917. Before those events, but after the overthrow of the tsarist government, President Hipólito Yrigoyen had sent an autographed letter to the Argentine ambassador in Petrograd accrediting him to the government of Alexander Kerensky. By the time the letter reached Russia, however, the October uprising had already occurred and the Bolsheviks, headed by Lenin, were in power. The letter was never presented and, for the sole purpose of protecting the diplomatic archives and other pertinences, the Argentine embassy was left in the charge of an employee of Armenian extraction, J. Naveillán.
This individual was to be the protagonist of truly novelesque episodes that testify to the confusion of those early years of the revolution, particularly for someone who represented a country with which Soviet Russia maintained no diplomatic relations. Arrested three times for different reasons, Naveillán managed to leave Russian territory in 1921. It is interesting to note that one cause of the apparent persecution of the Argentine representative was the semana trágica in 1919. According to agent reports and publications from Buenos Aires, the Soviet government interpreted that occurrence as repression directed primarily against workers of Russian origin living in Argentina. When efforts were made to secure Naveillán’s release from jail, Soviet Commissar of Foreign Affairs G. V. Chicherin allegedly stated to the Persian ambassador, who at the time was acting as intermediary, that it would be necessary for the Argentine government to recognize the Soviets.5
Between 1921 and 1927 there was a total break in relations, although various episodes reflect Soviet interest in Argentina, as well as reveal domestic pressure from within Argentina for a normalization of ties between the two nations. In 1922, for example, a Russian commercial agent arrived in Buenos Aires to negotiate the purchase of grain. Two years later, in 1924, the Soviet government made its first attempt to open a branch office in Argentina of a London-based company that sought to promote trade, and in 1925, the U.S.S.R. requested permission to send a trade mission to Argentina.
In July of the same year, the Argentine ambassador in Rome informed Buenos Aires that his Soviet colleague had communicated to him the Russian government’s interest in establishing diplomatic relations, an interest pursued simultaneously by other Russian diplomats serving abroad. Mean-while that same year, in Argentina, conservative deputy Rodolfo Moreno called for a normalization of relations. Similar proposals were made a short time later by Socialist and Independent Socialist deputies. In 1926, Crítica, the most popular newspaper of the day, protested editorially against the lack of diplomatic ties with the Soviet government and noted in an article the importance of the U.S.S.R. as a market for Argentina’s agricultural products.6
In the face of such pressures, Foreign Minister Angel Gallardo was called before the parliament in August 1928 and obliged to explain why Argentina did not intend at that time to renew its relations with the Soviet Union. In concert with Brazil and Chile, Argentina had adopted a policy of linking the normalization of relations to the U.S.S.R.’s abstention from all propaganda against the social and institutional order of other countries and its severance of contact with organizations like the Third International. Other elements that confirmed Soviet intentions, Gallardo argued, were the exceptionally large number of Soviet personnel at their embassies in Paris and London and the purchase by a Soviet group of the Banque des Pays du Nord de l’Europe, which, he suggested, would serve more than strictly commercial ends.7
In 1927, however, a new development had occurred in the relations between the two countries. Iuyamtorg, a joint stock company, was formed in Buenos Aires to promote trade between Russia and South America and acquired legal status in a decree signed in December of that year by President Marcelo T. de Alvear. As a result of its activities, there was an almost immediate increase in reciprocal trade. Comparing the periods 1923-26 and 1927-30, imports of Soviet origin grew rapidly, from 18 to 108 million rubles. From 1926 through September 1931, over half of all Soviet trade with South America was with Argentina. Export products included hides, quebracho extract, wool, and casein, while Argentina imported various kinds of lumber, furs, lamps, lentils, caviar, and so forth. Trade was financed through domestic and foreign banks, primarily the Banco de la Nación, Banco Tornquist, Banco Holandés, Banco Español, and Banco Alemán.8
The creation of Iuyamtorg was not fortuitous, but a direct outgrowth of the new Soviet policy of expanding economic relations with the West. This policy was first implemented on the American continent in 1924 with the founding in the United States of Amtorg, a company whose purpose was to promote Soviet—United States trade. Amtorg subsequently opened a branch in Buenos Aires (that later served as the foundation of Iuyamtorg).9
The Argentine government’s acceptance of Iuyamtorg can also be explained in terms of political economy. The new company was to play an important role in Yrigoyen’s battle to nationalize the oil industry, a move supported from within the national oil company, Yacimientos Petrolíferos Fiscales (YPF), by General Enrique Mosconi. Actually, the problem had first come up in 1927 during the Alvear presidency, when the Radicals presented a nationalization bill in the Chamber of Deputies. The bill was approved by that body but failed, after bitter debate, to pass the Senate. A year later the problem was further aggravated by the outbreak of a conflict with Standard Oil over concessions granted to Standard in the province of Salta. It was no coincidence that, in the midst of such a climate and perhaps even instigated by the Argentine government itself, Iuyamtorg agreed in August 1930 to provide 250,000 tons of oil at international prices in exchange for agricultural and livestock products. There was a campaign against accepting this offer, undoubtedly inspired by foreign companies fearful of new competition.10
The agreement was finally frustrated because almost immediately thereafter the coup of September 1930 took place, in which the hand of the oil interests was also apparent. In any event, the attitude of the new government was decidedly hostile to the Soviet Union; in July 1931 the offices of Iuyamtorg were raided by the authorities, who accused it of functioning as a Soviet consulate. All further activities by the company were prohibited. Rather than linking the matter to the oil imbroglio, an effort was made to demonstrate the involvement of the Radicals with international Communism. This effort was greatly facilitated by the fact that the company’s attorneys were two well-known Radical leaders, Mario Guido and the former foreign minister, Honorio Pueyrredón.11
Afterward, trade between the two countries fell off sharply and was not reestablished until after World War II. The efforts of the 1920s were not repeated in the 1930s and there was noticeable mutual hostility in international forums. This was especially apparent in 1939 in the League of Nations and in 1945 at the San Francisco Conference that led to the creation of the United Nations. This latter case will be examined below.
In December 1939, Argentine Foreign Minister José María Cantilo sent a note to the secretary of the League of Nations, already in its final days as an organization. Cantilo protested Soviet aggression against Finland and requested the immediate expulsion of the U.S.S.R. from the League. The Soviet Union was in fact expelled on December 14 by a resolution of the organization’s General Assembly.12 Rut these episodes were mere skirmishes compared to what would follow during World War II.
World War II (1939-45)
The Seventh Congress of the Comintern in 1935 marked a transcendental shift in the international Communist movement. At that Congress, support was given to the “popular front” thesis, which sought to shape the policies of individual Communist parties in accord with particular national conditions as those parties gradually broke out of the isolation in which they found themselves. Moreover, following the period of neutrality marked by the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, the U.S.S.R., once invaded by Germany, entered the war and joined the “Grand Alliance’’ together with Great Britain and the United States, clearly distinguishing thenceforth between its friends, the capitalist democracies, and the Nazi-Fascist enemy. The “popular front” thesis was thus wrapped up in the interplay of world alliances that shaped international politics until immediately after the war. The dissolution of the Comintern in 1943 likewise formed part of this new strategy.13
In this context, Argentine neutrality during the hostilities further distanced the two countries from one another. An additional strain was actually domestic in nature: the growing opposition of the Argentine Communist party to the successive governments of Ramón S. Castillo, Pedro Pablo Ramírez, and Edelmiro J. Farrell, which it labeled pronazi and accused of pursuing a foreign policy favorable to the Axis. The Soviet press shared this view throughout the war and up to the election of Juan Domingo Perón as president in February 1946. It was a position, moreover, very similar to that held in the same period by the U. S. Department of State and the North American press.14
The most important manifestation of Soviet conduct toward Argentina before San Francisco occurred at the Yalta meeting of the Big Three in February 1945. In his discussions there with Roosevelt and Churchill Stalin referred explicitly to the “Argentine case,” i.e., to the problem created during the war by Argentina’s foreign policy. (Actually, Argentina broke relations with the Axis in January 1944, but its government continued to be labeled pronazi.) As would be seen subsequently, this was not just a matter of principle for Stalin; his intention was also to secure advantages in the United Nations and probably, to undermine the unity of the Panamerican system, so laboriously promoted by the Roosevelt administration with its “Good Neighbor” policy.
Stalin insisted that the basic requirement for admission to the United Nations should be that member nations sign the Charter; this presupposed that countries seeking membership had declared war on Germany. At the same time, while not demanding formal recognition, he did express concern that certain nations who were eligible for U.N. membership, in particular various South American republics, did not have diplomatic relations with the U.S.S.R.15
Roosevelt accepted these arguments and even indicated that he had taken the necessary steps to get the Latin American countries that had broken relations with the Axis, but had not yet declared war, to do so forthwith. Stalin, however, was not entirely satisfied with the president’s reply. He inquired directly about the Argentines inasmuch as they, too, had severed relations with the Axis yet did not enthusiastically support the Allies. The problem was that those countries that had taken part in the war would not feel at ease with a member such as Argentina, a nation that had sought to save itself by “trying to speculate on who would win.”16
Roosevelt’s response appeared to exclude Argentina from the U. N., for it indicated that only those nations who actively collaborated in the war effort would be invited to join. Then together Stalin and Roosevelt set March 1 as the outside date for making the required declaration of war.17
One additional issue that was to affect the Argentine question in San Francisco was the admission of the Ukraine and Byelorussia, both Soviet states, as independent members of the United Nations. Here the matter was decided by Great Britain, who wished to facilitate the membership of its own imperial territories. Roosevelt, although faced with strong opposition from within the U. S. delegation, finally assented.18
Meanwhile, between February and April 1945, the United States reversed its position on Argentina, which until then had been one of severe condemnation, initiating a policy of rapprochement that culminated in Argentina’s adherence to the Inter-American Conference on Problems of War and Peace (Chapultepec Conference), its declaration of war against the Axis (after the date set at Yalta), and the conclusion of economic, political, and military accords during a visit to Buenos Aires in April of that year of a mission headed by special State Department envoy Avra Warren. It was apparent that the United States, pressed by the Yalta accords, sought at all costs to avoid losing a potential ally in the United Nations—a problematic ally, yet a necessary one for consolidating the Panamerican bloc. One of the Warren Mission’s objectives (another of history’s paradoxes) was to persuade the Argentine government to establish diplomatic relations with the U.S.S.R., thereby seeking, no doubt, to defuse possible Soviet objections in San Francisco.19
In this regard, the North Americans were not far from the mark. At the founding conference of the United Nations, the Argentine problem came up after Byelorrussia and the Ukraine had been voted to membership as provided by the Yalta accord and with the support of all the Latin American countries. At the Executive Committee meeting of April 30, Mexico and Chile proposed approving the admission of Argentina, linking it to that of the two Soviet republics. However, they misread the attitude of Molotov, the Soviet representative and foreign minister. Molotov asked for the floor and argued that the two cases were fundamentally different, inasmuch as the Soviet republics had fought heroically against the common enemy, while Argentina, in his view, had never ceased supporting that enemy. He indicated that to offer membership to Argentina and not to Poland (he referred to the pro-Soviet Lublin government, whose legitimacy was one of the key points of discussion at Yalta) would be incomprehensible and that accordingly, were they to proceed to a vote, the U.S.S.R. would vote against the Argentine invitation.20
The United States delegate, Edward R. Stettinius, Jr., replied that Argentina had satisfied the necessary requirements for joining the organization. Several Latin American representatives expressed similar views. Actually though, opinion was divided within the U.S. delegation itself and even President Truman was ready, in the final instance, to accept Soviet arguments and reject the admission of Argentina. Moreover, there was growing pressure from the North American press not to admit Argentina.21
The Soviets were well aware of the dissenting views within the U.S. delegation and sought to take full advantage of them. Soviet foreign radio broadcasts, for example, highlighted alleged statements by former Secretary of State Cordell Hull that sharply criticized possible Argentine membership in the U. N. Izvestiia, official organ of the Soviet government, described Argentina’s declaration of war against the Axis—the primary argument for its admission—as “considered essential by German fascists,” asserting that it had been decided at a meeting in which the “German secret service chief” took part and concluding that “German direction of Argentina is now obvious.”22
At a working session of the conference where the Argentine problem continued to be debated, Molotov himself referred to the contradictions in U. S. policy, citing public statements by Roosevelt and Hull to the effect that nazi and fascist methods were employed in Argentina and that that country had become “the headquarters of a fascist movement in this hemisphere.” Openly revealing what had been worked out in secret by the Big Three, Molotov added that the U.S.S.R. had accepted the presence of India and the Philippines, which were not independent states, at the request of Great Britain and the United States. He thus implied that this had been in exchange for the admission of Byelorussia and the Ukraine and that it had nothing to do with Argentina.
Still, Molotov’s arguments floundered in the face of an adverse vote, and the admission of Argentina was approved by an overwhelming majority. In subsequent conversations, both Soviets and North Americans criticized each other’s attitude toward Argentina. The Americans rebuked the Soviets for using past statements of the president and secretary of state; Stalin berated Argentina for not meeting the March 1 deadline for declaring war on Germany and Roosevelt for failing to keep his word, apparently given at Yalta, to exclude Argentina from the United Nations.23
The San Francisco episode cannot be fully understood without reference to the position of the Argentine Communist party toward the military government and, in particular, toward Perón. That position, in turn, was linked to the development of the international Communist movement, whose relations with the U.S.S.R. are, as indicated earlier, of great importance for an understanding of Soviet foreign policy, especially at that time.
