Death Flights During The Dirty War in Argentina
According to the testimony of Adolfo Scilingo, convicted in Spain of crimes against humanity under the doctrine of universal jurisdiction in 2005, there were 180-200 death flights in the years 1977 and 1978; Scilingo confessed to participating in two such flights, with 13 and 17 people killed respectively.
As an added twist, victims were sometimes made to dance for joy in celebration of the freedom that they were told awaited them. In an earlier interview, in 1996, Scilingo said, "They were played lively music and made to dance for joy, because they were going to be transferred to the south. After that, they were told they had to be vaccinated due to the transfer, and they were injected with Pentothal. And shortly after, they became really drowsy, and from there we loaded them onto trucks and headed off for the airfield."
Scilingo says that the Argentine Navy is "still hiding what happened during the dirty war". In May 2010, Spain extradited to Argentina pilot Julio Alberto Poch. Poch, who was born in 1952, had been arrested in Valencia, Spain, on September 23, 2009 and was wanted in Argentina for his alleged participation as a pilot on the death flights. In December 2010 an Argentinean judge dismissed all charges against Poch for lack of evidence and ordered his release pending further investigation. In November 2011 the investigating magistrate indicted Poch for his role in the disappearance of 41 people, and ordered him held without bail.
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Famous quotes containing the words death, flights, dirty and/or war:
“No man may him hide
From Death hollow-eyed,”
—John Skelton (1460?–1529)
“Now cracks a noble heart. Good night, sweet prince,
And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest!”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“We’re headed for collapse, if you want my opinion, Missy. I can see it in the fallin’ off of the quality of vagrants. There was a time you could find real good company in almost any jungle you’d pick, men who could talk, men who’d read a book now and then; and now, what do you find, a lot of dirty little guttersnipes no decent tramp would want to associate with.
Well, it’s been that way all through history.”
—John Dos Passos (1896–1970)
“In time of war you know much more what children feel than in time of peace, not that children feel more but you have to know more about what they feel. In time of peace what children feel concerns the lives of children as children but in time of war there is a mingling there is not children’s lives and grown up lives there is just lives and so quite naturally you have to know what children feel.”
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946)