Operation Massacre (in Spanish Operación Masacre), is an Argentinian Non-Fiction novel written by Rodolfo Walsh and published in 1957. It's a novelization about a series of executions afterwards the Military Coup against Juan Perón. It's considered the first non-fiction novel in history, dating nine years prior to Truman Capote's In Cold Blood. The plot takes place one year after the Coup d'Etàt, when a counter strike against the Military government has failed, and the military forces seek possible civilian rebels. The novel is the story of one of the seven survivors. He tells about the executions of José León Suárez, where he and several other men were imprisoned and shot. This ended with the deaths of five men: Nicolás Carranza, Francisco Garibotti, Carlos Alberto Lizaso, Mario Brión and Vicente Damían Rodríguez, and seven survivors.
Tropes:
- Body Horror: Livraga was shot in the face, but he doesn't die. He never receives the Coup de Grâce. He was horrifingly disfigured in the process.
- Comic-Book Adaptation: By Francisco Solano Lopez, no less. Also, a Compressed Adaptation since the comic has less than 20 pages.
- Coup de Grâce: Partially straight, Di Chiano's survives because the killers make an exception for him.
- Final Solution: Against Peronism. Or trade unionism. Or communism. Or poor people.
- General Ripper: The military president, Aramburu, was obsessed with killing all of the Peronist militants, or anyone that threatened his government
- Sole Survivor: Partially true. First, Walsh contacts someone who he thinks is the only one, but after this, he discovers seven more.
- Military Coup: Against Perón, first, and later a failed one against the Military government. This is the trigger for the shootings.
- Realpolitik: Aramburu's right-wing government uses terror and cold-blooded civilian murders to enforce his power, "because the Peronism was a dictatorship".
- Laser-Guided Karma: Aramburu's real life death was a similar operation, as he was kidnapped and executed after a non-judicial trial by the leftist guerrilla Montoneros by his crimes. This book was part of the evidence that Montoneros quoted.
- Shadow Dictator: the Argentinian oligarchy was behind the coup.
- Ur-Example: It's the first Non-Fiction novel in history, as it's dated 1957. In Cold Blood from Truman Capote is from 1966, although the latter is often credited as the first one.
- Would Not Shoot a Civilian: Subverted. All shootings were against civilian targets.
