by Luis Moreno Ocampo.
Translation by: Evan Fleischer.
Note: this is not an official translation.
October, 1984.
Seated before a small wooden desk, the guards would soon bring Jorge Rafael Videl into this room, and we hoped he would testify before the judges.
The courtroom of the Federal Chamber had a solemn mark to it — there were huge stained glass windows, and up above them, a crucifix. Though the room had all the trappings of a bank, it felt like a church. Beside me, Strassera smoked a cigarette, one without end. At another desk were two defenders. Counting police custody, we were no more than ten in a room that could only accommodate four.
A few days before, I had been appointed to assist Julio César Strassera as deputy prosecutor in the trial of the military juntas. It was the first time I went to work as a prosecutor and he would see personally to Videla. The different images I had of him, almost always in uniform, through the television broadcasts and all the newspapers dating back to the morning of March 24, 1976, when the deep voice of an announcer on national TV said that the Armed Forces had dismissed the president of Argentina, Isabel Martinez de Peron — that morning, while listening to the television, I saw through the window of my little apartment two ladies walking down the sidewalk, overwhelmed by the weight of their shopping bags full of food. It seemed to be a miserable attitude to stock food after a coup.
Looking back, I think I was trying to hide my sense of powerlessness.
Many things had happened between 1976 and 1984 to ensure that our paths would cross in the courtroom.
I wondered what Videla’s attitude would be before the judges. We knew that he would not testify, but we were still nervous. We were still tense. He entered in a gray suit, escorted by a deputy, walking a bit sideways, and greeted us in a very correct but noticeably nervous manner.
The name the Junta had baptized itself with was the “Process of National Reorganization.” Videla had occupied the position of President of the Nation for four years. In 1981, he had handed over power to then-General Viola — for the purpose of the movement that had led coup in 1976 was to perpetuate a civil-military party that would win the elections on that distant day when an election was called. 
From their point of view, after having won “the war against subversion,” it was necessary to “win the peace.” Find a formula for translating success into political repression: “encourage the pursuit of schools of thought to instill certain goals and achieve a desired inheritance.” This current of opinion, Videla declared in 1980, “should support a process such that there will never be an election of heads or tails, won’t be ‘Anti-Process,’ and won’t fail to achieve its goals.”
The foundation of their role was in “the triumph against subversion.” They believed that victory gave them a right, a historical role that they could project into politics.
Of course, this didn’t include investigating the ways by which they might become victorious. Then-General Viola had declared in 1980: “The armed forces will not support the review of the proceedings against terrorism. For our ethical concepts, allowing the prosecution to those who with honor and sacrifice have fought to restore peace to Argentina would constitute a betrayal and an affront … Argentina’s families’ pain can not be used to deform the reality of what happened and to serve as explanation for the inexplicable. “
