ABSTRACT
The relationship with the Soviet Union has also had consequences for the Argentine domestic situation. The Soviet interest in obtaining Argentine agricultural products and the Argentine desire to sell its production sometimes outweighed the political aversion. Agreements on economic, transportation, and scientific-technical cooperation have contributed to a cementing of the bilateral ties. The overthrow of the Peronist government by the 1976 military coup allowed, after a period of reaccommodation, the expansion and diversification of the bilateral relations. The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the subsequent grain embargo decreed by the United States provided the opportunity for a dramatic expansion of the Argentine-Soviet trade. The Argentine refusal to join the grain embargo and the Malvinas crisis served to increase the tendency toward closer Argentine-Soviet ties. The discreet partnership between both countries is no longer a circumstantial variable of difficult interpretation but has become a constant in the field of contemporary international relations and will remain so for the foreseeable fixture.
