The appointment of Lieutenant General Carlos Alberto Presti as Minister of Defense —the first of his rank to hold the position since 1983— has revived in Argentina a reflexive machine that oscillates between traumatic memory and political hyper-vigilance. What stands out is not the debate itself, but its intensity: the reaction seems to suggest that the country is facing a historic turning point, when in reality it concerns the selection of an official for an area whose technical complexity usually requires an expertise that politics alone does not always provide.

In reality, the debates over the boundary between civilian and military authority are a classic of democratic theory. From Huntington to Janowitz, and through the comparative experiences of Turkey, Chile, or Indonesia, the issue lies not in the presence or absence of uniforms within the state structure, but rather in their effective subordination to civilian power, something that Argentina has consolidated for decades with a level of institutionalism that, paradoxically, seems forgotten amid the din of reactionary commentary.

The ongoing discussion has become more emotional than analytical, more liturgical than strategic. And when drama replaces reason, politics loses perspective.

The noise of symbols and the silence of facts

The public narrative has unleashed with the usual speed: statements, professional repudiators, maximalist theories about "democratic backsliding." However, Presti's appointment lacks any subterranean movement that suggests institutional deviations. No norms were violated. No chain of command was altered. No congressional competencies were usurped. No hint, even faint, points to an undue expansion of military power.

The reaction, more than an analysis of the present, seems to be a conditioned reflex.

Argentina carries a history where the Armed Forces were protagonists of the national tragedy. That past should never be archived. But it should not become a disabling prism that prevents evaluating the contemporary state based on what it does, not on what we fear it may do.

Argentinian politics sometimes functions as a resonance box that amplifies shadows until they become existential threats. It is an anthropological problem before it is institutional: the persistence of a political imagination built around trauma.

Presti as a symptom and not a cause

The figure of the new minister condenses elements that in any other country would awaken serious analysis, not automatic alarms: an extensive career, experience in international missions, diplomatic background, traditional doctrinal training, and a respected chain of command. All this can be discussed and even criticized, but it is hard to interpret it as a destabilizing factor.

The real crux of the matter is not Presti, but Argentine political genealogy, where the figure of the military has been encapsulated in a negative myth that inhibits any rational conversation.

The presence of an active military member in Defense does not "politicize" the Armed Forces. Nor does it magically bring them closer to power. It does not return them to 1976 nor does it permit them to intervene in institutional play. It simply places a professional with a record in an area where technique is not a marginal detail, but the very architecture of management.

If something is worrying, it should be something else: the inability to admit that, in democracy, mature institutions do not tremble before positions, but before practices. And there is no illegal, irregular, or anomalous practice here.

The geopolitics of fear: Argentina facing its own labyrinth

In a world characterized by global rearmament, open conflicts in Eurasia, and rising tensions on the strategic margins of the international system, the domestic discussion seems encapsulated in a temporal capsule. While middle powers and neighboring countries reform their defense structures to adapt to an increasingly volatile environment, Argentina continues to debate whether or not to allow a military professional, trained for decades to understand these scenarios, to occupy a ministerial seat.

Large global trends —the deterioration of the liberal order, technological expansion in the military field, the militarization of outer space, the regionalization of hybrid conflicts— require sophisticated debates, not Pavlovian reflexes.

The uncomfortable question is another:

Can a country that fears its Armed Forces design a defense policy moderately adequate for the 21st century?

Memory yes; paralysis no

Human rights organizations play a fundamental role in preserving memory and justice. But confusing that mission with the management of the present state is an error that immobilizes. Democratic institutions do not sustain themselves on perpetual suspicion, but on the ability to distinguish between past and present, between facts and evocations.

The country has robust civil control mechanisms, clear laws, parliamentary oversight, and a judiciary that has been exemplary at the global level in terms of crimes against humanity. None of this changes because of the figure of a minister.

Argentinian democracy today is infinitely stronger than its ghosts. The problem is that it does not always recognize that.

When fear is more political than institutional

The appointment of Presti does not inaugurate an era nor does it close any. It does not foresee coups nor suggest regressions. It is not a threat. It is simply an administrative decision within a functioning democratic system.

The epic of panic reveals more about Argentine political psychology than about the Armed Forces: a democratic identity persists, built from denial rather than self-confidence. Perhaps the question we should be asking is less dramatic and much more mature:

Will Argentina ever be able to discuss Defense without discussing phantasmagorias?

The future, if it wants to be one, demands institutional maturity. And that maturity starts by admitting something simple, almost obvious, yet surprisingly difficult to express:

there is no danger where there is only an official fulfilling a role for which he is prepared.

The rest is noise, and noise has never governed anything.