Word: stroessner
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South America's two biggest democracies, Argentina and Brazil, last week were courting South America's last dictator-General Alfredo Stroessner of cattle-raising Paraguay (pop. 1,700,000). In Stroessner's capital of Asuncion, Argentine delegations promised to expedite Paraguay shipping to Argentine ports on the lower Parana River, and planned joint harnessing of a waterfall. Brazil had a military, economic and cultural cooperation drive going. Its Foreign Minister, Horacio Lafer, calls Stroessner's regime "one of peace and progress...
...cordiality was not for love of Stroessner. It came, rather, from 1) the historic tug of influence by Argentina and Brazil over the landlocked neighbor between them, arid 2) a hardheaded decision by both against helping Fidel Castro-style rebels seize power in Paraguay...
German-descended Artillery Officer Stroessner, 47, grabbed power in Paraguay six years ago and has ruled since by blackjack and gun butt. With his powerful neighbors, his policy has been the historic Paraguayan strategy of playing one against the other. At first, Paraguay favored Brazil, but when Argentine Dictator Juan Perón in 1953 offered an "economic integration" treaty, Stroessner (then all-powerful army chief) gave preference to Argentina. Perón was toppled in 1955 (he took exile in Paraguay at first), and Argentina's succeeding revolutionary regime turned on a cold war. Stroessner promptly let himself...
...Paraguay, Dictator Alfredo Stroessner went through the motions of a congressional election, even asked his opposition to put up candidates, but the opposition gracefully declined and Stroessner swept the polls...
Paraguay's Congress voted 26 to 23 to condemn the "police methods." Stroessner, who had been watching the debate minute by minute, decided democracy had gone too far, ordered units of the cavalry into Asunción, clamped on a state of siege, and Paraguay's democratic interlude was all over...