The Anglo-American-Soviet alliance during the war put the international Communist movement to a test and its response was not always uniform. The dissolution of the Comintern, a move whereby Stalin defined his relations with fraternal parties as a function of the U.S.S.R.’s new global strategy, deepened fissures that clearly already existed. As would be demonstrated subsequently by Yugoslavia, China, and Albania, the monolithic character of international Communism was more apparent than real.24
The line that was to prevail after 1941 would be expounded by the leader of a small but, at the time, key party: the U.S. Communist party. Long before Khrushchev, Earl Browder argued that peaceful coexistence among the Western democracies and the U.S.S.R. had become essential, that the postwar world offered opportunities for peace and cooperation, and that the contradictions between antagonistic social systems could be resolved peacefully. In a public address on November 6, 1944, Stalin personally endorsed this line, indicating that in his view “the alliance of [the U.S.S.R.], Great Britain and the United States” was not based on “accidental, transitory motives,” but on important “long-term interests.”25
In line with this strategy, which broadened the perspective of the Seventh Congress of the Comintern to include the entire world, the head of the Argentine Communist party, Victorio Codovilla, in an article published in the party’s daily paper, La Hora, called for the formation of the National Union. This was to be an antifascist front that would include all opposition political parties and serve as a model for the future Democratic Union that, in 1945-46, would oppose Perón. The date is significant, because Germany had invaded the Soviet Union less than a month earlier.26
The Argentine Communists, together with other opposition parties, the U.S. State Department, and a majority of the North American, European, and Soviet press, would create and disseminate internationally the impression that Argentine administrations of the time were pronazi and that Argentina had become a beachhead of Hitlerism in America—a myth that persists yet today. At the same time, the Argentine Communist party defined its international stance in those years by stressing the virtues of the alliance among the U.S.S.R., the United States, and Great Britain.
In a 1944 political report, Codovilla argued that it was necessary to overthrow the pronazi clique in the United Officers Group (GOU) who were abusing power “in their own interests and those of the most reactionary sector of the financial and landowning oligarchy” in order to carry out “the mission that had been assigned to them by Hitlerism and Falangism. . . . These Fascist adventurers,” he added, “try to camouflage their aggressive intentions with vague formulations about defending national sovereignty, which, they assert, is threatened by ‘Yankee imperialism, and they are able to fool the politically least aware part of the population.”27
In an interview in Chile in 1945, Codovilla would himself argue that “the Big Three, representing socialism and progressive capitalism, had initiated a collaboration that would span an entire historical period. . . . The highly industrialized countries,” he emphasized, “like the United States, the Soviet Union, England, and others, could obtain a broad foreign market for their continually expanding production,” to which end international organizations like the World Bank and others then being created would play an important role.28 The differences in their respective social systems notwithstanding, common economic and commercial goals were said to have been established among the Big Three with regard to the underdeveloped world, including the creation of international sources of financing.
Moreover, these statements reveal a line of thought that, as expressed in a secret State Department document, coincided with the objectives of the United States ambassador, Spruille Braden, during his brief stay in Argentina. “Evidence of continued cooperation among the Big Three,” the document said, “including Germany’s unconditional surrender to all the major Allies, the Davies and Hopkins missions to Britain and Russia, and the gradual resolution of outstanding interallied problems, set the stage for the pointed remarks of newly arrived Ambassador Spruille Braden in Buenos Aires.”29
The Establishment of Diplomatic Relations and Postwar Commercial Negotiations (1946-52)
At the end of 1945 there were rapid changes in Argentina’s domestic situation and, despite the fact that the Argentine Communist party continued its campaign against the military government and especially against Perón, signs of a different attitude started to appear within the international Communist movement. A first symptom showed itself in the posture of the Brazilian Communists, headed by Luiz Carlos Prestes. Already in June 1945, Agilberto Azevedo, one of the leaders of the Brazilian Communist party, indicated that he did not hesitate “to affirm in the name of Prestes that the Communists in Argentina have made a serious mistake in aligning themselves against Farrell and Perón.”30
This opinion would be confirmed by Pablo Neruda, the Chilean Communist poet and senator, who, in his memoirs, confessed that he had served as intermediary for Victorio Codovilla, in the latter’s efforts to resolve his differences with Prestes. On a trip to Brazil in July 1945, Neruda met with the Brazilian leader, who apparently said to him: “There is no fascism in Argentina. . . . Perón is a caudillo but he is not a fascist boss.” In this divergence, Neruda diplomatically commented, “Prestes was probably right.”31
According to a report of the Argentine embassy in Rio de Janeiro dated February 1947, the Brazilian Communist leader continued to insist emphatically to the Argentine representative that “we, and myself in particular, know what President Perón’s political orientation is: eminently democratic.” He accused the agents of “a certain reactionary nation of twisting the truth to make him appear like a reactionary kind of fascist, a totalitarian.”32
The contradictory positions of the Argentine and Brazilian Communist parties, in addition to two differing opinions within the international movement no doubt reflected probable differences in views among the Soviet leadership over which policy to pursue toward Argentina. In Argentina, when Perón approached the local Communist party to seek its political collaboration, one group of Argentine Communists began to view him differently; and important, albeit isolated, leaders, like Rodolfo Puiggrós, would subsequently support him.33
More to the point for purposes of the present study is that in mid-1945, and despite Molotov’s position in San Francisco, both Perón and the Soviets initiated direct contacts that eventually would lead to the establishment of diplomatic relations. As early as April 1945, Perón mentioned to Ambassador Braden that the counselor of the Russian legation in Montevideo had paid him a visit to propose the purchase of “all Argentine grain surplus.” In July of that year, Braden apprised the State Department of a possible anti–United States alliance, under Soviet protection, between Perón and Brazilian President Getúlio Vargas.34
This information was surely fantasy insofar as its purposes were concerned but was not entirely wide of the mark with regard to the facts. According to another version (a journalistic account), in November 1945, through the mediation of Vargas, secret negotiations were held in Montevideo between an Argentine and a Soviet delegation. These negotiations apparently progressed to the point that the Argentine government actually selected an ambassador to be sent to Russia—none other than Argentina’s future foreign minister, Juan Atilio Bramuglia.
In his memoirs, former U.S. Secretary of State Sumner Welles confirmed these facts, although he indicated that the contacts took place in Brazil. The Mexican newspaper, Excélsior, stated that five days before the opening of the San Francisco Conference the Argentine chargé d’affaires in Washington, Rodolfo García Arias, paid a visit to Soviet Ambassador Andrei Gromyko. Shortly thereafter the first meeting between Russian and Argentine representatives took place in São Paulo, a meeting in which Luiz Carlos Prestes was said also to have played an important role. According to Excélsior, once Argentina had been admitted to the United Nations in San Francisco, the talks (which had been interrupted) were resumed, this time in Belo Horizonte. Foreign Minister Bramuglia, for his part, explaining the background to the establishment of Argentine-Soviet relations before the Chamber of Deputies in September 1946, indicated that the initiative had come from the Soviet Union through its ambassador in Montevideo. What remains clear, however, is that there were multiple contacts in Rio de Janeiro and Montevideo and that they began at a time when the U.S.S.R. was publicly adopting a hostile stance toward Argentina.35
These contacts, moreover, appear not to have been limited to Argentina’s neighbors. In September 1945, for example, United States Military Intelligence received a report that a Perón envoy had allegedly met with Mexican labor leader and unofficial Comintern representative Vicente Lombardo Toledano. Perón was said to have expressed his desire that the U.S.S.R. become a major supplier of the Argentine market in exchange for the purchase of local products, which Moscow could then supply to its Asian and Balkan neighbors. This is doubtful, given that Lombardo Toledano at that time was a strong adversary of Perón and hardly constituted an appropriate intermediary for such contacts. Nonetheless, this version remains suggestive, all the more so when the North Americans themselves asserted in early October 1945 that four Soviet trade experts were going to Buenos Aires to study these proposals.36
Subsequently, on the eve of the presidential elections in late February 1946, rumors spread rapidly about the dispatch of a ten-person trade mission and the imminent establishment of Soviet-Argentine relations. United States ambassador in Rio de Janeiro, Adolf Berle, called attention in a telegram to the different signs that confirmed Soviet interest in Argentina and Perón’s contacts with the U.S.S.R. (through Brazil) at the very moment when the State Department, by means of its famous “Blue Book,” was pretending to discover nazi ties to the Argentine political leader. Berle indicated that:
It is difficult to escape the conclusion that Soviet policy at the moment is to take advantage of anything which might weaken Great Britain in any way, and possibly also the U.S.—irrespective of theory. Certainly we should be justified in drawing this conclusion if they send a trade mission on top of the Blue Book. The Department is already aware that Perón earlier endeavored to establish connections with the Soviet government using Brazil as mediary.37
Perón’s election as president, and the fact that there were logical affinities between the preceding military government and the recently elected constitutional government, permitted the arrival in Buenos Aires in April 1946, before the new president’s inauguration, of the highly publicized Soviet trade mission. A local pro-Soviet Russian-language newspaper, Russkii v Argentine (Russians in Argentina), underscored the mission’s political character and contrasted it with the “domestic and international” pressure applied to Argentina during the war years by the United States. “Argentine patriots,” the paper asserted, “dreamed of gaining a friend in the Soviet government, which could somehow ease pressure from the North Americans.”38 Times had changed since Molotov, using Roosevelt’s and Hull’s own arguments, had opposed Argentina’s admission to the United Nations or since some Argentine Communist leaders had criticized the State Department’s policy of “appeasement” toward the Argentine government and labeled warrenada the arrival in Buenos Aires of the Warren Mission, thereby indicating what they considered a United States betrayal of the principles of the Great Alliance.39
The local Russian paper cited above no doubt reflected the new focus of Soviet-Argentine relations. In a subsequent article it highlighted another essential point whose relevance to the present is obvious: the U.S.S.R. and Argentina, it pointed out, were two countries that complement each other economically,” in contrast to the United States and Argentina, and mutual exchange between them follows distinct, non-conflicting lines.”40
The Soviet trade mission was headed by Shevelev, and its purpose from the outset was the signing of a commercial treaty between the two countries and the purchase of primary products like wool and flax. The mission undertook active efforts and made contacts in Buenos Aires and other cities in the interior. Noteworthy were visits to the Buenos Aires Commodities Exchange, the Chamber of Exporters, the Secretariat of Industry and Trade, the Swift packing plant in Rosario, and the Banco Polaco, which would play an important role in trade with the East. On May 15, the mission also had a meeting with the recently elected president, which was made public.41
The Soviet mission’s activities aroused grave concern in the United States and in London, where it was feared that the U.S.S.R. might become a competitor of the Western countries in the purchase of certain agricultural products. (Mention was made of flax.) The Buenos Aires daily, La Nación, headlined one commentary on the subject suggestively. “Struggle Between Russia and U.S. Will Favor Argentina.”42
The arrival of the Soviet trade mission and its favorable reception in the Argentine press, especially that which supported the new government, announced the imminent establishment of relations. One paper favorable to Perón, for example, stated that the “rejection of Russia [constituted] an absurd chapter in Argentina’s international and diplomatic policy” and criticized the oligarchy and those conservative politicians who in the past had opposed any rapprochement with the U.S.S.R., citing among others Vicente Solano Lima, Héctor González Iramáin, Ramón Castillo, Robustiano Patrón Costas, Jorge Santamarina, Heriberto Martínez, and Matías Sánchez Sorondo.43 At the same time, the Soviet daily Pravda, citing a North American magazine, indicated that relations would soon be reestablished with Argentina and that this was explained by Argentina’s characteristic wish to counterbalance United States pressure and to preserve its own national independence.44
On June 6, 1946, just two days after Perón had assumed the presidency, it was announced simultaneously in Buenos Aires and Moscow that formal diplomatic, consular, and trade relations were being established between the U.S.S.R. and Argentina. In reality, it was a first contact, not a renewal of relations, for the old empire of the tsars had passed through a revolution and, following World War I, the Soviet Union had transformed itself into one of two great world powers. In Argentina a new leader and a new political alliance had come to power that would shape the course of public life down to the present. The obvious interest of the U.S.S.R. in these relations was reflected in the first statements of the Soviet press, which emphasized the benefits they would provide for Argentine national interests and the desire of local political, financial, and economic circles to see relations normalized. The economic theme was a constant in the commentaries of Izvestiia, which noted the negative role of foreign capital in Argentina and the need of that country to expand its trade relations in order to establish an independent economy. Izvestiia remarked in particular that the Argentines ought to purchase large quantities of light and heavy industrial goods; and in general that, given the Soviet Union’s great industrial development, it seemed only natural for the two countries to develop trade possibilities.45
These statements did not go unnoticed in the Western world. In official London circles, it was felt that this article in Izvestiia might signal Kremlin determination to compete with Great Britain and the United States for Latin American markets. The weekly Economist pointed out that “the motives behind Russian policy [toward Argentina] are part economic, part political.”46
In the United States, reactions were varied and contradictory. Some congressmen, especially from the liberal wing (like Sol Bloom, Hugh Butler and Claude Pepper), received the news with approval. Pepper stated that there was no reason to reproach Russia, especially since the United States had been the principal defender of Argentina’s admission to the United Nations. Whereas some North American economic experts spoke of the future importance of trade ties between the U.S.S.R. and Argentina, however, The New York Times did not believe that the establishment of relations between those two countries had been for economic reasons inasmuch as the U.S.S.R. had no machinery to export, while Argentine exports lacked markets in the Soviet Union. According to the Times, the reasons were above all political and, as far as Perón was concerned, were justified by his desire to become the strongman of South America. “This diplomatic penetration of Latin America by Moscow is not necessarily bad, nor alarming,” assured the Times. “But it would seem to behoove the United States to keep in good repair its own diplomatic fences there.” In any event, even were it to occasion “a conflict of ideas and diplomacy,” that could be “stimulating for everyone,” provided it contributed to a peaceful world.47
