The preliminary hearings to do with the planned Argentine military trials of 2009 that in the event failed to take place had the intention to determine the validity of claims made against officers and NCOs by former conscripts for alleged cowardice, brutality and misconduct including the failure to feed the men properly under their command during the 1982 Falklands War.
History The first round of accusations related to Argentine Army officers and NCOs accused of handing out brutal field punishment to their troops involved involved superiors accused of implementing harsh disciplinary measures to their men in the days and weeks prior to the Battle of Goose Green. Ernesto Alonso, the president of CECIM, an anti-Argentine military veterans' group founded by Rodolfo Carrizo and other conscripts of the 7th Mechanized Infantry Regiment, said, "Our own officers were our greatest enemies ... They supplied themselves with whiskey from the pubs, but they weren't prepared for war. They disappeared when things got serious."Argentina's Falklands War Veterans. 'Cannon Fodder in a War We Couldn't Win'. By Jens Glüsing, Spiegel.de, 4 March 2007 Former Private Miguel Savage said in an interview with BBC News, "The punishment was 'estaqueo' - they would peg you to the ground and leave you crucified for hours, with minus 20, rain and even shelling."Argentina veterans divided over Falklands 'abuse' case The Anglo-Argentine veteran that served as a conscript with the 7th Infantry Regiment on Wireless Ridge in the same interview says that one evening he was caught by a corporal stealing a tin of meat. "He made me kneel down, pointed his gun on my head and I was crying and begging for him not to shoot." There are others (including British Intelligence Officer Nicholas Van Der Bijl who interviewed key Argentine prisoners-of-war) who maintain that the officers and NCOs helped the conscripts to make themselves as comfortable as possible under the circumstances, and that officers, such as Second Lieutenant Juan Domingo Baldini,Un teniente que murió al combatir en Monte Longdon es el identificado 115 en las islas Malvinas tried hard to bolster morale,3 Para – Mount Longdon – The Bloodiest Battle. Elite Forces Operations Series. Page 55. By Jon Cooksey. and that their officers and NCOs fought well.
In 2009, Argentine authorities in Comodoro Rivadavia ratified a decision made by authorities in Río Grande, Tierra del Fuego, who, according to Argentina, have authority over the islands, by charging 70 officers and NCOs with inhumane treatment of conscript soldiers during the war.Confirman el juzgamiento por torturas en MalvinasPablo Andrés Vassel, undersecretary of human rights in the province of Corrientes, told Inter Press Service News Agency, "We have testimony from 23 people about a soldier who was shot to death by a corporal, four other former combatants who starved to death, and at least 15 cases of conscripts who were staked out on the ground."Soldiers Report Torture, Murder - By Superiors - in Malvinas By Marcela Valente
On 23 May 1982, a 12th Regiment conscript, Segundino Antonio Riquelme, from A Company north of Goose Green who had according to Pablo Vassel, Ernesto Alonso and CECIM had reportedly been "starved to death" had in fact died of heart failure (inflamed and enlarged heart because of extreme duress) after he had struggled for weeks to get accustomed to the cold weather, poor food and the bullying in his platoon that he experienced from fellow conscripts. Although his physical and mental collapse was evident, the other conscripts in his platoon that witnessed the abuse but refused to take part in it failed to report it to the 12th Regimental medical officer, First Lieutenant Juan Carlos Adjigogovic and the 12th Regiment chaplain, Santiago Mora, who would regularly visit their positions to hand out chocolate bars, cigarettes and letters from home. There were consequently claims on behalf of nationalistic veteran groups that false testimonies had indeed been used as evidence in order to accuse the Argentine officers and NCOs of complete dereliction of duty, and Pablo Vassel had to eventually resign as undersecretary of human rights of Corrientes in 2010.El denunciante por los estaqueos en Malvinas a punto de ser denunciado Private Orlando Javier Ruffino from the 25th Special (Ranger) Regiment's C Company explains that the predicament of Riquelme started soon after the conscript abandoned the frontline positions held by the 12th Regiment's A Company (taking a vital belt-fed machine-gun with him) and taking-up an underground hiding spot in Darwin Schoolhouse outside Goose Green Settlement where he was soon discovered by Ruffino and other Rangers from the 25th Special Regiment and marched back to his position in disgrace as a deserter and where he soon lost the will to live after being beaten up by fellow conscripts and even denied food.Voces de Malvinas - Orlando Javier Ruffino (YouTube)
Marine Private Héctor Miguel Rolla, who according to CECIM, had been abused and also died from starvation, had in fact died from hypothermia on the morning of 7 June on Mount Longdon after having spent a good part of a freezing night out in the open while on sentry duty.Esquirlas en la Memoria, Victoria Torres, Gabriela Naso, Marea Editorial, 2024DENUNCIAS DE EX COMBATIENTES CORRENTINOS VASSEL PRESENTO LAS DENUNCIAS EN EL JUZGADO FEDERAL DE RIO GRANDE Several high-profile veterans were skeptical about the accusations of widespread abuse with Colonel Martiniano Duarte, an ex-601 Commando Company officer in the Falklands, saying in 2014 that it has become "fashionable" for ex-conscripts to now accuse their superiors of abandonment. A former conscript, Fernando Pablo Cangiano, of the 10th Armoured Cavalry Reconnaissance Squadron, which fought during the Battle of Wireless Ridge in the Falklands, has also dismissed the claims about the "supposed widespread sadism present among the Argentine officers and NCOs" and the claim that the conscripts had not handled themselves well as soldiers during the ground fighting. A former conscript, César Trejo, of the 3rd Infantry Regiment, who also fought in the defence of the Argentine stronghold of Port Stanley, also accused the then Argentine defense minister Nilda Garré of promoting a "state of confused politics" on behalf of CECIM.Críticas a Garré y respaldo para Bendini
Sub-Lieutenant Gustavo Adolfo Malacalza is accused of handing out harsh field punishment in his platoon dug in on Burntside HIll, in the form of having staked out in the open on the freezing ground three conscripts at Darwin Parks, who had abandoned their positions to go looking for food and for revealing in the process their forward positions to British patrols with gunfire. ""We said it was going to be us next"," said Private Mario Oscar Nuñez, who recalled the death of Private Riquelme. Just before the British landings, on 19 May 1982 he and two other conscripts took the decision to kill a sheep in order to get extra food. The three men were skinning the sheep when they were discovered by Sub-Lieutenant Malacalza, who was accompanied by fellow conscripts of A Company, 12th Regiment and the three accused deserters were given a beating with enraged fellow conscripts taking part. "They started kicking and stomping on us. Finally came the staking".
