God's Assassins

State Terrorism in Argentina in the 1970s

By Patricia Marchak & William Marchak
Categories: Security, Peace & Conflict Studies
Publisher: McGill-Queen's University Press
Hardcover : 9780773520134, 456 pages, October 1999
Ebook (PDF) : 9780773568211, 456 pages, October 1999

Description

God's Assassins tells the story of state terrorism in Argentina through interviews with participants on all sides of this issue. They include military officers, "third world" priests, Catholic church officers who supported military objectives and methods, former members of guerrilla movements, survivors of prison camps, journalists, trade unionists, and others who experienced state terrorism in Argentina. Patricia Marchak combines excerpts from these interviews with documents and media reports from the time and her own insightful study of Argentina's history to provide an analysis of the process as well as the causes of state terrorism. The graphic and moving interviews in God's Assassins show the complexity of these causes and indicate that there is no simple explanation of the period. Was the head of a major guerrilla movement a double agent? Did the intelligence service actually believe it was engaged in the third world war? Why did the Catholic church turn on its own priests? Through her interviews, Marchak reveals much that will never appear in official documents.

Reviews

"God's Assassins is a remarkably successful attempt to get inside a nightmare. I was in Argentina at the time and thought I understood what was going on. Now I understand much more - especially about what was going through people's minds. A fine and instructive book." Gwynne Dyer.