The opinion of The Washington Post was different. In the view of this paper two factors had brought about the establishment of relations: Argentina’s importance as a source of foodstuffs and raw materials and Perón’s belief that in this way he could acquire influence against the United States. The paper asserted that the Kremlin and Casa Rosada had made a marriage of convenience, one that would pit totalitarian extremes against the United States’ democracy.48
Other newspapers of a conservative bent reflected an even more negative attitude toward Argentine-Soviet rapprochement. The New York Herald Tribune, for example, after a violent criticism of the Soviets, concluded by warning of the difficulties that Russia would cause in South America through native communists or “such amoral nationalists as Perón.”49
A number of European newspapers, while not as negative in their views, nonetheless shared a distrust of Soviet intentions in Argentina, both from an economic point of view, which was Europe’s primary interest as Argentina’s traditional trading partner, and from a political point of view. The editors of Le Monde, the influential Paris paper, pointed out the importance of Argentina as one of the principal communications and trade centers of the Southern Hemisphere, and suggested that diplomatic ties would give the Russians facilities for developing their activities throughout Latin America, Others, like La Lanterne of Brussels, asked if Perón might not be a new pawn. Belgium’s minister of foreign relations, Paul Henri Spaak, however, had a different attitude. Spaak had opposed Argentina’s admission to the United Nations, supporting the Soviet position, and now thought that the South American country’s ties to the U.S.S.R. would strengthen Argentina’s international role.50
In Argentina, few daily newspapers openly opposed the establishment of relations with the U.S.S.R. The most significant exception was the Catholic paper, El Pueblo, which had supported Perón in the elections. El Pueblo titled one editorial “Hecho Consumado” and noted the “intrinsically perverse nature of communist ideology, as indicated by the church, and the impracticality of the measure, which could not be justified even from a purely commercial perspective. The paper most pleased by the development, of course, was the Communist La Hora, for whom the news had evoked excited manifestations of enthusiasm among all the popular and working class sectors of the population.” 51
The official United States attitude, as revealed by the few State Department secret reports that deal with the matter are by and large alarmist, especially as to the possible effects of Soviet-Argentine ties on trade relations. A memorandum from the cultural attaché, John Griffiths (who later would be accused by Perón as the instigator of an anti-Perón campaign in which the Communists were also involved), informed Ambassador George S. Messersmith that, according to information received, the Russians were willing initially to sell Argentina captured German airplanes and trucks. In exchange, they would demand “fishing concessions in southern waters,” committing themselves, in turn, “to support the Argentine’s claims to the Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas).” Had this report not been written in July 1946, it might appear to be contemporary news. Griffiths added that, as an indication of the importance the U.S.S.R. attached to its new relations, there was a possibility that the future Soviet ambassador would be former Foreign Minister Maxim Litvinov.52
On this last matter Griffiths proved to be wrong, for the new ambassador turned out to be Mikhail Sergeev, who arrived in Buenos Aires on August 31, 1946. Although Sergeev lacked the prestige of Litvinov, according to the North Americans themselves he was one of the most capable members of the Soviet diplomatic corps, having served previously as ambassador to Belgium.53
The trade talks began with the arrival of the Soviet mission in April 1946 and dragged on for more than a year, showing very poor results. Negotiations centered on the signing of the Soviets proposed commercial treaty, which, according to Perón and his minister Bramuglia, contained elements that the Argentine government was unwilling to accept. Perón mentioned to U.S. Ambassador Messersmith that certain clauses were politically unacceptable, while Bramuglia noted the Soviets’ wish to publicize the treaty with a joint signing ceremony at the Casa Rosada. Bramuglia considered the latter counterproductive, its sole purpose being to achieve political effect in Latin America. Moreover, according to Messersmith, Perón was worried by Soviet political penetration of the continent. He cited the presence of three Communist ministers in the cabinet of Chilean President Gabriel González Videla, the latest manifestation of the antifascist popular front strategy in Latin America, and indicated that should his own government fall under Communist influence, he would immediately resign from the presidency. For Perón, in sum, it was preferable not to sign a treaty and to maintain trade relations on the basis of periodic negotiations.54
According to information from the United States Embassy, by late 1946 the Soviets had become exceedingly disillusioned with Argentina’s new president, to the point that a TASS correspondent in Argentina was said to have stated that if matters did not improve, his country would withdraw part of its diplomatic and other personnel. This same journalist, however, also confessed that the U.S.S.R. was incapable of supplying machinery and other industrial goods to Argentina in the near future.55
Soviet preoccupation was revealed in December of that year when Ambassador Sergeev made a brief trip to the United States, allegedly for a vacation but in reality to discuss the Argentine situation directly with Molotov, who was then in New York. Still more significant, perhaps, was the departure for Moscow in March 1947 of Shevelev, head of the Soviet trade mission, to discuss the same problem with his superiors. No date was set for his return to Buenos Aires.56
According to a version that Perón related to the United States ambassador, the disagreement centered on Argentina’s refusal to sign a long-term accord. A draft of a normal treaty of trade, navigation, and friendship had actually been drawn up for signing in January 1947, but the Argentine government was not very interested in going through with it; and the Soviets felt it was too broad and therefore were themselves dissatisfied with it. According to Perón, one problem lay in misunderstandings between the Soviet ambassador and the head of the Soviet trade mission, who apparently was directly responsible to the Kremlin. Perón suggested that the latter’s attitude was much more understanding and that this may have been the cause of his return to Moscow, where there was perhaps displeasure at the way he had handled the negotiations.57
In any event, talks were renewed again in October in more concrete terms. There was no longer a demand for a treaty and discussions focused on the exchange of grain and nonedible oils for machinery, rails, and military equipment. In the opinion of the new United States ambassador, James Bruce, the Argentine government intended to use these initiatives to achieve better negotiating terms with England and the United States, although they had probably also been influenced by pressure from important domestic groups (nonCommunists opposed to the government), who look “with favor on the maintenance of normal relations with Russia as a supposed safeguard against becoming prematurely and irrevocably tied to United States foreign policy. ”58 At the very moment when consideration was being given to Argentina’s possible participation in the Marshall Plan, there can be no doubt that Perón’s primary objective was the one Bruce had indicated.59
Rumors of possible Soviet-Argentine negotiations persisted throughout 1948 and 1949, forcing a policy decision on the United States State Department, which at the time, despite the cold war, seems to have encouraged ties with the U.S.S.R. In January 1949, for example, Perón informed the United States ambassador that Russia had offered to buy all of Argentina’s surplus oil, casein, and hides and to pay in dollars or gold.60 After consultation with Secretary of State Dean Acheson, the ambassador informed Buenos Aires that “the Departments of State and Agriculture and the Economic Cooperation Administration perceive no basis for objection to the sale of these products to Russia” against payment in dollars. However, he later warned that the possible expansion of Argentine trade with Eastern Europe might debilitate “Argentina’s political affiliation with the West” and deprive the United States and certain countries of Western Europe of an important market and a source for their import needs.61 In any event, the basic contradiction underlying United States policy debates at the height of the Anglo–Argentine–United States triangle continued to surface. As long as trade with the U.S.S.R. provided dollars with which to import goods from the United States, it was acceptable, although it constituted a dangerous potential element, even more so than trade with Great Rritain, for now there were strategic and ideological elements to consider as well.
In Moscow, meanwhile, relations with Argentina were not developing as well as had been hoped. In October 1946, the Argentine Congress had approved the appointment of an ambassador in the Soviet capital. Senator Diego Luis Molinari had emphasized as a principle of this appointment that countries should not divide themselves into different blocs and that, in order for there to be real international order, the presence of the Russian people in the concert of nations was essential.62 Federico Cantoni was named Argentina’s first ambassador to the Soviet Union. Cantoni was a Radical bloquista from San Juan (a provincial party split off from the Radical Civic Union), twice governor of that province (1923-25, 1932-34) and a recent adherent to Peronism. He was a controversial personality who expressed a kind of populism rooted in Radicalism but with features akin to the new movement led by Perón. He was, in any event, a social reformer who appeared qualified to serve as ambassador to the U.S.S.R. His ambassadorship, however, would not be very successful and was brief. It was perhaps beyond him to control a situation that was being decided by cold war developments and the trade talks in Buenos Aires.63
Cantoni arrived in the U.S.S.R. in April 1947, accompanied by a retinue of 25 persons, and soon thereafter moved into a country dacha on the outskirts of Moscow, since the embassy did not yet have its own quarters. The new ambassador familiarized himself with the problems of Soviet agriculture, proposed sending Argentine agricultural advisers to the U. S. S. R., and even offered breeding bulls and varieties of seeds. The sending of cattle samples had been decided in a personal conversation between Cantoni and Perón before the ambassador’s departure and was designed to promote greater cordiality in Soviet-Argentine relations and to lead to, perhaps, obtaining samples of Soviet livestock useful to Argentina. They had also discussed sending technicians together with the cattle for the purpose of studying in detail the functioning of the kolkhoz and sovkhoz, the Soviet collective and state farms.64
Cantoni’s initiatives, however, produced little response and he soon found himself the object of Soviet hostility, or at least indifference. The Argentine diplomats were subjected to surveillance, and their movements were restricted to Moscow and its immediate environs. Moreover, throughout Cantoni’s stay in the Soviet Union, the embassy encountered constant difficulties in relation to visas and other bureaucratic matters.65
One motive for this unfavorable treatment was expounded by Cantoni himself in a personal letter to President Perón, which he sent in July 1947, to keep Perón “personally informed about the diplomatic matters that have increasingly occupied me in Russia.” In that letter the Argentine ambassador wrote:
Having posed to the Ministry of Foreign Relations of the U.S.S.R. proposals, formulated through this embassy by our [Foreign] Ministry, for the purchase of lumber and asbestos fibers and for Russia’s participation in bidding on the supply of rolling stock, equipment for the grain elevator at Puerto Nuevo, etc., Vice Minister Malik expressed to me that, inasmuch as the draft trade agreement submitted some time ago by the Russian trade mission for the consideration of the Argentine government had not been formalized, it was not possible to enter into detailed discussions of purchases and that the U.S.S.R. was only willing to operate on a large scale and on the basis of an accord that contemplates all possible cases in trade between both nations.66
The failure of negotiations with the Soviet trade mission in Buenos Aires and the U.S.S.R.’s intransigence on the matter of signing a treaty made Cantoni’s task exceedingly difficult.
Another unfavorable element for Argentina was the Inter-American Conference for the Maintenance of Continental Peace and Security, which met in Rio de Janeiro from August 15 through September 2, 1947, and concluded with the signing of the Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance. The Rio Treaty would produce a hardening in the Soviet attitude toward the Latin American countries, as Cantoni himself recognized in a letter sent to the Argentine Foreign Ministry in October of that year. In the letter the ambassador even mentioned an anti-Argentine campaign in the Soviet press and direct attacks against Perón, Evita, and the Argentine ambassador to the United Nations, José Arce.67
On a personal level, as well, things became increasingly difficult for Cantoni. When he needed to make a trip to Western Europe, Soviet authorities found different pretexts to hold up the necessary safe-conduct passes and advised the ambassador that he was to travel by rail rather than automobile, as Cantoni had wished. In October 1947, evidently upset by the diverse obstacles placed in his way, the ambassador presented a written protest to Molotov in which he summarized his misfortunes in the Soviet capital. “I have the honor of addressing myself to Your Excellency,” Cantoni wrote, and am “regretfully obliged to bother you with reference to unpleasant facts concerning the unfriendly treatment that I receive in the U.S.S.R. from organs of your Government and of which I am certain that Your Excellency is unaware.”
He then referred to the fact that during his stay in Moscow he had sincerely wished to familiarize himself “with the advances made by this spirited country in its different scientific, industrial, agricultural and commercial activities” so that his reports might contribute to a strengthening of relations between the U.S.S.R. and Argentina. “But my requests for access to the sources of information, to institutes, organizations, etc., have been impeded,” he continued, “sometimes taking three months for approval, other times not being honored at all.” Cantoni’s note concluded with a concrete complaint about the ill treatment to which he had been subjected as a result of his proposed trip outside the U.S.S.R., treatment quite unlike that accorded Russian diplomats in Argentina, who were allowed to travel around the country without special authorization. He made a particular point of the fact that the Soviet ambassador in Buenos67 Aires frequently vacationed in Mar del Plata without any inconveniences whatsoever.68
This protest was answered in unequivocal terms a few days later by Vice-Minister Malik, who replied in Molotov’s name, which in and of itself indicated the degree of tension in Soviet-Argentine relations. Malik denied Cantoni’s assertions, indicating that, to the contrary, the treatment accorded the Argentine embassy had been correct and that most of the ambassador’s complaints were so obviously unfounded that there was no need to consider them.69 This exchange of letters no doubt made matters much worse, and Cantoni, having failed to meet with Stalin or any other Soviet official of importance, decided to return to Buenos Aires.70
The Argentine embassy remained temporarily in the hands of Chargé d’Affaires Leopoldo Bravo, who, in a public statement made in the Soviet capital in early 1948, sought to counter rumors that Cantoni’s return to Buenos Aires stemmed from a chill in relations between the two countries. According to Bravo, Cantoni returned because he wished to inform President Perón personally of his diplomatic efforts.71
Cantoni did not go back to Moscow, however, and a short time later Juan Otero, labor attaché at the Argentine embassy in Italy, was designated ambassador to the U.S.S.R., an appointment not well received by the Soviets, who considered it an example of the lack of importance Argentina attached to this mission.72 It is apparent that the failure of talks in Buenos Aires and the cold war had contributed to distancing the two countries in these years, even after the laborious negotiations that had led to the establishment of formal relations and despite the optimistic expectations immediately following World War II. Between 1950 and 1952 almost nothing transpired by way of trade. It was not until 1953 that things began to change, leading to the notable rapprochement that occurred in the final years of the Perón government.
