materialised around the memory of the disappeared. claiming speech widespread in the early years of
However, the Army also intended to renew their democracy that intended to differentiate the “victors
damaged image with new justifications and of the anti-subversive war” from the “subversives”,
reasoning about the actions carried out with the aim the Complete Memory places the focus on the human
to suggest a strengthening of the military memory. losses, unifying all the victims around its “common
By focusing on the figure of the officers killed by the denominator”, that is suffering.
armed organizations, we can construct a selection of
The Complete Memory erases from the memories
facts, persons and periods and also hide, minimize of the military the actions carried out by the officers
and disguise others, particularly, we can erase from and the institution during the illegal repression,
the horizon of their memories the events and the concealing and fading away the legal, political and
officers who carried out the coup d’etat on March moral responsibilities that are incumbent on the
24, 1976 and the crimes committed during the illegal officers and the armed and security forces for the
repression. illegal repression. Therefore, it takes place a kind
Although the Complete Memory does not deny
of transition in which the rule of “everybody” is
the existence of disappeared persons nor the actions replaced by the rule of “nobody”. In the words of
of the army during the illegal repression, there is Arendt (2007: 151) the saying of collective guilt
an equation effect similar to the so-called “two- that holds “where everybody is guilty, nobody is
demon theory”. It, therefore, equates officers guilty” is superseded by another equally exculpatory
killed by armed organizations with those who have one claiming: “where everybody is victim, nobody
disappeared and also equates insurgent actions is guilty”. While the figure of guilt conceals the
committed by the armed organizations with the responsibilities by attributing universal complicity
illegal and clandestine violence perpetrated by the (Arendt, 2007), the collective victimization arouses
State during the military dictatorship. feelings of solidarity and compassion with the aim of
equalizing suffering as well as behaviour. Both help
The Complete Memory
replaces the triumphalist
and glorifying account of
the “victory in the anti-
subversive war” with
a dramatic account of
the suffering and pain
of the officers and their
families as victims of a
“fratricidal war”.
to exonerate officers at a moral and legal level, and
the armed institutions at a political level.
Having said that, the Complete Memory bases
its argument on traumatic events that, while
documented and of true value, do not achieve any
social or state recognition. Nevertheless, how is
a memory that presents itself as “complete” and
“overcoming” regarding other memories accused
of being “partial and sectarian”? Memory is
“complete” when it is based on the idea that “we
are all victims”. In other words, it is connected to
all Argentines through a common pain, to the dead,
but also to their mothers, children, grandchildren,
grandparents and siblings “from one side or the
other”, confronted in the past for the violence,
while currently confronted for political ideologies.
With notions such as “internal war”,
The setting-up of a national community of victims
“fratricidal war” or “war between Argentines”, is possible as long as the bonds of consanguinity
the Complete Memory seeks to introduce an between those “killed by the subversion” and their
argumentative line that equates all victims and relatives are extended to the “other” victims and
makes up for the suffering and violence. Unlike the their relatives and, in this way, the “other” victims
10
Observing Memories
ISSUE 2