Uruguay changes history training of its military for “a broader and wider perspective”

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Professionals from various fields contributed to the new curriculum and helped to define the study of recent history for military training.

The subject “Military History” has emerged from this component. This program is to be modified. The concern arose from a survey of several units where officials noted the lack of knowledge about the country’s recent history.

IMES education system director Mario Moreira said that “the study plans at all levels of education, through certain goals and topics that seek to provide objective, broad and transversal information” are going to be modified. He added that “to this end, it must be considered that the curricula of any level of education system have a professional and an academic training component.”

Minister of Defense Javier Garcia announced in a military event last Tuesday about changes in the history curricula in Military School and in grade transition courses. There are 127 books and texts comprising the bibliography.

Army Commander-in-Chief Gerardo Fregossi explained that “historical events in the period spanning from 1958 to 2020 were analyzed in order to update the Military History syllabus (…) seeking to strengthen the knowledge of its members.” In addition, he stated that the plan is to provide “a broad, comprehensive, objective and plural view of events.”

The new documents, which review Uruguayan history between 1958 and 2020, will be sent to Parliament, García said.

He mentioned that the process was conducted “based on addressing it with neither dogmas nor prejudices. History is as it is, it is not as we would like it to have been,” and added: “The National Army, based on these presentations made today, has decided not to skip any chapter. However painful the chapters may be, they are part of history and Uruguay deserves to analyze it and the National Army’s future officers deserve to know it.”

The Minister conceded that “this was not a cycle or a process free of debates” and that its particularity is that it presented opinions and criticisms from compatriots in opposing positions.

For a year, the researchers in charge of developing the new program held meetings with different actors related to recent history. Among them were the three former presidents, Julio María Sanguinetti (Partido Colorado), Luis Alberto Lacalle Herrera (Partido Nacional) and José Mujica (Frente Amplio), and journalists and academics such as Ignacio Zuasnábar, Gerardo Caetano and Leonardo Haberkorn.

This process “was not done to please anyone. It was done because it was good (…) And, above all, it was good for us Uruguayans. And I am also grateful to the National Army for having led a process that contributed to the unity of Uruguayans,” García said.

Gerardo Fregossi clarified that the institution does not intend to erase the burden of knowledge on National History that students bring with them when entering the military education system.

However, within the institutes’ Military History program, an analysis of the performance of the force in the last conflict, “unfortunately developed between compatriots, was considered necessary, by incorporating elements for an overall analysis of the conflict, albeit focusing on the specifics of the military profession.”