Cultural relations, too, followed a changing course. In August 1946, a Russo-Argentine Cultural Institute was created in Buenos Aires, initially under the direction of a provisional commission headed by Enrique Corominas, undersecretary of culture of the Ministry of Foreign Relations, which suggests the importance attached to it by the government. The purpose of the institute was “to learn about and disseminate what the Soviet Union has accomplished in the field of culture, [and] to study its political institutions and social order.” The institute was open to all qualified persons who wished to collaborate in its tasks, although its directors were mainly well-known cultural or scientific personalities connected with the Communist party.73
Institute activities, including exhibits, lectures, concerts, and trips to the U.S.S.R., developed normally until 1949, when a September lecture by writer Alfredo Varela was raided by the police. After that its activities were for all practical purposes limited to the teaching of Russian language courses. The growing international tension produced by the Berlin crisis of June 1948 through May 1949, which would be followed by the Korean War, as well as the particular difficulties experienced in Soviet-Argentine relations, explain this reduction of institute activities more than did the police raid itself. Already in 1953, having been renamed the Institute of Argentine–U.S.S.R. Cultural Relations (IRCAU), it once again expanded its activities, due above all to the strengthening of economic ties between the two countries as a result of a commercial accord signed in August of that year. In this period, Soviet-Argentine relations would improve very rapidly.74
Argentina’s Image in the U.S.S.R. and the Position of the Argentine Communist Party (1946-52)
Between 1948 and 1952 there were sharp changes in Soviet perceptions of Argentina and its government. How the Soviets characterized Peronism varied according to international developments and the position Perón adopted toward the local Communist party.
An unofficial but revealing view can be found in a lecture given in December 1947 at the Moscow Polytechnic Institute by a Soviet economist. After pointing out the strategic importance of Argentina, “which was located at the union of two great oceans,” the lecturer highlighted the importance it would have if the Panama Canal were ever cut off, and he referred at the same time to its economic significance as an agro-ranching country, especially as one of the principal world exporters of wheat. After analyzing Argentina’s political process since the 1930s, he alluded directly to Perón, describing him as a demagogue who had made promises he did not keep and saying that he was subject domestically to the contradiction of interests between workers and capitalists and internationally to “the contradiction of interests between Argentina’s national economy and those of foreign capital, which tended to strangle that economy. ”75 This still strongly negative view of Perón did not impede a clear geopolitical conception of Argentina’s role in the world, which the Soviets have maintained over the years and through various changes of government.
The Marshall Plan and Foreign Minister Bramuglia’s position on the Berlin conflict were also factors that contributed to the Soviet position on Argentina in those years. In September 1948, a Soviet radio commentary stated that, in contrast to other Latin American nations, Argentina had not submitted to the commands of their Yankee masters, in response to which the United States was applying a policy of pressure in order to subject Argentina to its designs. The commentary further argued that, while the Argentine government was not in a position to implement an anti-imperialist policy, it had for some time attempted to counter English and United States interests. Trade negotiations with Poland, Rumania, Hungary, and various countries of Western Europe and Latin America based on direct exchange of raw materials and other products indicated that Argentina was—to some degree—attempting to pursue an independent path. But this same discourse warned that Argentina’s lack of dollars could produce an agreement whereby it would be included in the Marshall Plan, thus increasing its dependence on the United States.76
Undoubtedly, the difficulties at the time in United States–Argentine relations, occasioned by bilateral trade problems and United States reluctance to open European markets to Argentina via the Marshall Plan, encouraged Soviet optimism. The same must have been true of Argentina’s bilateral agreements with East European and other nations requiring no dollar payments, for this was the kind of treaty arrangement to which the Soviets themselves aspired. But a few months later, in November 1948, when it was rumored that Argentina would at last be allowed to participate in the Marshall Plan and Soviet expectations seemed (falsely) to evaporate, another Soviet paper, quoting a Czechoslovak colleague, indicated that Perón, bowing to United States pressure, had agreed to surrender Argentina’s economic independence.77
Minister Bramuglia served as president of the U. N. Security Council in Paris in late 1948, during the debates on the Berlin crisis and played a central role in mediations between the great powers. His position was well received in Moscow, where in March 1949 Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Vyshinskii, recalling his contacts with Bramuglia in Paris, spoke kindly of him in a meeting with the Argentine representative in the Soviet capital.78
During the final months of 1949, however, coinciding with the hardening of international tensions and a more rigid government policy toward the Argentine Communists, various Soviet newspapers published harsh criticisms of Perón. According to a United States source, one cause of Moscow’s discontent was the Argentine president’s efforts to court the U.S.S.R. precisely when he was having difficulties with the United States, an interpretation that perhaps reflected actual United States opinion regarding contacts between Perón and the Soviets.79
As a corollary to this period, the characterization of Perón published in the 1950 edition of the important Diplomaticheskii Slovar (Diplomatic Dictionary) offers an exact idea of official Soviet thinking about the man who at the time occupied the Casa Rosada. Giving a brief biographical sketch, the dictionary cited the following salient elements: (1) Perón had been leader and secretary of the fascist military organization GOU (Grupo de Oficiales Unidos), in which capacity he, together with Generals Arturo Rawson and Pedro Ramírez, led the coup d’état of June 1943; (2) in 1944 he opposed breaking diplomatic relations with Germany and Japan, and in 1946, having been elected president and responding to pressure from the Argentine people, he established diplomatic relations with the U.S.S.R., although he also began to manifest hegemonist intentions in the continent’s Southern Cone, as demonstrated by his policy toward the neighboring countries; (3) subsequently he established friendly relations with Franco’s Spain and both at home and abroad began to submit more and more to the dictates of United States imperialism.80
Thus, the image of Perón’s fascism had not yet been erased, and his contacts with Franco, as well as supposed efforts to head a bloc of South American countries, tended to identify him as a reactionary ruler. His subordination to the United States, on the other hand, placed him in the same category as the other dictators of Latin America. Indeed, it was not a coincidence that this view appeared in the same year as the outbreak of the Korean War and at a time when Perón was once again reaffirming his commitment to defend the Western world.81
The attitude of the Argentine government toward the Communist party and, of course, the latter’s opinion of the domestic situation and of Perón himself, also must have influenced these judgments within the larger relationship of the U.S.S.R. and the international Communist movement alluded to above, in which Moscow indicated general policy lines and received back information and viewpoints—occasionally divergent—from its local antennae. This interrelationship functioned especially, although not without friction, during the Stalin period, after which it was severely strained by the Chinese, Yugoslavian, and Albanian schisms and, to a lesser degree, by Eurocommunism.
Here, then, a closer examination of the situation of the Argentine Communist party is in order. At the party’s 11th congress in August 1946, an attempt was made to abandon the earlier characterization of Peronism as a local version of fascism. It was now defined as a polyclass and therefore contradictory movement in which either the bourgeois forces or the popular sectors could prevail. It was recognized, however, that it drew very considerable support from the latter. The Communist party indicated that it would not allow itself to be dragged into systematic opposition to the new authorities, and that it preferred to support the government’s positive features and to criticize its negative ones. Nonetheless, it accepted the fact that there were strong pressures from the forces who had made up the “Unión Democrática,” and now warned of “a drift toward Peronism,” as well as from other forces who demanded unconditional support for the government.82
Actually, these contradictions existed within the Communist party itself and would surface in the estrangement of several party leaders, like Rodolfo Puiggrós, who formed a group of “dissident Communists” associated with Perón from 1946 on; in serious differences between Codovilla and Rodolfo Ghioldi requiring the mediation of the Cuban Communist leader, Juan Marinello; and in the suspension of two party notables, Julio Notta and Cora Ratto de Sadovsky. Ratto de Sadovsky was the main moving force behind the “Junta de la Victoria,” an antifascist women’s organization that played an important role during the war. This process came to a head in 1953 with the expulsion of the party’s organizing secretary, Juan José Real (one of the top three leaders), who sought to associate the Communist party with Peronism.83
The anti-Peronist current within the party had a great deal of strength. Rs most conspicuous figure was veteran leader Rodolfo Ghioldi, who in an article published in 1972 evaluates those years from the prevailing wartime perspective. “From before the coup of 1943,” Ghioldi writes, Perón “sided with German-fascist imperialism; with the defeat of Hitlerism, he turned initially to British imperialism.” Finally, “given Great Britain’s precarious situation in the immediate postwar period and in light of the hegemonic role of the United States in the imperialist camp, Perón turned to this latter country.” After drawing a parallel between Miguel Miranda, who had primary responsibility for the Argentine economy during Perón’s first term, and Hitler’s famous minister, Dr. Hjalmar Schacht, Ghioldi concludes his characterization with the ironic observation: “Perón speaks of his socialism—national socialism, no doubt.”84 Pronazi, pro-British, pro-Yankee, selling out to all the imperialisms, Perón, for Ghioldi, had not a single redeeming feature; his only aspiration was to place himself at the service of foreign powers. However extreme this opinion may be, it reflects the view of an important sector of Argentine Communism and, judging by the dissemination this article received in the U.S.S.R., must also have enjoyed some endorsement within the Soviet leadership.
The “critical support” mentioned earlier, moreover, would appear to have been generally more “critical” than “supportive.” In 1949, for example, the party economist Paulino González Alberdi published an extensive study in which he judged the government’s economic policy negatively and went so far as to compare the Anglo-Argentine accords of the Perón regime with the Roca-Runciman Pact.85 This period, too, saw the aforementioned police raid on the Russo-Argentine Cultural Institute and the arrest of the party’s main leadership following a celebration of the 32nd anniversary of the U.S.S.R. The United States Communist paper, Daily Worker, came out in defense of its Argentine comrades, referring to the terrible events that demonstrated Perón’s tendency—ever stronger—toward fascism, words that no doubt revealed the prevailing view of the U.S. Communist party.86
As for the Argentine Communist party’s analysis of the international situation, following the 11th party congress it turned its attacks on the United States—accentuating them as the cold war unfolded—in direct contrast to the theses put forth only a year before by party head Victorio Codovilla.87 To this must be added the party’s criticism of Peronist foreign policy and its continual insistence that Argentina strengthen its relations with the U.S.S.R. and the socialist bloc. A July 1949 editorial in the party’s theoretical journal, Nueva Era, compared the Latin American governments to mice who end up in a cat’s (the United States) clutches, and declared: “Instead of learning the appropriate lesson from this situation, the Peronist leadership adopts for Argentina the so-called ‘third position,’ which in foreign policy has the country playing the role of ‘defenseless mouse’ jumping between ‘two bad cats,’ England and the United States.” According to this editorial, the only real way to break out of the imperialist ring was to establish “close relations with the Soviet Union and the popular democracies, with whom it is possible to trade in absolute equality on the basis of mutual benefits.” It went on to state that “such relations could have been established some time ago and yet they have not,” and that it was “not the fault of the Soviet Union.” In effect, then, the editorial blamed the Argentine government.88 Here and in other matters pertaining to world politics one must recall that, within the international Communist movement, the Argentine Communist party has always been one of the most faithful followers of Soviet foreign policy and of the successive Kremlin leaders who have given it shape.89
The drift toward a more fully anti-Peronist position was completed a short time later, in November 1950, at the 6th party conference (conducted after the Korean War had broken out and Perón was declaring his adherence to the Western cause), where participants now spoke of “a country governed by fascist laws.” In his subsequent criticism of Juan José Real in February 1953, which led to Real’s expulsion from the party, Codovilla justified the changes in the party line toward Perón following the 11th congress by arguing that the bourgeoisie had secured hegemony in the government and that “Perón had been able to structure his corporate state along fascist lines”—words that sounded like an echo of 1944 and 1945.90
This view was not abandoned even after Perón began to promote economic relations with the U.S.S.R. in 1953. On the one hand, in the final period of his government, relations also improved significantly with the United States, Communism’s primary enemy in the world. On the other, the ideological incompatibility between Peronism and Communism, which Perón took every possible occasion to stress, was clear. But perhaps the most important factor was that the influence of the Communist party into the Argentine working class, where it had developed most notably in the 1930s, was sharply curtailed by the appearance of Peronism.91
From Perón’s point of view, his anticommunism did not negate the possibility of extending relations with the Soviet bloc, provided the latter did not interfere in the country’s internal affairs. As early as 1947 he had stated to the Soviet ambassador in Buenos Aires that so far as Communism in Soviet Russia was concerned, it was a matter of Russian concern, but insofar as it related to Argentina, it was a matter of Argentine concern.92 Years later, in 1954, while Perón was indicating to the U.S. ambassador, Albert F. Nufer, that it was not possible “to adopt an attitude of indifference toward communism” and that the time had come to take a firm position and to eradicate it from the hemisphere, Soviet-Argentine trade and diplomatic relations were experiencing their greatest flowering.93
Moreover, Perón maintained fluid relations with former Communists like Puiggrós and even came to have frequent contacts, through officials in his government, with important leaders of the Communist party. Both Perón and the Communist party, however, understood very well that they found themselves on opposite sides of the street.94
Soviet policy toward Argentina in those years was implemented, no doubt, in the awareness of these factors and in the full knowledge of the internal polemics within the local Communist movement. Beginning in 1952, however, it abandoned all ideological prejudice and was conducted with the greatest realism.
The Moscow World Economic Conference and the Strengthening of Argentine-Soviet Economic Relations (1952-55)
It is usually said that the 20th Congress of the Soviet Communist party, with Khrushchev’s famous report on “the cult of personality” and the beginning of “de-Stalinization,” also initiated a new course in Soviet foreign policy. At that point the party adopted as its axis the twin theses of “peaceful coexistence” among differing social systems and economic competition between capitalism and socialism, the latter as a consequence of the cold war. In reality, things did not occur so abruptly.
