Ler História 65 / December 2013
Dossier: THE PORTUGUESE ARMY STAFF CORPS: THE PEAK AND THE FALL
Luís Nuno Rodrigues
Presentation
Daniel Marcos
NATO and Army Staff Corps: implications for the officers' instruction
João Campos Neves
Refounding the Portuguese Army Staff Corps in the 20th century
Luís Nuno Rodrigues
Military officers and politics: «Abrilada 1961» and the resistance to the Estado Novo
Studies
Ana Isabel Buescu
The library of the Duke of Bragança, D. Teodósio (1510?-1563). A comparative approach
Célia Reis
Discussing India on the parliament. Economic and financial matters (1885-1910)
Diogo Campos Rodrigues
Maia Magalhães: a democratic military officer in the WWI and in the "Sidonismo" resistence
Fátima da Cruz Rodrigues
The demobilization of African soldiers in the Portuguese Armed Forces during the Portuguese Colonial War (1961-1974)
José D'Assunção Barros
Retrodiction – reconstructing historical time
Remembering
Carlos Maurício
A long thaw: the colonial war and the decolonization in Portuguese screens (1974-1994). An inventory
Reviews
Abstracts
Ler História 65 / December 2013
Daniel Marcos
The purpose of this paper is to analyse the way Portugal's participation in NATO contributed to the modernization of the Portuguese army staff's instruction. We particularly wish to understand if the participation in this international organization influenced the maintenance of a closed Army Staff Corp within the Portuguese Armed Forces. In the end, we wish to show that NATO was fundamental to modernize the Portuguese Army Staff instruction but it was not capable to overcome the existence of a closed Army Staff Corp, wish was seen as a true elite of the Portuguese Army.
keywords: NATO; Portugal; Army Staff Corp Instruction.
João Neves
This article is essentially about the refoundation of the Portuguese Army Staff Corps, 'body' of elite of the Portuguese Army, which existed since the 19th century and was refounded in 1937, during the period of political and ideological consolidation of the New State. I analyse the political and military fundaments of its reorganization as theoretical brain and 'body' of elite of the Army, as well as the relationship of power between Salazar and the military elite.
keywords: Army Staff Corps; Portuguese Army; Reorganization; Military Reformism.
Luís Nuno Rodrigues
This article focuses on the attempted coup d'État that took place in Portugal in April 1961. Some of the most relevant figures in the Portuguese military hierarchy and in the Army Staff Corps were involved in the conspiracy, including the minister of National Defense, General Botelho Moniz. This failed plot aimed at overthrowing not only the head of government, Oliveira Salazar, but also the President of the Republic, Américo Tomás. The attempted coup was called «Abrilada of 1961», and it was the last significant attempt at military intervention in Portuguese political life before 1974. This paper analyses the origins of the conspiracy, the national and international context in which it developed, its most relevant moments, the causes of its failure and the consequences for the Portuguese regime and its colonial policy.
Keywords: Abrilada 1961, Estado Novo; Army Staff Corps; Colonial Policy.
Ana Isabel Buescu
This paper deals with the rich library of D. Teodósio, duke of Bragança. We will analyse it under two points of view. The first one is its insertion within all the assets of the duke, known by the post-mortem inventory. The second one is the dimension of this library in comparison with other aristocratic and royal libraries of the time. We can conclude that, with the exception of the huge Fernando Colon's library, the duke's library was, no doubt, one of the biggest libraries of the Renaissance period.
Keywords: Inventories; Libraries; Duke D. Teodósio of Bragança.
Célia Reis
The colonial issues became central in the life of the Portuguese late nineteenth century and they were reflected in the Parliament, more with discussion then with decision. This article shows how the affairs of a distant colony, in space and the link to the metropolis, were equated in the «Câmara dos Deputados», what were the main aspects and the size they occupied. In this affairs we emphasize the end of the Treaty of India with its inherent changes as well as the railway of Mormugão.
Keywords: Colonies; India; Economics, Parliament.
Diogo Rodrigues
Biographical study of Maia Magalhães, that analyses his participation in the South Angolan Campaign and organization of the Portuguese Expeditionary Corps during the First World War and his subsequent involvement in the military movement that crushes the Sidonist Regime and the northern Monarchist Uprising. As member of the military elite linked to the Democratic Party (PRP), Maia Magalhães stands as a study object that allow us to comprehend networks of influence between the military and the political powers from 1916 to 1919, in Portugal. As sources, we highlight his private correspondence with his family.
Keywords: First World War; Portuguese Expeditionary Corps; South Angolan Campaign 1914; Democratic Party (PRP).
Fátima Rodrigues
In the wars that marked the last years of the Portuguese colonial presence in Africa, Portugal recruited more than 400 000 Africans for his Army. This article presents the results of a research that seeks to know how the situation of these combatants was considered at the war's end and how their countries of origin have welcomed them soon after their independence.
Keywords: Colonialism; Post-colonialisms; Colonial wars; Veterans.
José D'Assunção Barros
This article aims to reflect about the methodological problem of the historiographic retrodiction. It is discussed initially the question of the finalism in the teleological approach of History. In the sequence, it is examined the really question that involves this and other problems pertinent to the construction of the historiographic explanations: the retrodiction. After some theoric-methodological clarifications about the question, with historiographic examples, they are developed commentaries about two authors that have elaborated pioneering perceptions of this problem – Friedrich Nietzsche and Walter Benjamin. The article finalizes discussing the most recent developments of this question in historiography, covering authors such as Josep Fontana and Ranajit Guha.
Keywords: Retrodiction; Teleology; Historiography; Nietzsche; Walther Benjamin.
Carlos Maurício
In the last half-century, the construction of collective representations and images increasingly depends on cinema and television. Some theorists even argue the concept of «pictorial turn» is as important as the «linguistic turn» had been a few decades earlier. This inventory covers all narratives made for screen, released in Portugal between 1974 and 1994, having as their main theme the colonial war and/or decolonization.
Keywords: Colonial War; Decolonization; Social Representations; Memoirs.