elections behind him, Argentina s President Juan Peron is now turning his attention to the left-wing opposition to his regime.
On 15 June we warned in Red Weekly that the new Peronist Government would not be prepared to tolerate any opposition currents outside its ranks, Sure enough, one of the first acts of the new President was to ban the Revolutionary Army of the People (ERP) the largest armed revolutionary organisation in the country.
On Tuesday, 25 September -the day following the banning of the ERP-Jose Rucci, general secretary of the Peronist trade union federation, the CCT, was assassinated outside his home. The Chief of Police claimed to have received a phone youth the day after Rucei's death. It seemed call accepting responsibility on behalf of the ERP-22 (a split from the ERP, pro-Peronist and rather matterist in out ooki At once the Peronists took this up, proclaiming "We are at war with the ERP", as they had done after the shooting at Exeiza on Peron's return to the country (the ERP then turned out to have had nothing to do with it).
As before, however, this story oould not stick. Journalists were sceptical about this claim from the beginning. because it was not customary for the armed groups to claim responsibility in this way. As one of them argued in Le Monde of 28 September: "The possibility of a simple settling of accounts between leaders of the left and the right within the CGT & not excluded. Numerous left-wing Peronists were hostile to Jose Rucci, whom they condemned because of his contacts with the military before the return of Peron. These are the same left currents who, last May, assassinated another Peronist trade unionist, Dick Kloosterman, an important leader in the metal industry.
This theory was given strong support by the clear that despite their public attacks on the ERP the right-wing Peronists knew better, and were unable to restrain some of their number from secking revenge in a more likely quarter. There is no reason whatsoever to doubt the ERP's statement denying their involvement in the Rucci killing. (Except, of course, for this country's self-proclaimed Trotskyist daily Workers' Press, who are able to print the ERP denial one day and a slanderous article the next-by the same author -joining hands with Argentina's reactionaries to try and pin the blame on the ERP: in the price they set for such treachery to the revolutionary movement they outdo even Judas, selling themselves for the price of a few phony polemical barbs to hurl at the IMG and the Fourth International.)
The events surrounding the Rucci killing serve Rucci (left) campaigning with Peron and his wife Isabelita to underline the danger in which the revolutionary lelt in Argentina finds itself. The consolidation of the Peronist regime can only take place on the backs of the working class, hut an Important part of the Peronist movement's support comes from exactly this source. That is why it is necessary for Peron to cradicate all forces that could offer an alternative way forward for the working class: starting with those who have remained outside the Peronist movement and then turning to the left-wing opposition within his own ranks.
The recent Chilean experience offers many lessons for revolutionaries in Argentina. On the one hand, we have scen the tremendous possibilities that exist in a period of mass upsurge to develop the independent activity and organisation of the masses, on the other band the weakness of such activity in the face of the capitalist state if the people are not fully prepared for armed struggle. The armed organisations of the Argentinian revolutionary vanguard are very precious acquisitions that must be maintained at all costs. They are the reservoir of the training, experience and equipment which will be necessary to prepare the mass movement for But the revolutionary groups cannot carry out this task simply by maintaining or extending their armed apparatuses. Alongside this work they must launch political initiatives to develop the independent mobilisation of the masses and break the Peronist strangle-hold, They must not only urm themselves, but convince the masses of the need for self-defence and, when the time is appropriate, arm the masses for this job.
In the long run, only a Leninist, revolutionary parly can tie together the essential tasks of mobilising the anti-capitalist political potential of the mass movement which the victory of Peron has set in motion, and equipping that mass movement for civil war -the only road to proletarian power.
BRIAN SLOCOCK