Overthrow
Displeasure in the military and among conservatives for Frondizi's Cuban initiative, as well as for his lifting the ban on Peronism ahead of the March 1962 mid-term elections made a coup d'état increasingly likely. Running on the Popular Union ticket, Peronists nominated Framini for governor of the Province of Buenos Aires (home to 38% of Argentines). Distanced from Frondizi since the 1959 recession, Perón added a further point of contention by having himself named Framini's running mate, a symbolic spot on the ticket which, unable to return, he could never fill, but which would prove a powerful endorsement to Framini.
Framini and Perón's other proxies won 10 of 14 governorships at stake, and Frondizi was forced to annul Framini's victory. He stopped short of annulling other Peronist victories, however, and in the face of a near-certain coup, he defiantly announced that he would not "resign, commit suicide, or leave the country."
He was overthrown on March 29, after being surrounded in the presidential offices at the Casa Rosada by a decision of Army Chief of Staff General Raúl Poggi. Frondizi was spirited to Martín García Island, a tiny exclave on the Río de la Plata, and subsequently to the Andes resort town of Bariloche, where he would spend the next year. His appointed successor, Senate President José María Guido, initially refused the dubious honor, citing loyalty to the president. He accepted, however, after a request he do so by Frondizi, himself.
The coup itself led to more rivalries within the military than it had calmed, and following a power struggle between Poggi and the hard-line Commander of the Cavalry Corps, General Enrique Rauch, the relatively moderate ("blue" faction) prevailed with the appointment of General Juan Carlos Onganía as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs; Onganía only narrowly avoided a takeover by the far-right, "red" faction of the military in the difficult subsequent months.
Read more about this topic: Arturo Frondizi
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