When Jacobo Timerman, an editor in Argentina, founded La Opinión, in 1971, he positioned the publication as a voice of reason in a polarized country. At the time, Argentina was entering a period of turmoil and upheaval. In 1973, Juan Domingo Perón, the country’s former president, returned from a long exile and was reelected. Timerman supported him. The following year, Perón died and was replaced by his wife, Isabel Martínez de Perón. The left rose up to oppose her; the country descended into chaos. In 1976, Jorge Rafael Videla, a lieutenant general, overthrew the government, which marked the beginning of a military junta and the onset of the Dirty War. Timerman covered the news in the pages of La Opinión, printing the names of desaparecidos—those “disappeared” by the brutal regime.
A lesson from the Vietnam War on the press, the military, and authority
The voice of journalism, since 1961
