Former Argentine dictator Jorge Videla in 1979. An Argentine
court has convicted two of the nation’s former right-wing
dictators, Jorge Rafael Videla and Reynaldo Bignone, in a scheme
to murder leftist mothers and give their infants to military
personnel often complicit in the killings, a shocking process
known to the Reagan administration even as it worked closely
with the bloody regime.Testimony at the trial included a video
conference from Washington with Elliott Abrams, then-Secretary
of State for Latin American Affairs, who said he urged Bignone
to reveal the babies’ identities as Argentina began a transition
to democracy in 1983.Abrams said the Reagan administration “knew
that it wasn’t just one or two children,” indicating that U.S.
officials believed there was a high-level “plan because there
were many people who were being murdered or jailed.” Estimates
of the Argentines murdered in the so-called Dirty War range from
13,000 to about 30,000, with many victims “disappeared,” buried
in mass graves or du