The change in Soviet foreign policy began in 1952, before Stalin’s death, and marked the culmination of an internal debate that had commenced with the conclusion of World War II (the E. Varga debate). The cold war and the need to strengthen the Soviet economy and the economies of the Soviet bloc countries—the socialist camp—precluded putting some of the ideas discussed into practice sooner. The reduction of tensions following the Korean War and the economic growth experienced in those years by the U.S.S.R., which permitted a more active Soviet role in world markets, were variables that were exerting pressures for change by the end of 1952.
The new policy would be put into practice even before the 19th party congress, at the World Economic Conference held in Moscow from April 3 through 12, 1952, which had been called the previous October by the World Congress of Defenders of Peace meeting in Copenhagen. In a report to Foreign Minister Jerónimo Remorino dated April 16, 1952, Argentine Ambassador Juan Otero summarized the objectives, development, and conclusions of the Moscow conference. The primary objective would be “to improve people’s standard of living by promoting economic ties among different countries and systems and thus to preserve world peace,” although in Oteros opinion the real purpose of the Soviet policy was rather
to counter the discriminatory economic policy pursued by the United States in international trade and not to try . . . to achieve a genuinely sound policy of equilibrium, since its condition as an imperialist country and a country that, more than any other, needs to escape the strangulation of not trading makes its policy more pernicious in its demagogic procedures than that pursued by the United States.
Otero added that, in his judgment, “the substantive part of the conference and its success lie in its recommendation that all governments assist representatives of the business world . . . and foster the exchange of goods in order to eliminate the ills discussed.”95
A memorandum from the British ambassador in Buenos Aires coincided in part with this last observation, maintaining that the primary objective of the conference was to secure the attendance of as many non-Communist economists, industrialists, and businessmen from the West as possible so as to demonstrate the acceptance by the Western countries of the Soviet Unions image as champion of international economic cooperation and peace.96 Participation in the conference of 471 persons representing 49 countries seemed to confirm this idea of breadth noted by Otero and the British.97
Among the participants at the Moscow International Economic Conference were several Argentine representatives who took an active part in the proceedings. One, Felipe Freyre, declared in one of the sessions that “undoubtedly the conference would have a profound influence” on future trade relations between Argentina and other countries. “Many kinds of raw materials essential to Argentina’s economic development cannot be acquired,” he added, “because powerful foreign consortia impede the free exchange of goods.” Moreover, Freyre said, “the introduction of the Marshall Plan had deprived Argentina of the opportunity to obtain the things it needs,” whereas trade relations with the peoples democracies have given rise to beneficial trade and have had wide support. Other Argentines attending the conference included economist Ricardo Olivari, then National Director of Statistics, J. M. Rivera, and Arnaldo Cúneo, an engineer. In a different session, Cúneo suggested that there was a need for the U.S.S.R. to convene an International Congress of Agriculturalists. ”98
Of greatest importance, however, were the Soviet presentations establishing the new line to be pursued by the Kremlin. The main arguments were presented by M. V. Nesterov, president of the Chamber of Commerce of the U.S.S.R. He explained that “the proposal to convene the International Economic Conference had been favorably received by the directors of Soviet industry and commerce.” He then noted that, in response to the wish of commercial circles in a number of countries to expand trade with the Soviet Union, it could be positively stated that there existed “definite possibilities” for such an expansion. To that end, the chamber over which he presided had made an effort to identify the possibilities for augmenting the trade of Soviet economic organizations “with the countries of Western Europe, the Americas, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, Africa and Australia.” It had also given concrete consideration to increasing United States–Soviet trade (the U.S.S.R. could place orders in the United States for four or five million rubles), as well as trade with Latin America, in particular with Mexico, Argentina, and Brazil, where, it was suggested, the U.S.S.R. could obtain primary products and foodstuffs, supplying in return manufactured goods, machinery, and raw materials. Finally, Nesterov recalled Stalin’s words corroborating his statements: “Those who desire peace and seek commercial relations with us will always have our help.”99
Among the most important decisions of the conference was the creation of a Committee on Contributing to the Development of International Trade, which was to give future continuity to the ideas that had been generated. This committee had a particular repercussion in Buenos Aires, where in late 1952 an affiliate Argentine Commission for the Promotion of Trade (CAFI) was formed under the presidency of Felipe Freyre. CAFI would play an active role in expanding future trade between Argentina and the countries of the socialist bloc. Some members of the commission served in firms linked to trade between Argentina and the socialist countries and even acted as intermediaries in several commercial accords signed during these years. They also had close relations with representatives of Eastern bloc trade missions located in Argentina. CAFI was to be one of the principal sponsors of the Soviet Industrial Exposition in Buenos Aires in 1955 and published a journal, Intercambio, that contained publicity and advertisements designed to promote mutual relations. According to a secret United States report, CAFI maintained permanent contact with prominent members of the Argentine Communist party and with IRCAU.100
The change in Soviet policy mentioned above coincided in Argentina with important changes in the domestic economic and political situations and in the country’s international position. The economic crisis of 1950-52, which was influenced by both external and internal factors, produced serious difficulties in the country’s balance of payments. In 1951 and 1952, the commercial balance was decidedly negative, and the government had to formulate new economic policy guidelines and reorient its foreign policy.
Milton Eisenhower’s trip to Argentina in 1953 signaled a clear rapprochement with the United States, foreseen already some years earlier when the Cereijo mission was sent to Washington. An effort would now be made to attract North American capital: this would cover the existing paucity of dollars and help to activate certain sectors of the economy (such as the automotive industry) or stimulate the exploitation of other sectors (such as petroleum). At the same time, a number of bilateral agreements were concluded with countries of Western and Eastern Europe and Latin America that covered important areas of the country ’s foreign trade largely with barter or reciprocal credit operations.101
Argentina rapidly developed commercial and economic ties with the Soviet Union in particular, which had opened its borders to foreign trade after the Moscow Economic Conference. For the Argentine government, moreover, these fit in logically with the postulates of the Third Position, which sought to pursue its own path independent of the two superpowers. This required that a certain equilibrium be maintained between the superpowers, above all to secure maneuvering room vis-à-vis the leader of the Western world and Argentina’s primary associate, the United States.
The accords with the U.S.S.R. no doubt sought, among other things, to try to counterbalance the policy of rapprochement already initiated with the power of the North. Once the specter of World War III—in which Perón believed—had dissipated following the Korean War, it was possible to increase the pendular game without placing in question Argentina’s adherence to the West.102 Accordingly, between January and August 1953 diplomatic and commercial negotiations were once again opened and feverishly pursued with the U.S.S.R. A Foreign Ministry memorandum relates step-by-step the course of these negotiations, which climaxed with the Stalin-Bravo interview and the signing of a trade treaty.103
Initial steps were taken in January by the Argentine side, when a list was passed to the Soviet ambassador in Buenos Aires “of the products Argentina was willing to sell and acquire. It is difficult to say if this was the first step, because the Moscow Conference and the creation of CAFI were already indications. What is clear is that almost immediately, on February 3,
the new Argentine ambassador in Moscow, Leopoldo Bravo, reported that, according to a communication from the Ministry of Foreign Relations, the then prime minister, Joseph Stalin, would soon grant him an audience, within a few days at most. Foreign Minister Dr. Jerónimo Remorino immediately issued the necessary instructions as to how best conduct the pending meeting, indicating among other ideas that the ambassador should express . . . the wishes of the Argentine government to see closer economic relations between both countries.
The following day, Bravo met with the Soviet vice-minister of foreign trade, who told him that his country “had a commercial interest in Argentina and wished to explore in detail the memorandum that had been given to its ambassador in Buenos Aires.”104
On February 7, Bravo was received by Stalin (the first meeting granted by the Soviet leader to a representative of a Latin American country), the political importance of which was noted in the world press and even gave rise to commentary in the United States Congress. The Argentine Foreign Ministry memorandum cited above offers the following summary of the conversation between Stalin and Bravo: “In conclusion, Stalin said that the Soviet Union would trade with Argentina, to which end it can provide many of the products specified in the aforementioned Memorandum. ”105
The New York Herald Tribune, in turn, mentioned a statement by Ambassador Bravo in which he was said to have described his meeting with Stalin as “a good-will gesture . . . and an indication of Soviet interest in the improvement of relations with Latin America as a whole,” adding that, in addition to closer economic relations, cultural exchanges would be increased, starting with a soccer match and the visit to Argentina of the Soviet ballet company. The paper felt that there had been a change in the Kremlin as a result of “the new Soviet tactics” outlined by Stalin “in a series of economic essays” published before the 19th Congress of the Soviet Communist party. From “political warfare against the Western powers,” it added, there is a move to “economic warfare.” Stalin “is applying it in a new way, by using exports and imports of Communist countries, not simply for selling and buying goods as before but for promoting antagonisms among capitalist countries. . . . Perón, with his own ambitions and hostility to the United States, is Stalin’s logical choice for stimulating economic and political friction in the Western Hemisphere.” In this way, concluded the article, “Stalin will be in a better position to bid for their raw materials on behalf of the entire Communist world in exchange for gold and industrial goods.”106
United States concern about this turn of events is revealed in State Department secret reports describing the new course in Soviet-Argentine relations. One of them attributed the change, on the Argentine side, primarily to the problems arising from the imbalance of payments and the utility of this kind of trade for the policy of strict bilateralism being pursued by the Argentine government. One expert considered the new Soviet policy another form of cold war and stressed that increased trade with so-called underdeveloped countries, like Argentina, cultivated the image of the Soviet Union as a benevolent capital-exporting nation.107
The fact is that the Stalin-Bravo meeting and its subsequent results had a considerable impact worldwide. The Foreign Ministry memorandum cited above, after noting the importance of the meeting since Stalin rarely granted audiences to foreign diplomats, pointed out that “in official political and diplomatic circles of the leading powers the event was generally considered a resounding political triumph for General Perón that fortified his position vis-à-vis the United States of North America and, eventually, would permit him to seek peace with the U.S. on much more favorable terms”—a clear reference that confirmed U.S. fears and expressed the essential content of Peronist foreign policy.108 Following this meeting, negotiations progressed quite rapidly. They were not even delayed by Stalin’s death on March 6, a particularly significant event in light of the internal repercussions it would have within the Soviet leadership, unleashing an open struggle for power.
On April 4, 1953, an Argentine trade mission traveled to Moscow, where it discussed with Soviet representatives preliminary details for the signing of a commercial accord. A few days before, Bravo met with Molotov, who, according to the previously cited memorandum, told Bravo “that he was familiar with General Perón’s policy based on the three cardinal principles of economic independence, political sovereignty, and social justice.” Molotov found these principles “very interesting inasmuch as a policy of economic collaboration leads to the definitive political and economic consolidation of the different countries participating in such a policy.” These were significant words from one who had been a harsh critic of the Argentine government eight years earlier, a government in which the strongman had been Perón himself. Technicalities of the commercial accord were discussed between April 6 and 20. On the 18th of that month, the Soviets gave a luncheon for the Argentine delegation at which Anastas Mikoyan underscored the significance of the fact that “the treaty with the Argentine Republic is one of the first to be concluded by the U.S.S.R. with a non-communist nation.”109
At the end of May, the Soviets appointed a trade mission headed by Nikolai Cheklin, director of foreign trade, and Aleksei Manzhulo, which arrived in Argentina in mid-June. In Buenos Aires, two subcommissions were formed, one commercial and the other financial, to discuss the different points of an agenda that included product lists and specifications, prices, and financial matters. On August 5, 1953, the treaty was finally signed in the Argentine capital in the presence of senior Foreign Ministry and economic officials—the first such accord to be endorsed by the U.S.S.R. with a Latin American country.
The agreement, essentially the same as others signed by Argentina in those years, contained four chapters: (1) general provisions; (2) commercial provisions; (3) payment plan and financial provisions; and (4) final provisions. Two lists, A and B, detailing the products to be exported by each party were also appended: from the Argentine side, primarily wool, hides, quebracho extract, flax oil, and different kinds of meats; from the Soviet side, oil and petroleum derivatives, coal, industrial raw materials, precision instruments, and railroad equipment. While the accord did not specify any particular volume of trade, it was estimated that the total exchange could reach 150 million dollars divided equally between the two countries. In addition, the U.S.S.R. opened a credit line of 30 million dollars for the purchase of machinery and capital goods. Although never actually used, it inaugurated the “Soviet credit program” for underdeveloped countries.110
As Ambassador Bravo noted in a subsequent report summarizing relations between the two countries, trade with Argentina was very important to the U.S.S.R.:
because of the possibilities it offers to negotiate with other Latin American countries. There are many indications that demonstrate and prove this interest on the part of the Russians, who are optimistic about expanding trade in America based on the idea that other states will follow the Argentine example of trading with all the countries of the world regardless of their political creeds.
