PARAGUAY: Christmas Plot

"It's too hot for revolutions this time of year," President Alfredo Stroessner contentedly remarked in the flower of Paraguay's summer; moreover, it is bad form in Latin America to plot just before Christmas. But last week, disregarding both the heat and all considerations of good taste, Strongman Stroessner's enemies tried to throw him out.

The revolutionaries, led by Central Bank President Epifanio Mendez Fleitas, were all Paraguayan admirers of Argentina's fallen dictator, Juan Perón. At one time, Stroessner himself was chummy enough with Perón to put his picture and Perón's together on Paraguayan postage stamps. But of late Argentina's revolutionary government has been pressing for de-Peronization in Paraguay as well as at home. Argentine exports to Paraguay of vitally needed flour and other foods began to fall off significantly. A fortnight ago. Stroessner sent a top general to hold private talks with Argentina's new President Pedro Aramburu. Upon the general's return, Stroessner ran a quiet housecleaning and offered Mendez and his Peronista cohorts honorable ambassadorships in distant countries.

Mendez refused, hurried from Asuncion out to Campo Grande, Paraguay's biggest military base, and lined up an artillery regiment, two cavalry regiments, the capital's police force and an infantry battalion for the revolution. Stroessner hastily secured the loyalty of two cavalry regiments, the presidential guard battalion, an infantry regiment and Paraguay's two-gunboat navy. Politicos of the dominant Colorado party, who have developed a phenomenal sensitivity for this sort of thing, carefully studied the lineups and threw in with Stroessner. Without a shot having been fired, Mendez conceded, at least for the moment. The crowds in the streets of Asuncion went happily back to their Christmas shopping.