Throughout the period 1946-1959 Argentine politicians made use of the scien-tific work being done by Argentine nationals in Antarctica, in order to support their claims to sovereignty in the Antarctic Peninsula. In the crudest form, politi-cians viewed scientists as effective occupiers of Antarctic territory: to boast of Argentine nationals living and working in the Antarctic Peninsula was to make a legal case for possession of the region. In a similar fashion, politicians used the fact that Argentine scientists were taking the trouble to conduct scientific re-search in such inhospitable surroundings as evidence of Argentina’s commit-ment to the region. This “difficulty” argucommit-ment was often loaded with racial under-tones, and the political rhetoric presented Antarctica as a proving ground for the Argentine criollo race. In a much more sophisticated fashion Argentine politi-cians actually built the results of scientific enquiry into their case for sovereignty.
For example, the Natural History Museum in La Plata displays fossils discov-ered in the Antarctica Peninsula alongside similar fossils discovdiscov-ered in Argen-tine Patagonia, putting the two together to make a case that the Peninsula
30 Instituto Antártico Argentino 1960.
region is a “natural” extension of Argentine territory. By the 1940s and 1950s, many of the scientific facts used by Argentine politicians to support their case – such as that of geological continuity – had already been established. But during this period there was an ongoing dialogue between politics and science, espe-cially as the IGY approached. Many Argentine scientists – just like their British and Chilean counterparts – attempted to give their research a political signifi-cance in order to win wider support for their work. Far from being neutral ideal-ists, Antarctic scientists often presented themselves as extremely committed to the political cause.
Juan Domingo Perón was the consummate political opportunist, and shortly after becoming President he came to see Antarctica as a cause that could rally the Argentine people around him. From the Argentine point of view, sovereignty in Antarctica was intimately connected to the question of the Islas Malvinasand their illegal occupation by the British. Claims against the British in Antarctica therefore created a form of “formal imperialism” upon Argentine territory, which neatly complemented Perón’s campaign against British “informal imperialism” in Argentina itself.31 In the first period of his Presidency, the role of the Navy in Antarctic affairs put Perón in an awkward situation: he could not overemphasize the Antarctic issue without giving implicit support to his internal enemies. But this did not stop Perón making use of Antarctic science and geography in his political rhetoric. Perón’s fullest expression of his Antarctic doctrine in this peri-od came in the intrperi-oduction to a booklet published in 1948 by the Comisión Na-cional del Antártico entitled Soberanía Argentina en La Antártida:
“The fundamental fact is that this region constitutes a natural geologi-cal prolongation of our territory, situated in the most southern part of our land and in the extreme south of America. Geographical and his-torical reasons add to our legal case for sovereignty.”32
Claims to sovereignty based upon proximity and geographical continuity meant that Argentina could not entirely deny Chile’s claims to Antarctic Sovereignty.
Indeed, so long as Argentina remained the senior partner, Perón’s position during this period was very much to work alongside the Chileans promoting the idea of Antártida Sudamerica against the pretensions of British imperialists.33 Following the First Scientific Expedition to Antarctica and the Creation of the Instituto Antártico Hernán Pujato, Perón found himself in a much better position to make political capital out of the Antarctic Sovereignty dispute. The period 1951-1955 saw a rapid increase in the use made of Antarctica and Argentine Antarctic Science in political rhetoric. The magazine Mundo Peronista provides an extreme example of Peronist propaganda. One article, entitled “For all the men of the world”, discusses Argentine scientific research into cosmic radia-tion.34 After explaining the great work that Argentine scientists were doing for the good of humanity, the article concludes that such research could only take place in Argentina because of its privileged geographical situation stretching from Salta in the north to the South Pole. Such rhetoric works at a number of
31 Hennessy and King 1992.
32 Comisión Nacional del Antártico 1948: 10.
33 Genest 2001.
34 Mundo Peronista 15 October 1951.
levels: the idea of Argentina justifying its sovereignty through conducting useful scientific research resonates with traditional utilitarian justifications of imperial-ism. Other articles were less subtle. On 15 May 1952 the Mundo Peronista pub-lished an article about Pujato’s establishment of the San Martín base with the headline “The Peronist example with the support of Perón and of his people.”