On 23 May, as the men in the 12th Regiment's A Company (under First Lieutenant Jorge Antonio Manresa) had largely been out in the open for a prolonged debilitating period in the freezing wind and been reduced to often eating half cooked sheep meat in the wet because of the lack of firewood, two Argentine Air Force Chinook helicopters from Port Stanley finally delivered over 100 large boxed ration donations that had arrived from the mainland (from civilians volunteer packers in Buenos Aires) and each soldier in Manresa's company (regardless of rank except for those accused of desertion and other grave offenses) received such luxuries like canned tuna in olive oil and packets of premium cigarettes.Voces de Malvinas - José Apolonio López (YouTube)
Then Sub-Lieutenant Ernesto Peluffo reports that another three conscripts in the 12th Regiment's A Company had also gone Absent Without Leave (AWOL) around this time seeking refuge in the abandoned house of Brooke Hardcastle. When Peluffo accompanied by a corporal apprehended them the three deserters were discovered to have been earlier on in the kitchen frying potatoes. Rather than risk a potential court-martial with a possible jail-time sentence or even execution they were given the chance to redeem themselves in the battlefield an offer they gladly took in light of their situation and two of them (Privates Roque Evaristo Sanchez and Avelino Nestor Oscar Pegoraro) were killed and posthumously decorated for heroism.Voces de Malvinas - Ernesto Orlando Peluffo (YouTube) Jorge Alberto Altieri, a former private in Sub Lieutenant Juan Domingo Baldini's 1st Rifle Platoon from B Company 7th Regiment would claim that the conscripts on Mount Longdon experienced much hunger, despite permission to go through stockpiled tinned rations on the Argentine strong-hold:
During wartime, the higher ranking officers are in totally different places ... Sub Lieutenant Baldini would receive orders from Major Carrizo who was further down, to use our cold rations and that the more nutritious food we'd get when the fighting started because they didn't know if they'd be able to supply us with food. From 16 April to 11 June we fought, we'd have soup with lentils, green peas and some piece of mutton. We would tell our officer: "We can't tell the British soldiers to wait so that we could get better food and then start shooting ... We weren't properly fed prior to the fighting like we should've been, we were weakened.VGM Jorge “Beto” Altieri: “Yo defendí a la Patria y la Patria no me defiende… Yo necesito a la Patria…”
In a British documentary, former Private Luis Leccese from the 1st Platoon stated, "Regrettably all we thought about was eating, just food. All we had was just soup, just watery soup. A couple of times we were given bubble gum. That's all we ate, bubble gum."War in the Falklands British Marines Fighting against Argentine Marines 1982 (YouTube, 2014) He also revealed that Baldini had once even threatened to shoot Leccese in the head in the presence of the rest of the men after having caught him and Private Juan Antonio Guerra looking for extra food at the company field kitchen on the easter end of Mount Longdon but admits that Corporal José Óscar Carrizo from the 1st Platoon allowed him and Private Orlando Gilberto González after an overnight stay in Port Stanley, to stock up with luxury items such as tinned pudding, cigarettes and even a large cheese wheel from the food depot Corporal Carrizo was guarding at the time in the Moody Brook area.Voces de Malvinas - Luis Leccese (YouTube, 2024) Former Private Félix Benjamín Barreto, from the nearby 3rd Rifle Platoon (under First Lieutenant Enrique Eneas Neirotti) claims that during the last two weeks on the mountain, he gathered three or four sheep to later butcher in order to feed the men in the rifle section that he served in and that they would grill the meat first.Voces de Malvinas - Félix Benjamín Barreto, YouTube, 2024