Bravo added that:
the communist leaders in the U.S.S.R. know perfectly well that Gen. Perón’s doctrine is contrary to the two major systems, capitalism and communism, and that he has created a distinct system with its own particular features and characteristics, a doctrine that on numerous occasions they have said they know and respect. Our position of equidistance, neutrality and absolute independence is highly valued.111
In order to implement the agreement, a technical mission headed by Juan Carlos Dardalla traveled to Moscow in December to contact the principal Soviet commercial, mining, and other enterprises so as to evaluate the types of products suitable for Argentine needs. The missions report gave a detailed analysis of the different possibilities, noting which were advantageous and which were not. Among the first were electric power equipment, railroad rolling stock, and some—not much—machinery. In the latter category were oil and coal mining equipment.112
While Argentine sales to the U.S.S.R. experienced a considerable increase in 1954, with some, like hides, wool, and canned meats surpassing tonnage levels set by the accord, the importation of Soviet products was much lower and the purchase of machinery almost nil. It is not surprising, therefore, that in March of that year Ambassador Bravo advised the Foreign Ministry about Soviet concern over this shortage of purchases, especially capital goods, noting that Soviet officials had indicated to him that were purchases of capital goods to increase, the U.S.S.R. might buy more from Argentina.113
Partly for this reason, and also to expand cultural ties, a new mission headed by Luis Praprotnik, envoy extraordinary from the Ministry of Foreign Relations, traveled to the U.S.S.R. in November 1954. The Soviet daily Pravda, which gave broad coverage to the activities of this mission, emphasized above all the support the mission had received from the main organs of the Soviet government. Almost simultaneously, in Buenos Aires IRCAU organized a “Soviet Friendship Month” and a film accord was signed between the two countries.114
All these developments renewed the disquiet of the U.S. government, as clearly revealed in a meeting that its ambassador in Moscow, Charles Bohlen, had with Bravo in January 1955, and which Bravo reported to Foreign Minister Angel Gabriel Borlenghi on the tenth of that month. Bohlen especially wanted to know if Russia was selling petroleum, coal, and other products considered strategic to Argentina. He justified his query on the grounds that, by knowing the future orientation of Argentine trade with the U.S.S.R. “insofar as it reflected a growth in heavy or light industry, it would be possible to determine whether Soviet foreign policy intentions were directed toward war or peace.” Obviously, the North Americans had other means at their disposal for determining that orientation. Their primary interest was to assess the degree to which Soviet-Argentine trade had evolved.115
Two more important developments occurred in May 1955: the signing of an additional protocol to the 1953 accord, and the inauguration of the first Soviet industrial exposition in Latin America. The new protocol regulated exchange levels, establishing revised product lists more in tune with reality, although capital goods, which were subject to credit conditions extended by the U.S.S.R. and which still had not been used, diminished from 30 million to 4 million dollars, apparently because of Argentine resistance to acquiring equipment deemed unsatisfactory. Nonetheless, in the first six months of 1955, Soviet imports doubled in comparison with the first six months of 1954.116
The industrial exposition, in turn, which constituted the Soviet Unions first showcase on the South American continent for the display of its economic potential, opened on May 21, 1955, in the presence of Mikhail Kuzmin, the Soviet vice-minister of commerce, the Soviet ambassador, and local officials from government, business and, especially, the General Economic Confederation (CGE), whose president, José Orioni, delivered an address.117
The main address, however, was delivered by Kuzmin, who highlighted “the development and strengthening of economic and cultural ties between the U.S.S.R. and the Argentine Republic” since 1953, enumerated the principal items of exchange, and explained the difficulties experienced thus far in the sale of capital goods by the Soviet Union. The latter, according to Kuzmin, were the result of insufficient familiarity with “Soviet goods and commercial practices.” The industrial exposition was undoubtedly designed to improve this aspect of exchange between the two countries and, in fact, almost all of the machinery exhibited remained in Argentina, having been purchased above all by state enterprises. Even so, not much progress was actually made in this regard.118
Referring to the industrial exposition, the Communist paper Nuestra Palabra asserted that it demonstrated “that the solution to the problems posed by our industrial and agricultural requirements lies, in the first place, in the audacious and decisive expansion of our trade with the Soviet Union.” But the paper went on to criticize the government “for not adopting immediate measures to promote to the highest level trade between our country and the U.S.S.R.,” denouncing “the price the country had to pay for the unilateral orientation of our foreign trade.” It alluded concretely to the areas of petroleum and steel, where the government, instead of expanding its relations with the U.S.S.R., which—according to Nuestra Palabra—would guarantee an independent solution, preferred dealing with Standard Oil or falling back on loans from North American banks. The Communist paper thus expressed in a loud voice what the Soviets probably did not dare say, despite the satisfactory state of relations with Argentina.119
It is true that Soviet-Argentine trade was still marginal within Argentine foreign trade as a whole. In 1954 it represented 3.9 percent of the country’s total exports and 3.2 percent of its imports; a year later, these percentages stood at 3.2 and 3.3, respectively. Considering the entire socialist bloc, including the countries of Eastern Europe, however, the figures oscillated in those two years between 9 and 8.8 percent for exports and 7.5 and 9.4 percent for imports.12
On the other hand, in addition to the increase that these figures represented compared to previous years (trade with the U.S.S.R. was practically nonexistent before 1952), for certain products exchange with the Soviet Union was particularly significant. Thus in 1954, the U.S.S.R. absorbed 99 percent of frozen lamb and mutton and 32 percent of canned meats exported from Argentina, while, together with Czechoslovakia, it absorbed 52 percent of Argentina’s frozen beef, 26 percent of its flax oil, 25 percent of its lard, and 10 percent of its quebracho extract exports. As for imports, in 1955 the U.S.S.R. supplied 76 percent of all railroad equipment, 72 percent of iron piping, 50 percent of diesel oil, and 32 percent of imported gasoline.121
Still more important from the Soviet viewpoint was the fact that Argentina had confirmed its status as the principal trading partner of the U.S.S.R. and Eastern Europe in Latin America. In 1954, for example, its share of total Latin American exports to the U.S.S.R. was 63.7 percent, while its share of imports was 100 percent (at the time, Argentina occupied fifth place among the capitalist countries). Considering the socialist bloc as a whole, its share of Latin American exports was 63.9 percent and of imports, 74 percent.122
In the latter phase of the Perón regime diplomatic relations also became more extensive. Various telegrams to the Foreign Ministry from Ambassador Bravo reflect Soviet interest in Argentina and the changed perception that the Kremlin leadership had of the Argentine government, especially of Perón, as compared to the earlier periods. In the annual report of 1954 referred to above, Bravo noted “the satisfaction of high officials in the Soviet government with the positive development of our commercial and cultural relations.”123
In a similar vein, in a cable to Foreign Minister Remorino describing a reception offered by the Argentine embassy in Moscow celebrating the 25 de Mayo holiday, Bravo summarized Molotov’s view as follows: “Minister Molotov toasted our country and its president, and expressed the wish for closer relations in the economic and cultural fields, as well as sports. He stated that between our countries there exist no problems of any kind. These same words were repeated in August by the Soviet ambassador to Buenos Aires, Rezanov, who was on leave in Moscow, and met with Ambassador Bravo. On this occasion, Rezanov communicated to the Argentine representative his opinion of Perón, whom he considered the “most influential” public figure in Latin America, as well as a politician of world stature.”124
That same month the Soviet government invited all the heads of diplomatic missions accredited in Moscow to spend a Sunday at a country dacha on the outskirts of the city, where rowboats were placed at their disposition on a nearby river. One colorful anecdote involved a boat race between Mikoyan and the U.S. ambasssador; but another interesting detail reflecting the importance attached to Argentina was the invitation extended by Molotov to only two diplomats to share his boat: the representative of Indonesia and the Argentine ambassador.125
This change in attitude toward Argentina also included important figures connected with the international Communist movement who in the past had opposed Perón. For example, Lombardo Toledano, the Mexican labor leader, in January 1955, during a luncheon in Moscow, told Bravo that he had been opposed to the Peronist movement due to “distorted and bad information and that, while he did not share the movements doctrine, “he recognized what it had achieved for the [Argentine] people through its policy of trading with all countries.”126
Another indication of the degree of rapprochement achieved between the two countries is the fact that in September 1955, only a few days before Perón’s fall, the Soviets were awaiting the arrival of an Argentine technical military mission headed by General Muller. It remains unclear whether this mission actually arrived. In any case, it would have been the first such mission sent to Moscow by a Latin American country.127
As late as 1958 some Soviet diplomats revealed a certain nostalgia for the Peronist government, as attested by the Argentine ambassador to India, Vicente Fatone, commenting on a meeting he had with his Soviet counterpart, P. K. Ponomarenko. The ambassador,” Fatone reported,
alluded to the ex-dictators “popular support.” I replied that any government can temporarily receive that support, above all if it monopolizes the means of propaganda . . . and I informed him that, on the eve of the [1958] elections the Communist party of Argentina had invited parties formerly opposed to the deposed regime to unite, just as it had formed part of the Democratic Union in the elections of 1946.
Fatone concluded, however, that “throughout the entire meeting I had the definite impression that the Russian representative lamented the fall of that regime, whose alternatives he knew.”128
Many things had changed since the years of World War II when Argentina not only did not have diplomatic relations with the U.S.S.R., but was actually perceived by the Soviets as an international danger and a center for the spread of fascism in Latin America. On the eve of the overthrow of the Peronist government, in contrast, Argentina was experiencing a noticeable improvement in its relations with the two countries with which, before Perón, it had had its greatest conflicts: the United States and the Soviet Union.129
In the same way that the Soviets criticized the actions of U.S. imperialism in Latin America, though, the United States perceived that the relations of Argentina and other Latin American nations with the U.S.S.R. and its satellites were beginning to take a disturbing turn. “In fomenting Latin American bloc trade and working to increase its influence in the area,” reads an intelligence report from February 1956,
Soviet propaganda, as found in the Communist and the Communist front press in Latin America stresses three main themes: (1) the advantages of trade between Latin America and the bloc, which are generally pictured in exaggerated form; (2) the concern for the underdevelopment of Latin America and the part that bloc equipment could play, if allowed, in economic development . . . (3) appeals to national interest and pride, tied in with attacks on the United States and references to the “colonial” status of Latin American countries in the past.
As was obvious, “insistence upon the primary role of private capital in the development of Latin America is constantly criticized and cited as an example of a desire by the United States to prevent full development of the area.” To make things worse, the report continued, “responsible officials of Latin American governments have often made statements supporting the thesis that the bloc represents a great potential market, thus tending to support the claims of Communist propaganda.” Referring to more specific economic questions, it emphasized that “the fact that the bloc has been buying Argentine and Uruguayan agricultural surpluses has been a strong stimulus to closer commercial relations.” At the same time, increased trade with the countries of the Soviet orhit would seem to offer the Latin Americans, according to the report, “an opportunity to mitigate their balance of payments problems by providing a new market for their goods, by allowing them to acquire necessary goods without using their dollar reserves, and by providing a bargaining point in economic negotiations with other areas.”130
Two years later, Secretary of State John Foster Dulles publicly expressed his governments preoccupation with the possibility that Latin America was to receive the full force of a Russian economic offensive. He expressed his confidence, however, that the Soviets would not find the venture overly profitable.131
History would prove his prediction wrong. Without a doubt, one of the elements that Dulles underestimated was Moscow’s promotion of economic and diplomatic ties with Argentina in the early 1950s. At that time a course was set that 30 years later, having been through ups and downs, would make Argentina one of the Soviets’ most important trading partners in the West.
Translated from the Spanish by Russell H. Bartley, Associate Professor of History, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
The U.S.S.R. absorbed 20.1% of Argentina’s exports in 1980; 20.8% in 1982; and 25.1% in the first eight months of 1983. The average for 1979-83 was 20.9%. Its place in the purchase of cereals (80.3% in 1981; 61.8% in 1982) is absolutely predominant, and it is also a very important purchaser of meats. In recent years the Soviet presence has begun to be felt as well in the construction of thermal and hydroelectric installations, nuclear energy, fishing, and other activities.
Argentina’s large favorable trade balance in these relations concerns the Soviets, who want to reduce it by increasing their own exports. During the last military government there was also closer political collaboration, as in the case of human rights (the U.S.S.R. refused to condemn Argentina in international forums), the Malvinas conflict, and even military matters.
Augusto Varas, “América Latina y la Unión Soviética: Relaciones interestatales y vínculos políticos, ” CIDE. Cuadernos Semestrales (México), 12 (2° semestre 1982), 81ff.
Ibid., 81-84. See also Fernando Claudin, The Communist Movement: From Comintern to Cominform, two parts (London, 1975). At the same time, however, Soviet Commissar of Foreign Affairs G. V. Chicherin stated in 1920 that it was “necessary to find a modus vivendi so that our socialist states can coexist peacefully with the capitalist states and relations between them can be normal.” See E. H. Carr, La Revolución Bolchevique (1917-1923) (Madrid, 1974), p. 174.
See Varas, “América Latina y la Unión Soviética,” 84-86; Stephen Clissold, ed., Soviet Relations with Latin America, 1918-1968; A Documentary Survey (New York, 1970), pp. 8-9.
República Argentina, Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores y Culto [hereafter MREC], Informe referente a la situación diplomática entre la República Argentina y el gobierno de los Soviets de Rusia (Buenos Aires, 1928).
Ibid.; Ernesto Abel, “Pasado, presente y perspectivas de la política exterior argentina,” Anales (Buenos Aires), 3 (2° semestre 1982), 22; Crítica (Buenos Aires), Sept. 5, 1926.
MREC, Informe referente a la situación diplomática.
Honorio Pueyrredón, La S.A. Iuyamtorg ante la Justicia Federal (Buenos Aires, 1931). pp. 4ff.; B. N. Shegoliev, “La realidad del comercio argentino-soviético,” América Latina (Moscow), 3 (May-June 1970), 71-72.
Carr, La Revolución Bolchevique, I, 488; Alejandro Sizonenko, “Las relaciones soviético-latinoamericanas y sus detractores,” América Latina (Moscow), 2 (Mar. 1970).
Pueyrredón, La S.A. Iuyamtorg ante la Justicia Federal; Alain Rouquié, Poder militar y sociedad política en la Argentina, 2 vols. (Buenos Aires, 1981), I, 213-214; F. Molina, C. Mayo, and O. Andino, La diplomacia del petróleo (1916-1930) (Buenos Aires, 1983). pp. 42-58. 65-67, 77ff.; Carl E. Solberg, Petróleo y nacionalismo en la Argentina (Buenos Aires, 1982), pp. 203ff.