When asked about his most memorable moment in Antarctica, General Pujato recalls the Argentine elections of 1951 and states that all eight members of his expedition voted for Perón: “Eight creole hearts, eight creole votes!” Such blatant politicization of the Antarctic issue became all pervasive, and even entered school curricula and text books.35 During these years the political rhetoric around Antarctica was by no means confined to scientific interests, but politicians did not hesitate in using the work of Argentine scientists or their results when these suited their political purposes.
The overthrow of Perón in 1955 brought about a marked change in the political use of Argentine science. Whereas science had generally been only one part of Peronist political rhetoric concerning the Antarctic issue, in the period 1955 -1959 it became central. This shift occurred more because of the growing inter-national importance of Antarctica than because of internal changes in Argen-tina; although there was a generally acknowledged opening up of Argentine universities during this period that may well have had some impact. The im-portance of the International Geophysical Year (IGY) cannot be overstated.
From the mid 1950s scientific research became the currency of political debate in Antarctica: without a substantial scientific research program, a country lacked a voice in the political negotiations. Under the leadership of Panzarini the Ant-arctic Institute represented Argentina in the four conferences of coordination of the IGY, and participated in the formation of SCAR.36
In his article “Argentine Scientific Interests in Antarctica,” Panzarini concludes his discussion of Argentine Antarctic Science as follows:
“The geographical nearness, the historic tradition, the existing organiza-tion, the character of the interests in play, the clear understanding of the essence of each problem, the scientific and technical capacity of Argen-tina and the availability of the material and human resources, estab-lishes a harmonious combination of factors that constitutes a valuable inheritance and signals an unavoidable duty for the country, namely to undertake a high quality and intense scientific activity in Antarctica.”37
In this paragraph there is a sense that the rhetoric of Argentine Antarctic Sci-ence has gone full circle. Panzarini’s language sounds very similar to Perón’s case for Argentine sovereignty in Antarctica written eleven years earlier, which in turn mirrors the original language used by the Argentine Antarctic Commis-sion in their letter to the Foreign Ministry in 1940. Just as Moreno and his col-leagues used geology and geography to justify an Argentine interest in Antarc-tica, Panzarini is ostensibly making a case for scientific research rather than legal possession. In the context of 1959 the absence of any explicitly political rhetoric in Panzarini’s article is hardly surprising. The overlapping language of
35 Escudé 1992.
36 Comerci 1979.
37 Panzarini 1959.
science and politics suggests that the two elements have become profoundly connected, to the extent that even Panarinzi’s failure to mention political motiva-tions can be seen as being to some extent political. In the new language of the IGY, SCAR and the Antarctic Treaty negotiations, it was no longer politically expedient to mention politics.
5.6 Conclusion
At the Antarctic Treaty negotiations in Washington D. C. in 1959, Adolfo Scilingo, the head of the Argentine delegation, made a strong case against the proposed freedom of scientific investigation in Antarctica38. Argentina feared that absolute freedom to conduct scientific experiments would undermine its supposed sovereignty in the region. “Scientific” bases could be established wherever a country wanted, and could then easily be used for other, more hostile, activities. In the context of the Cold War, the Soviet Union, rather than Chile and Great Britain, aroused the greatest suspicion. Argentina, which had become adept at using science as a vehicle for political purposes, could recog-nize when others were doing the same. Although Argentina eventually gave some ground on Article 2 – the freedom of scientific investigation would remain as it had been during the IGY – in exchange for the proscription of nuclear activities in the continent, its initial opposition to such a clause clearly reveals the superficiality of any notion of “pure science”.
This paper has made two connected arguments. Firstly, throughout the period 1946-1959 the Antarctic sovereignty dispute between Argentina, Chile and Bri-tain provided the primary motivation for Argentine Antarctic Science. Secondly, although this international political motivation remained a constant, the nature of the connection between science and politics changed over time, due to both internal and external circumstances. The broad connection between politics and science was not unique to Argentina: every country that participated in the scientific activities of the IGY in Antarctica had political reasons for doing so.
However, the precise nature of this connection between science and politics in relation to Argentine Antarctic Science was unique, and this connection was always in flux. The political background to Argentine Antarctic Science does not detract from the quality of the science conducted, but it does explain the chang-ing patterns of Argentine scientific activity over this period.