Operation Charly

Operation Charly (Spanish: Operación Charly), according to journalist María Seoane, was the alleged code-name of a right-wing covert operation to extend the illegal methods of repression used in the Dirty War in Argentina to Central America. The operation was either headed by the Argentine military with the agreement of the Pentagon, or was led by the US administration and used the Argentinians as a proxy. It lasted from 1977 to 1984. According to French journalist Marie-Monique Robin, these methods themselves had been taught to the Argentine military first by the French military, drawing on the experience of the 1957 Battle of Algiers, and then by their US counterparts.

Clarín newspaper journalist María Seoane states she has read released classified documents of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and interviewed Duane Clarridge, former CIA operative purportedly responsible for those operations. María Seoane states that with the election of President Jimmy Carter in 1977, the CIA was blocked from engaging in the special warfare it had previously delivered against opponents. In conformity with the National Security Doctrine, the Argentine militaries then did the work the most conservative North American elements wanted to achieve, while they pressured the United States to be more active in counter-revolutionary activities. María Seoane states that finally they submitted themselves to Washington's control following the access of Ronald Reagan to the presidency in 1981. María Seoane says that activities were taken up by the Pentagon following the defeat of the Argentine Armed Forces during the Falklands War (March–June 1982).