Ibid.
MREC, Memoria. Año 1939-1940, (Buenos Aires, 1940), pp. 81-88.
Charles Bettelheim, Les luttes de classes en URSS (1930-1941). Les dominants (Paris, 1983), pp. 238ff ; Varas, “América Latina y la Unión Soviética,” 86; Claudin, The Communist Movement, pp. 182ff.
The attitude of the Argentine Communists and the Soviet press will be examined below. As for the attitude of the U. S. State Department and the North American press, there is an abundant bibliography. See, for example, Mario Rapoport, Gran Bretaña, Estados Unidos y las clases dirigentes argentinas: 1940-1945 (Buenos Aires, 1981), pp. 239-278.
James F. Byrnes, Speaking Frankly (New York, 1947), pp. 38-39; Edward R. Stettinius, Jr., Roosevelt and the Russians: The Yalta Conference (New York, 1949), pp. 113, 199-201; and United States Department of State, The Conferences at Malta and Yalta, 1945 (Washington, 1955).
Ibid.
Ibid.
Byrnes, Speaking Frankly, pp. 39-41.
Rapoport, Gran Bretaña, Estados Unidos y las clases dirigentes argentinas, pp. 267-270; Avra Warren to secretary of state, Buenos Aires, Apr. 18, 1945, United States National Archives, Washington (hereafter USNA), Department of State (hereafter DS), Decimal File Number 711.354-1845. (Hereafter State Department papers will be cited by decimal file only.)
Carlos A. Spinosa, “Ingreso de la Argentina a la Organización de las Naciones Unidas” (unpublished monograph, Universidad de Belgrano), pp. 2-4; United Nations, The United Nations Conference on International Organization: San Francisco, California, Apr. 25 to June 26, 1945 (Washington, 1946), p. 405; Juan A. Lanús, De Chapultepec al Beagle: Política exterior argentina (1945-1980) (Buenos Aires, 1984), pp. 41ff.
Spinosa, “Ingreso de la Argentina,” p. 5; United Nations, The United Nations Conference, 1945, pp. 405-406; Foreign Relations of the United States (hereafter FRUS); Diplomatic Papers, 1945, 9 vols. (Washington, 1967-1969), I, 386-401, 410-413, 483-488, 500-501; Cordell Hull, The Memoirs of Cordell Hull, 2 vols. (New York, 1948), II, 1404-1408.
Izvestiia, June 13, 1945. During May and June 1945, other Soviet newspapers (e.g., Pravda and Krasnaia Zvezda) harshly criticized the Argentine government. (These commentaries are cited in a British Foreign Office memorandum dated June 21, 1945; Public Record Office, London [hereafter PRO], file AS 3268/92/2.) As for the use of statements attributed to Cordell Hull by Soviet radio, see U.S. Legation in Reykjavik, Iceland, June 5, 1945, USNA, DS, 711.35/6-545. After praising Molotov’s position at the San Francisco Conference, another Soviet broadcast stated that proof of the true nature of the Buenos Aires government was provided by an interview that Perón had granted to the Evening Standard. That interview demonstrated that the unpopular, antidemocratic regime in Argentina is “contaminated by Nazi and Fascist bacilli” and thus represented a particularly serious threat to the security of the Western Hemisphere and to world peace,” June 7, 1945, USNA, DS, 711.35/6-545.
Spinosa, “Ingreso de la Argentina,” pp. 10 and 20; United Nations, The United Nations Conference, pp. 409-410; see also Robert E. Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins: An Intimate History (New York, 1948), pp. 892-894.
See Joseph R. Starobin, “Origins of the Cold War," in E. Hofman and F. Fleron, The Conduct of Soviet Foreign Policy (New York, 1980), pp. 275-288. See also Claudin, The Communist Movement.
Starobin, “Origins of the Cold War,” pp. 282-283. Browder was expelled from the U.S. Communist party in February 1946, primarily for reasons connected with his attempt to dissolve the party, but in May of that same year, he traveled to Moscow where he was received cordially and worked for the next two years as an advisor to the Kremlin on U.S.-Soviet relations. (Starobin, pp. 285-286.) For a detailed analysis of Browder’s role, see Maurice Isserman, Which Side Were You On? The American Communist Party During the Second World War, (Wesleyan, CT, 1982).
Ernesto Giudici, “El surgimiento de una nueva realidad social argentina (1943-1945).” Todo es Historia, 193 (June 1983), 53.
Victorio Codovilla, Hay que derrocar a la camarilla nazi del G O. U. (Buenos Aires, 1944), pp. 3, 11-12. Another Communist leader, Rodolfo Araoz Alfaro, published an article in Montevideo entitled “El 4 de junio, peón pasado del hitlerismo,” Justicia, June 1, 1945.
Victorio Codovilla, En marcha hacia un mundo mejor (Buenos Aires, 1945), pp. 11-12. This was an interview granted to the Chilean magazine, Ercilla. These arguments rested on Codovilla’s earlier statement that “the capitalist governments who entered into the anti-Hitler coalition together with the U.S.S.R. had replaced their old reactionary and imperialist policy of appeasement with a democratic and progressive policy.” Ibid., p. 5.
“Argentine Attitudes Toward the United States—Argentina, Feb.–June, 1945,” July 7, 1945, USNA, Office of Strategic Services (hereafter OSS), file R&A, 3167, pp. 4-5. See also Spruille Braden to secretary of state, July 17, 1945, USNA, DS, 835.00/7-1745.
“Soviet Policy and Objectives in the Other American Republics,” Intelligence Research Report, Dec. 31, 1946, USNA, DS, OCL-4185, 29.
Pablo Neruda, Confieso que he vivido (Buenos Aires, 1946), pp. 422 and 477.
Letter from Nicolás Accame to Bramuglia, Rio de Janeiro, Feb. 4, 1947, Archivo del Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores y Culto (hereafter AMREC), Expediente 6/1947.
Giudici, “El surgimiento de una nueva realidad,” 57-58. Identical commentary on contacts with party leaders by Perón and other government officials can be found in Juan José Real, 30 años de historia argentina (Acción política experiencia histórica) (Buenos Aires, 1962), pp. 78-83; and Rodolfo Puiggrós, El peronismo: Sus causas (Buenos Aires, 1969). Both authors were top party leaders.
FRUS, Diplomatic Papers 1945, IX, 384; and Braden to secretary of state, July 8, 1945, USNA, DS, 711.35/7-845. Braden’s opinion did not contradict the OSS report mentioned above (R&A 3167), for, in order to resolve the threat, he went on to request a meeting of the Big Three. The ambassador felt that Russia would not risk its “present good relations with us in exchange for less valuable gains in Latin America.” The “Great Alliance” spirit continued to influence U.S. actions.
Salomón de la Selva, “El lío argentino,” Hoy (Mexico), Nov. 3, 1945; Sumner Welles, Where Are We Heading? (New York, 1946), pp. 211-214; Excelsior, Mar. 27, 1946; República Argentina, Cámara de Diputados de la Nación, Diario de Sesiones, Sept. 4, 1946, p. 549.
Military Attaché, Buenos Aires, Oct. 12, 1945, USNA, Military Intelligence Division, R-690-45.
Adolf Berle to secretary of state, Rio de Janeiro, Feb. 21, 1946, USNA, DS, 635.6131/2-2146.
Russkii v Argentine (Buenos Aires), Apr. 13, 1946. Cited in Beaulac to secretary of state, Asunción, Apr. 23, 1946, USNA, DS, 635.6131/4-2346.
See, for example, Rodolfo Ghioldi’s article, “La política exterior de Estados Unidos,” Pueblo Argentino, Apr. 25, 1945.
Russkii v Argentine, Apr. 20, 1946. See USNA, DS, 635.6131/4-2346. Ambassador Beaulac stated that this paper was subsidized by the Soviet Embassy in Montevideo.
The arrival of the trade mission was preceded in Mar. 1946 by that of the Soviet commercial attaché in Montevideo, who apparently made all the preliminary arrangements. See La Calle, Mar. 26, 1946; La Hora, Apr. 14, 1946; El Cronista Comercial, Apr. 24, 1946; La Prensa, Apr. 25, and 26, 1946; Tribuna, May 14, 1946; and El Laborista, May 15, 1946. On the activities of the Banco Polaco (later Banco Continental), see “Soviet Economic Activities in Argentina,” Sept. 28, 1956, USNA, OSS, 7249, p. 8.
La Nación, May 6, 1946; La Prensa, May 16, 1946.
Ahora (Buenos Aires), Mar. 2, 1946.
Pravda, June 2, 1946. Cited in Smith to secretary of state, Moscow, June 4, 1946, USNA, DS, 635.6131/6-446.
La Prensa, June 7, 1946; Clarín, June 7, 1946; La Hora, June 7, 1946. La Prensa reproduced the Izvestiia commentary. A majority of Latin American countries had recognized and agreed to establish formal relations with the U.S.S.R. before Argentina. In the cold war years, five governments would again break those relations (Brazil and Chile in 1947; Colombia in 1948; Cuba and Venezuela in 1952); in the case of Cuba, it was the U.S.S.R. that withdrew recognition of the new Batista government. See Cole Blasier, The Giant’s Rival: The USSR and Latin America (Pittsburgh, 1983), pp. 23, 28; “SSSR–Latinskaia Amerika: khronika mezhgosudarstvennykh otnoshenii,” Latinskaia Amerika, 12 (Dec. 1982), 119-141.
The Economist (London), 150:5363, (June 8, 1946), p. 922.
La Prensa, June, 1946; The New York Times, June 8, 1946, p. 20.
The Washington Post, June 8, 1946.
The New York Herald Tribune, June 8, 1946.
Le Monde, June 8, 1946; La Lanterne, June 8, 1946. On Spaak’s attitude, see Spinosa, “Ingreso de la Argentina,” pp. 15-16; legation in Brussels to Bramuglia, “Guerra entre EE. UU. y los países del Eje,” June 14, 1946, AMREC, Tomo X, Anexo III, Expediente 26.
El Pueblo, June 7, 1946; La Hora, June 7, 1946.
Memorandum from John Griffiths, Buenos Aires. July 1, 1946, USNA, DS 635 6131/7-346.
USNA, OSS, OCL 4185, p. 7; La Prensa, July 13, 1946.
Messersmith to secretary of state, Dec. 2, 1946, USNA, DS, 635.6131/12-246.
Enclosure No. 1, Nov. 29, 1946, ibid.
Messersmith to secretary of state, Mar. 6, 1947, USNA, DS, 635.6131/3-647; La Prensa, Dec. 31, 1946.
Messersmith to secretary of state, Mar. 13, 1947, USNA, DS, 635.6131/3-1347; La Prensa, Dec. 21, 1946.
James Bruce to secretary of state, Oct. 30, 1947, USNA, DS, 635.6131/10-3047.
On Argentina's misfortunes in the matter of possible participation in the Marshall Plan, see Tewksbury to Bruce, Jan. 25, 1949, USNA, DS, 840.50 Recovery/1-2549. Tewksbury traces the negotiations and cites U S. export surpluses as the principal cause of discrimination against Argentina.
Ray to secretary of state, Jan. 31, 1949, USNA, DS, 635.6131/1-3149.
Dean Acheson’s reply, Feb. 15, 1949, USNA, DS, 635.6131/1-3149; Acheson to U. S. Embassy, May 18, 1949, ibid., 635.6131/5-1849. The problem was due, as Acheson himself noted, to the fact that the United States had no intention of purchasing these surplus products from Argentina.
La Prensa, Oct. 10, 1946.
For a characterization of Cantoni, see the excellent book by Celso Rodríguez, Lencinas y Cantoni: El populismo cuyano en tiempos de Yrigoyen (Buenos Aires, 1979), pp. 204-235ff. See also AMREC, Rusia, Expediente 1C/1946, wherein the minister of the interior presents several biographies of Cantoni to the minister of foreign relations, one of which accuses Cantoni of leftist tendencies.
Lucio García del Solar, “Las relaciones entre la Argentina y la Unión Soviética,” Criterio, 54: 1873-74 (Christmas 1981): 759: The New York Herald Tribune, Feb. 15, 1953; Cantoni to Bramuglia, Moscow, July 4, 1947, AMREC, Rusia, Expediente 5/1947.
García del Solar, “Las relaciones,” 759. Numerous dispatches to the Foreign Ministry report on the difficulties faced by Argentine diplomats, difficulties not peculiar to them alone but which affected a majority of the diplomatic missions accredited in Moscow.
Cantoni’s personal letter to Perón is dated July 21, 1947. It was hand carried from Moscow by a relative of an embassy official and gives a sense of the importance that Perón attached to relations with the U.S.S.R. AMREC, Rusia, Expediente 5/1947.
Cantoni to Bramnglia, Moscow, Oct. 4, 1947, AMREC, Rusia, Expediente 6/1947.
Note from Cantoni to Molotov, Oct. 3, 1947, AMREC, Rusia, Expediente 6/1947.
Malik to Cantoni, Oct. 9, 1947, AMREC, Rusia, Expediente 6/1947.
García del Solar, “Las relaciones,” 759; The New York Herald Tribune, Feb. 15, 1953.
Bravo to Bramuglia, Moscow, Mar. 18, 1948, AMREC, Rusia, Expediente 3/1948.
García del Solar, “Las relaciones,” 759.
Comunicado de Prensa, Aug. 23, 1946, AMREC, Instituto Cultural Argentino-Ruso (ICAR), 1946-1954. This press release contains the names of all the members of ICAR’s first governing board, as well as of the members of the institute’s different departments.
AMREC, Instituto Cultural Argentino–Ruso, “Breve reseña de los principales actos culturales,” URSS (ICAR), 1946-1954.
This lecture, which dealt generally with Argentina, was delivered by Dr. Sokolova, a Soviet economist. It was summarized in a dispatch from the Argentine Embassy in Moscow. AMREC, Departamento de Política, Jan. 30, 1948, 22.50 hours, Expediente 3/1948.
Comunicados de Audiciones Radiales, Moscow Radio Broadcast, Sept. 16, 1948, Ministerio del Interior, Subsecretaría de Informaciones, AMREC, Departamento de Política, Expediente 3/1948. While Argentina did not sign an agreement with the U.S.S.R. in these years, accords were concluded with other countries of the Soviet bloc: Czechoslovakia, in June 1947; Rumania, in Oct. 1947; Hungary, in July 1948; Poland, in Dec. 1948; and Bulgaria, in July 1949. These agreements were antecedents to an eventual rapprochement with the U.S.S.R. See USNA, OSS, 7249.
Vechernaia Moskva, Nov. 17, 1948. The Czech daily was Svobodnoie Slovo. See AMREC, Rusia, Expediente 8/1948, 1a parte.
Foreign Minister Bramuglia played an important role in the resolution of the Berlin crisis. For the public record, see United Nations, Security Council, Actas Oficiales, Tercer Año, nos. 96-115 and 116-135, July 14–Oct. 6, 1948 and Oct. 14–Dec. 27, 1948, Palais Chaillot, Paris.
Two telegrams from the Argentine Embassy in Moscow to the Foreign Ministry in Buenos Aires, dated respectively Oct. 25 and Dec. 12, 1949, report on articles severely critical of the Argentine government published in Krasnaia Zvezda, Trud, and Novoe Vremia. See AMREC, URSS, Expediente 8/1949. On U.S. opinion, see Report no. 4714, July 29, 1948, USNA, DS, Office of Intelligence and Research, p. 51.
A. I. Vyshinskii et at, Diplomaticheskii slovar’ (Moscow, 1951), II, 351.
On Perón’s attitude toward the Korean War, see Juan A. Lanús, De Chapultepec al Beagle, pp. 76ff., and Alberto Conil Paz and Gustavo Ferrari, Política exterior argentina, 1930-1962 (Buenos Aires, 1971), pp. 184-186.
Oscar Arévalo, El Partido Comunista (Buenos Aires, 1983), pp. 78-80. The author of this work is one of the principal leaders of the Argentine Communist party today. A U.S. intelligence report provides a similar analysis: USNA, OSS, OCL-4185, p. 30.
On the divisions within the Argentine Communist party, see the works cited above by Puiggrós and Real. For an analysis of these differences by a critic of the party, see Jorge Abelardo Hamos, El Partido Comunista en la política argentina: Su historia y su crítica (Buenos Aires, 1962), pp. 190, 195-203. The “official” party version of the “Real affair” is contained in Victorio Codovilla, Defender la línea independiente del Partido para construir el Frente de la Democracia, la Independencia nacional y la Paz (Buenos Aires, 1953). There are also numerous State Department reports on internal dissension within the Argentine Communist party between 1946 and 1954. On the differences between Ghioldi and Codovilla and the expulsions mentioned above, see O’Donoghue to secretary of state, May 28, 1947, USNA, DS, 835.00B/5-2947.
Rodolfo Ghioldi, “Acerca del peronismo y su esencia,” talk given on July 13, 1972 at the Latin American Institute of the U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences, in Moscow, Panorama latinoamericano (Moscow, Sept. 1, 1972), 14-17. Here Ghioldi also severely criticizes another former leader of the Argentine Communist party, Luis V. Sommi, who at the time had a favorable attitude toward Peronism.
Paulino González Alberdi, ¿Por qué está en la crisis la economía argentina? (Buenos Aires, 1949). González Alberdi referred to the Eady-Miranda accord of 1946 as a second Roca-Runciman pact.
Daily Worker, Nov. 18, 1949.
Arévalo, El Partido Comunista, p. 78.
Nueva Era, 4 (July 1949): 391, 396.
In contrast to other Communist parties, especially the European parties, the Argentine party systematically supported the U.S.S.R. and its leaders in foreign policy matters and in their position vis-à-vis the Yugoslav, Chinese, and Albanian questions, as well as in the Hungarian, Czech, and Afghan interventions. It was an ardent supporter of Stalin, as it was of Khrushchev and his successors. For the early history of the Argentine party according to the “official” version, see Partido Comunista, Esbozo de historia del Partido Comunista de la Argentina (Buenos Aires, 1947). The Arévalo book offers few references to the party’s international position, especially as relates to events in which the main protagonist was the U.S.S.R. To clarify that position, it is necessary to study the appropriate party documents.
Codovilla, Defender la línea independiente, pp. 30-31.
On the relationship between the Communist party and the working class in these years, see Hiroshi Matsushita, Movimiento obrero argentino, 1930-1945: Sus proyecciones en los orígenes del peronismo (Buenos Aires, 1983).
Messersmith to secretary of state, Mar. 13, 1947, USNA, DS, 635.6131/3-1347. “The Perón administration,” states another U.S. document, “although stressing its anti-Communist character in national politics, has drawn a distinction between its attitude toward the local Communist Party and the Soviet Union and has continued to carry on a sporadic affair with the Soviet Union,” Report no. 4714, USNA, DS, Office of Intelligence and Research, p. 50. The Soviet ambassador in Buenos Aires, however, was said to have complained of Perón’s anticommunist attitude. See Messersmith to secretary of state, Mar. 11, 1947, USNA, DS 635.6131/3-1147.
Memorandum on Nufer’s meeting with Perón, Buenos Aires, Feb. 20, 1954, USNA, DS, 735.001/3-354.
Interview with Ernesto Giudici, Sept. 1, 1983. Giudici, who at the time was a party leader, admits to contacts by himself and other party members with high officials of the Perón government. Various State Department documents, in turn, mention contacts by Puiggrós and other former communists. See, for example, Martindale to Department of State, Aug. 10 and 13, 1953, USNA, DS, 735.001/8-1053 and 735.001/8-1353.
Otero to Foreign Ministry, Apr. 16, 1952, AMREC, URSS, Expediente 12/192.
British Embassy Memorandum, Mar. 14, 1952, ibid.
Actas de la Conferencia Económica de Moscú (Buenos Aires, 1952), p. 225.
Ibid., pp. 80-81, 164. According to the Actas, other Argentine participants were Oscar Bardeci, José E. Pinnel, and Enrique Minyersky. Ambassador Otero indicated in his April 16 communication to the Foreign Ministry (supra, n. 95) that the Communist labor leader, Rubens Iscaro, also attended.
Ibid., pp. 46-55.
Ibid., pp. 227-228; File 7249, pp. 6-7, USNA, OSS.
For a general description of the problem, see Antonio Cafiero, De la economía social-justicialista al régimen liberal-capitalista (Buenos Aires, 1974). A critical interpretation of Peronism can be found in C. F. Díaz Alejandro, Ensayos sobre la historia económica argentina (Buenos Aires, 1975), pp. 111ff. See also R. Mallon and J. Sourrouille, La política económica en una sociedad conflictiva. El caso argentino (Buenos Aires, 1976).
Contrasting interpretations of the Third Position can be found in Juan Carlos Puig, Doctrinas internacionales y autonomía latinoamericana (Caracas, 1980), pp. 193-194, who labels it autonomismo heterodoxo; Juan A. Lanús, De Chapultepec al Beagle; Conil Paz and Ferrari, Política exterior argentina; and Sergio Bagú, Argentina en el mundo (México, 1961). Negotiations with the U.S.S.R. after 1953 and, in general, the maintenance of relations with the Soviet Union during the cold war (when several Latin American countries severed ties) show that the Third Position did not rest solely on “the fundamental view that World War III was imminent, although Perón came to believe it was possible. See Joseph A. Page, Perón, 1a parte (Buenos Aires, 1984), p. 219.
The undated Foreign Ministry memorandum was written in Aug. or Sept. 1953. “Historial de las negociaciones comerciales argentino-soviéticas, 1952-1954,” AMREC, URSS.
Ibid.
Ibid. See also Congressional Record, vol. 99, part 9, Jan. 3–Aug. 3, 1953, pp. A677-678, “Extension of Remarks of Hon. Frank E. Smith of Mississippi. ”
The New York Herald Tribune, Feb. 15, 1953. Cited in Congressional Record, ibid.
File 7249, p. 1, USNA, OSS; Robert L. Allen, Soviet Economic Warfare (Washington, 1960), p. 129.
“Historial . . . 1952-1954,” AMREC, URSS.
Ibid.
Ibid.; File 7249, USNA, OSS; Allen, Soviet Economic Warfare, p. 185; “Convenio sobre comercio y régimen de pagos entre la República Argentina y la Unión de las Repúblicas Soviéticas Socialistas,” Expediente 5a/1955, AMREC; Jerónimo Remorino, Política internacional argentina: Compilación de documentos (1951-1955) (Buenos Aires, 1968), I, 557-558.
The report to which the author refers (“Informe y memoria anual de 1954”) was forwarded to Remorino by Ambassador Bravo on Mar. 31, 1955. Memoria Anual, Expediente 6b/1955, AMREC, URSS. Bravo also analyzes in this document Soviet foreign policy, as well as the domestic political situation in the U.S.S.R.
The report, sent from Paris, was dated Feb. 12, 1954. Relaciones económicas, Expediente 5f/1955, AMREC, URSS.
Leopoldo Bravo to Foreign Ministry, Mar. 9, 1954, Expediente 12/1954, AMREC, URSS.
Pravda, Nov. 13, 1954. Cited in Expediente 10/1954, AMREC, URSS. Despite Argentina’s rapprochement with the U.S.S.R., the Argentine Foreign Ministry maintained certain reservations, particularly in the cultural field. As indicated in a ministry memorandum dated Oct. 21, 1954, visas were denied to eight Soviet intellectuals who were to attend a series of events organized in Buenos Aires by the IRCAU. Expediente 8/anexo 1/1954, AMREC, URSS.
Bravo avoided giving Bohlen the information he sought by claiming that the product lists were being studied by both the Argentine and Soviet governments. Expediente 2a/1955, AMREC, URSS.
“Protocolo adicional al convenio sobre comercio y régimen de pagos entre la República Argentina y la Unión de Repúblicas Soviéticas Socialistas,” Expediente 5a/1955, AMREC, URSS; File 7249, USNA, OSS; “Trade Relations Between Latin America and the Soviet Bloc,” Feb. 1, 1956, File 7118, pp. 11-12, USNA, OSS.
Clarín, May 21, 1955; Nuestra Palabra, May 31, 1955; File 7249, pp. 6-7, USNA, OSS.
Clarín, May 21, 1955; Nuestra Palabra, May 31, 1955. A U.S. intelligence report indicates that 700,000 dollars worth of equipment was sold to state firms, including 500,000 dollars to Fabricaciones Militares, 110,000 dollars to YPF, and 30,000 dollars to DINIE. See File 7249, 13, USNA, OSS.
Nuestra Palabra, May 31, 1955.
Anuario del Comercio Exterior Argentino, 1954, 1955; Enrique Estremadoyro, Relaciones económicas entre los países de América Latina y los países miembros del Consejo de Asistencia Mutua Económica (CAME), E/CEPAL/PROY, 4/R.3, Nov. 1979, p. 73 (author’s calculations).
File 7249, USNA, OSS.
File 7118, pp. 18-19, 25. Tables I and IV, USNA, OSS. One should keep in mind that the figures for some Latin American countries were provisional when this report was prepared, although they still give an idea of the general scope of Argentina’s place in the trade relations. See also Shegoliev, “La realidad del comercio argentino-soviético.”
Bravo to Remorino, Mar. 31,1955, Memoria Anual, Expediente, 6b/1955, AMREC, URSS.
The cable about the reception of May 25 was dated May 31. Bravo’s meeting with Rezanov is described in a subsequent cable of Aug. 13, 1955. Expediente 6c/1955, AMREC, URSS. Rezanov, however, expressed his concern over Perón’s support of an anticommunist congress and warned that the Radicals could exploit politically the “proposed opening of Argentine oil exploitation to the North Americans.” Bulganin’s toast “for President Perón and for his people” at the July 9 embassy reception, in turn, constituted a manifestation of the good state of relations between the two countries. Expediente 6/1955, AMREC, URSS.
The description of the reception of the diplomatic missions is contained in a cable from the Argentine embassy in Moscow to the Ministry of Foreign Relations dated Aug. 8, 1955. Expediente 6c/1955, AMREC, URSS.
Lombardo Toledano added “that in his judgment a deeper solution should be found to the agrarian problems by combatting latifundia.” Expediente 6g/1955, AMREC, URSS.
The cable from the embassy to the Foreign Ministry was dated Sept. 3, 1955, 13 days before the events of the 16th. Expediente 5b/1955, AMREC, URSS.
Vicente Fatone to Hartung, New Delhi, Jan. 29, 1958, Expediente 2/1958, AMREC, URSS.
For improved relations with the United States, see Alain Rouquié, Poder militar y sociedad política en la Argentina, II: 1943-1973 (Buenos Aires, 1982), 105; Robert A. Potash, El ejército y la política en la Argentina, 1945-1962 (Buenos Aires, 1981), pp. 222-229, 246-247.
File 7118, abstract and p. 8, USNA, OSS.
Clarín, Jan. 11, 1958.
Author notes
The author wishes to thank the Social Science Research Council for financial support that facilitated his research in the United States.